Peeping Tom

 SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed.

Peeping Tom (1960) came out the same year as Psycho, and both films show up in Roger Ebert’s book, The Great Movies. They are both daring artistic psychological works that explore homicidal behavior linked to parent-child dysfunction. They also implicate the audience in wishing to participate in the main character’s perversion through voyeurism. Peeping Tom is even more focused on the connection between filmmaking and watching the private and sometimes gruesome experiences of others.

The first images of the film are of a target with arrows shot at a bull’s eye. We immediately have a weapon present and a phallic symbol in the form of the arrow that penetrates and, in this case, is also linked to danger. We then see a human eye (remember Janet Leigh’s dead accusing look at Hitchcock’s audience), which adds to the theme of voyeurism, amplified by the man who is secretly filming a woman in front of a shop window. The sexual aspect is evident when she announces her price, which reveals her to be a prostitute. He follows her to her place, and we see things through the viewfinder of the camera which stands in for the view of the predator (not the first time we see events from the killer’s perspective and certainly not the last in films). We hear the sound of a knife (the same phallic weapon that Norman Bates uses) being unsheathed and then witness the horror of the woman as she is attacked.

The killer is Mark Lewis (Carl Boehm), and he returns to the scene of his crime, filming the aftermath, pretending to be a photojournalist. He records his excursion (he later says he is making a documentary) into this dark realm of fear as the police are there, removing the victim from her home, appropriately covered in a red blanket. He works at a store that contains adult material where he photographs young women in sexy outfits. He repeats what the proprietor has told him that magazines that sell are “those with girls on the front covers, and no front covers on the girls.” So, voyeurism is a business that is profitable, and part of society, although people may not want to acknowledge its presence. Thus, a customer receives his nudie pictures in an envelope marked “educational material.”

When Mark goes into a backroom to do his work one of the models says that her fiancé caught her with another man, and she tells Mark to make sure that her bruises don’t show in the photos. The film shows the seedy side of life and how we try to cover it up, which is what the mainstream movie industry has done in its past. When he takes a while to take her picture, the model, Milly (Pamela Green) asks if he has a girlfriend hidden under the camera’s drape. She is kidding, but she is correct because Mark’s lover is the camera, and his intimacy presents itself in a voyeuristic fashion.

The other model we see only in profile at first. She looks lovely, but then she turns to face Mark and reveals a facial deformity on her right side. She wants the disfigurement to stay hidden, but Mark takes out his own camera and says he wants to shoot her as she is. He does not shrink from the unpleasant side of things. The film may be saying we may kid ourselves that life is not tainted, but that is not reality.

The next scene is at Helen Stephens’s (Anna Massey) apartment where she is celebrating her twenty-first birthday with other tenants. She is attractive and one would think innocent, although her blind mother (Maxine Audley) grunts when a guest expresses a compliment about Helen. Those present see Mark peering in from outside a window. He looks like, well, a Peeping Tom. The lattice work of the window looks like a viewfinder, adding to the connection between film, Mark, and us. Mark lives upstairs, and Helen greets him in the hall, inviting in the outsider, but he declines.

Later there is a knock at Mark’s door, and he immediately does what we all do, try to make the place look presentable, not wanting others to see that we don’t live in a messy home. Only Mark’s dirtiness includes his tapes of his sordid activities. He’s an extreme extension of everyday people. Helen is bringing him a piece of cake. He is awkward with others because of his anti-social personality. He reveals that he has lived in that building his whole life. He inherited it from his father, so, he is the landlord, although nobody knows this fact. As the model Milly noted, he is a puzzle. He seems so shy and gentle on the surface (like Norman Bates, whose name sounds like “normal”). He asks if the rent is too high and is willing to lower it. When she says not to tell the others that he is willing to lower the cost, she says the renters will give him no “peace.” He repeats the word, as if not knowing what it means, implying he has had none.

He admits that he works in photography and hopes to direct a film (director Michael Powell possibly making the link between voyeurism and filmmaking. Mark even has a director’s chair). Helen is perceptive since she must have heard his projector as she asks if he was watching a movie reel. He admits that he was, and she asks if it was his own work. She asks to see it, as a sort of birthday gift. He seems willing to let her view his work and maybe feels that he has found someone with whom he can share his secrets. He lets her see his dark room that she admits is huge. The size suggests that there is a vast subconscious, shadowy world below the surface of Mark’s outwardly benign appearance. She stumbles there, implying that the underside of the human psyche can be scary.

He almost shows her what he was looking at, the removal of the girl he murdered, but he decides not to be that open with her. He instead displays a film of himself as a child, which his father, a scientist, took. The implication is that his father was the influence on Mark’s interest in photography, which is confirmed when there is a scene of his father giving him a camera, the one he still has. The home movie shows how his father experimented on him to see his reaction to fear. He would shine a bright light into young Mark’s eyes which caused him to cry. He dropped a lizard in his bed to frighten him. He also filmed the child looking at two lovers kissing and embracing in the park. He also documented Mark’s reaction to his dead mother and her burial. Helen is obviously upset by these images. Mark now wants to record Helen as she looks at the home movie. His father taught Mark to live life through observing and recording people in distress, and it’s as if Mark is continuing his parent’s scientific studies. Director Powell’s camera shows Mark looking through the turning reel of the film, stressing how he is tied to seeing life through the camera.

As Helen questions him about what this all means, Mark strokes the camera, a masturbatory action again linking how he can only get excited by way of his voyeurism. There is the image of Mark’s young stepmother coming out of the water on the beach, scantily clad in a two-piece swimsuit. We have arousal in an inappropriate way displayed here by means of observation. He calls her the “successor,” as if this woman dethroned the queen in Mark’s life only six weeks after his mother passed away.

After Helen sees how disturbed Mark is, she tells him to turn off the camera. She moves him away from the dark room, as if she is getting him out of his dark state of mind, into the lit outer room, where she wants to shed light on what she saw. Mark tells her his father was a biologist and wanted to know how fear registered on the nervous system, especially with children. We see volumes of his father’s books on the topic. Mark says he had no privacy since his father was always filming him. Thus, he has no problem invading the privacy of others based on his upbringing. Mark seems to rationalize that his father learned from him, and some benefitted from his father’s work. However, Helen doesn’t buy the excuse.

There is then a quick cut to a film set (called The Walls are Closing In, a foreshadowing) where Mark works, but the impression is that we have stepped out of the story and are witnessing the filming of the movie we are watching. It is a deliberate attempt to link imaginary reel life with actual reality. There is a discussion of whether a movie is commercial enough to be made, which fits the making of this controversial work we are watching. There was a criticism of Powell using himself and his son for the characters of young Mark and his father given the disturbing material of the story. The movie takes the joining of fictional and actual characters to a daring level.

The stand-in actress in the movie Mark is working on, Vivian (Moira Shearer), is supposed to have a secret meeting with Mark about her dancing after the end of the workday. She stays behind to meet him after the set shuts down, but she encounters a dark studio (like Mark’s dark room?). Then spotlights turn on her just the way Mark’s father used bright lights on Mark. He has the place set up with props and marks like a director. He tells Vivian that they will be doing a shoot, which allows him to present the guise of a film piece to manipulate her. He says he wants her to play frightened, which ironically, she says she doesn’t feel afraid. He tells her to imagine that someone is approaching her to kill her, which is what he is actually doing. He agrees that the killer is a madman, and says, “but he knows it, and you don’t.” Mark here seems to realize his mental illness but can’t stop his pathology. He removes the cover at the end of the camera tripod revealing a knife attached to the end. He then records Vivian’s fear as he moves forward amid her screams and kills her. The image of the lethal tripod leg merges Mark’s voyeurism with that of the audience as we vicariously participate with the character in this crime, linking us with Mark’s perversion. Just like Norman Bates, the knife becomes a demonic form of sexual deviance, used for penetration that also destroys.

Mrs. Stephens is a despondent woman who drinks alcohol to excess. However, even though she is blind she senses the suspicious nature of the photographer living upstairs. She says, “I don’t trust a man who walks quietly,” and that his footsteps are “stealthy.” She does condone Helen visiting him. Mark gives her a pin and when she moves the placement of where she might affix the gift, Mark moves his hands to the same places on his upper body. Ebert says Mark here becomes a camera himself, recording what he sees through his own lenses. Again, he seems to only exist by way of what he observes. She tells him she is a librarian working in the children’s section of the library and has had short stories published. She recently had a book accepted about a magical camera and wants him to help her add photos as part of her story. He is thrilled but adds a chilling note that sometimes he photographs some things for no charge. The contrast of the innocence of children and Mark’s dark side is implied here.

While shooting on the movie set, an actor must move a trunk, which is especially heavy. We realize from the deadly encounter with Mark that Vivian’s body is in the trunk, which is discovered in short order. The police, who are also investigating the prior murder of the prostitute, notice the same look of terror on the body of Vivian as they saw on the hooker. As they interview those involved with the making of the film, Mark photographs the proceedings. Mark talks with a fellow worker and says that he is filming the police as part of his “documentary.” The other man jokingly questions whether they will catch Mark recording them. He answers in the affirmative, but he is talking about arresting him for the killings. It implies that he feels that he will be apprehended eventually. When the man asks jokingly if he is crazy, Mark says, “Yes. Do you think they’ll notice?” He is admitting to his deranged mental state, but he is cloaking it in a humorous exchange.

Chief Inspector Gregg (Jack Watson) interviews Mark, who offers his camera as a way, most likely, to show that he is cooperating with the police as to any filming that may prove useful to the investigation. But he constantly reaches out for it during the scene, like a man reaching for his lover, or even a part of himself. Mark photographs the removal of the body from the rafters. As he leans over, objects fall out of his pocket, but he is not discovered, at least not yet. All the above takes place on the movie set, sealing the emotional connection between the fictitious moviemaking and actual events.

The sightless Mrs. Stephens again shows her perceptive abilities as she can feel Mark looking in on them again through the window. She jokingly says, “Why don’t we make a present of that window?” When she shakes his hand she says that he has been running. He says he was hurrying to see Helen, but we know he was escaping the movie studio. Mrs. Stephens asks Mark about the dead actress, but he claims he didn’t know her. The look on his face shows that he registers the mother’s suspicious nature.

On their way to dinner, Helen suggests that Mark doesn’t need to take his always-present camera with him that night. He is defensive at first, but admits that he trusts Helen, and they lock it in what was once Mark’s mother’s room. Mark seems genuinely happy to be with Helen. But, as they head out, he sees a couple kissing, and he instinctively reaches for where his camera would be slung over his shoulder, ready to capture the passion between the man and woman vicariously.

They have a nice evening, but their joy is intercut with the timer ticking away to clock his developing film. The image suggests that the movie we are watching is counting downward, and possibly that Mark’s time is growing short. It may also mean that despite Mark’s attempt to escape his obsession, it is always in the background. When Helen retrieves his camera, she points at herself and wonders how it would photograph her. Mark grabs it out of her hands, repressing the thought of filming her murder. He says he will not film her because, “whatever I photograph I always lose.” How true when it comes to ending a person’s life. She kisses him goodnight, but he doesn’t respond with any passion. After she leaves, he kisses the lens of the camera, emphasizing his displaced, detached emotional personality that can only become involved at a distance.

While looking at the film he made of Vivian, Mrs. Stephens surprises him. This is a fascinating scene. We have a blind woman at home in the photographer’s dark room. She has heard him every night running his camera. She can keep him at bay with her pointy cane, a version of his knife-like tripod. He is on the defensive here at first. She asks what he is looking at and says he can lie to her, but he perceives her intuition and knows she would know the truth. Vivian’s projected image is partially on the screen and also on his back, visually implicating him in her fear. The film ends and he lunges toward the white film screen, arms raised. It appears as if he has been crucified by his own obsession. He says that the light ends too quickly, and he needs a new opportunity. He is talking about what he has filmed but what his words imply is that he feels compelled to seek another victim. It appears it is going to be the mother. However, Mark relents. The two continue to speak in a code as if they are talking about film. But what Mrs. Stephens says is that he needs to seek help and doesn’t want him to see her daughter until he does. He says he will never “photograph” Helen, which means he would not harm her. She says they would move away if he became a threat to Helen. He escorts her back to her place, and she warns him that he will have to tell someone about his problem, a confession really, and the implication is that it will either be a psychiatrist or the police.

Back on the movie set, there is a psychiatrist there to aid the traumatized lead actress. Taking Mrs. Stephens’ advice, Mark asks the shrink, who knew about Mark’s father, if he had insight on someone being a “Peeping Tom.” The technical term is scopophilia according to the psychiatrist. Mark is hopeful, symbolized by his raising the stage elevator as he talks to the psychiatrist. When he hears that it would take a few years of continuous analysis to cure, Mark becomes despondent, as he lowers the lift appropriately. The Chief Inspector is on the set and the psychiatrist mentions to him that Mark was asking about voyeurism, which piques the policeman’s interest. The fellow worker he spoke to before gives Mark a photo of a beautiful woman, which Mark says gives him “an idea.” He then speaks to the man who employs him to shoot sexy photographs. The audience may suspect that he may make one of the models his next victim.

The police are now following Mark as he goes to the store to photograph Millie. Mark realizes he is being tailed and it appears that he films the model, then leaves the store, locking up the place. Meanwhile, Helen seeks out Mark, who is not back yet. She turns on one of his cameras, and we see only her response. Her face goes from being in the light to being hidden in darkness, which reflects what she is witnessing. She gasps and whimpers, seeking escape from the room as she realizes the horror of what she is looking at. Mark shows up and she wants to know if the film she watched was just from his “magic” camera, creating an illusion. But he confesses that he killed the women. He tells her that she should stay in the shadows because if he can’t see her fear, she will be safe. How much his father warped Mark is very evident here.

The store proprietor informs the police that he found Milly’s body. So, Mark is allowing himself to get caught. He is driven to commit his crimes, but he is also a sympathetic character because he realizes his mental illness and wants to end his lethal actions. He reveals to her that his father had the whole house wired for sound. and he plays back his screams that his father recorded. She sees his torment and wants to understand what he actually did. He tells her he let his victims see their fear being recorded in a distorted reflection as the tripod knife penetrated their throats. He acts out but does not consummate the crime with Helen. He records his own fear, as his father once did, as he kills himself with his own weapon. The police burst in right after his suicide as a film reel stops rolling, reflecting the end of the movie.

The film has shown us that we are getting our thrills by also being Peeping Toms. At the end of the movie, we hear Mark’s father saying to his young son that there’s nothing to be afraid of. Despite the fact that we are watching a piece of fiction, our fear is real.

The Prestige

 SPOILER ALERT! The plot will be discussed.

Director/writer Christopher Nolan has given us complex films (Memento, Inception, Interstellar). Here he uses the story of competing magicians in The Prestige (2006) to explore what defines one’s identity. He also uses the performers as a metaphorical vehicle to explore the magic of filmmaking, which is also an illusory art, and how far some may go to succeed in the creative process to achieve recognition, or “prestige.”

The story takes place in 19^th century England and begins with Cutter (Michael Caine) doing a voice-over that describes the three parts of a magic trick. The “pledge” introduces something ordinary. In Nolan’s case, where nothing is ordinary, he presents some intriguing events that will be explored later but for now sets us up for what is happening in the present. The “pledge” is followed by the “turn,” which is a special action, like making something disappear. Cutter says the audience wants to know how the magician did that exceptional move, but “You don’t really want to know. You want to be fooled.” Cutter is talking about the willing suspension of disbelief, which is necessary to buy into stories, and which the filmmaker depends upon. The third part of the trick is the “prestige,” which, through a surprising act uses the “magic” to return things to the way they were before the start of the trick.

Nolan actually subverts these parts. His opening gives us intriguing shots he will expand upon later to lead us up to the present, which is one of three timelines in the film. The first image is of something common, a top hat, but there is a field filled with them, making it unusual. As Cutter speaks he is telling the parts of a trick to a little girl, Jess (Samantha Mahurin), which we later discover is the child of magician Alfred Borden (Christian Bale), and this scene will reappear at the end of the movie. There are shots of the other magician, Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) performing his transporter trick on stage amid electrical discharges from a machine. There is a worker there who is blind – a clue. He drops through a trapdoor into a tank of water which the astounded Borden witnesses.

Nolan then transports us to a courtroom where Borden is on trial for the murder of Angier. The depiction of current events is the first timeline. Cutter, Angier’s magic trick engineer, is testifying, saying Borden placed the tank under the trapdoor to drown his competitor. Cutter is not willing to reveal the details of the “transported man” trick Angier was performing at the time of his death since it is very sought after and knowledge of the trick would render the act worthless. He reveals to the judge in private that a “wizard” invented the electrical machine which was not an illusion, but did what it appeared to do. This statement is a half-truth, as we discover, and fits in with the theme of illusion versus reality in the story. He tells the judge that magicians dress up “plain” and “sometimes brutal truths.” Like most artists, they present truth clothed in fiction. He says that the water tank joined the two men in an awful way, which we later learn.

Owens (Roger Rees), a lawyer, visits Borden in jail. He says he represents Lord Caldlow who wants to buy Borden’s version of the “transported man,” and has already purchased all of Angier’s belongings. Borden refuses, and Owens uses Jess’s fate as leverage, saying Caldlow will intervene to save her from becoming an orphan in a workhouse. He also gives Borden Angier’s diary which relates his attempt to find out about Borden’s transporting trick. Later, Fallon, Borden’s engineer, nods his confirmation that the state will put Jess in an orphan work program after Borden is hanged. Borden tells Fallon to get in touch with the lawyer, Owens, that he has reconsidered selling him his transported man trick. He hasn’t lost his skill despite the finger loss as he fools a nasty guard by securing the man in a leg chain.

The contents of the diary are the second timeline in the film. The diary tells of Angier trying to decode Borden’s notebook (we later learn how he acquired it), which needs a five-letter encrypted word reveal Borden’s illusions. Angier travels to Colorado to meet the now-renowned Tesla (David Bowie) who Angier believes helped Borden do his famous trick. (Angier is limping, and we learn of the injury further on. He also wears a hat like those in the first shot. More of Nolan’s teasers). Angier is already a known magician under the name The Great Danton. The question of what is one’s true identity enters here, as we see later that disguises are used in various ways to trick others, and of course the audience, which is part of showmanship.

As Angier reads Borden’s notebook (which is a story within a story), the movie presents the third timeline. It relates how Angier and Borden in the past worked for magician Milton (Ricky Jay), along with Cutter. Angier and Borden pretended to be members of the audience and tied the wrists and feet of Julia (Piper Parabo) in a water-escape trick (we have an echo here of Angier drowning in the water tank in the first montage). Angier kisses Julia’s leg while he puts rope around it, and Cutter divulges their relationship when he says Angier could be seen kissing his “wife.” Borden complains that Milton’s act is boring, and he thinks there should be more risky tricks like the bullet-catching bit. Cutter says that an audience member could substitute a button instead of the blank and kill someone. He also warns Borden about the type of knot that Borden uses on Julia’s wrists, which may look better but is difficult to slip off. (There is a foreshadowing here).

Cutter tests the men’s magical insight by sending them to see a Chinese magician make a large fishbowl with water and a fish appear from behind a scarf. Borden says the magician held it between his legs under his robes. He walks in a halting manner in real life to hide his deception. Again, what appears on the surface is not a true picture. Borden says the real trick is his daily performance, pretending to be handicapped. It is the Chinese magician’s devotion to his craft that Borden admires. Nolan could be saying the same about any artist committed to his craft.

Angier can barely hold the fishbowl without water, and marvels as to how the Chinese magician lives his act, pretending to be a cripple. Angier has his own secret, which we get a hint of when he says he uses a fake name so his family will not know he is trying to be an entertainer. The implication is that he comes from a prestigious family who would not cherish him trying to earn a magician’s prestige. The film stresses deception in art and in life, and how they merge.

Borden reads in Angier’s diary about how Borden requires self-sacrifice in magic and comments about how Borden doesn’t understand that extreme level of sacrifice that he has undergone. We see Angier looking at a cameo of Julia when we hear these words. (Of course, Borden can’t see this fact by reading. It takes Nolan to manifest the narrative visually). The story eventually shows us why Angier speaks of personal loss.

There is a scene where Milton takes the ordinary, a bird in a cage, and slams down on it while it is covered with a drape. The cage disappears (the “turn”). He then supposedly brings back the bird from under a handkerchief (the “prestige”). A boy in the audience cries, perceiving that the original bird was killed and another took its place. His insight is confirmed by Borden disposing of the dead bird in the collapsed cage hidden in the table, while other birds in the back room await their fate. We have here a foreshadowing of Angier’s ultimate trick (which was implied by the opening scene of the film showing the numerous hats). Borden later tells the boy that “the secret impresses no one. The trick you use it for is everything.” The suggestion is the way one uses the mystery is what’s important. Again, the same can be said of filmmaking.

Borden and the boy’s aunt, Sarah (Rebecca Hill), begin a relationship (which eventually mirrors to some degree that of Angier and Julia, as the story revolves around itself). When he walks her home, she says she can’t invite him in just then. He seems to leave, but then is inside her place asking her about what she wants in her tea. Is he that good a magician, doing his transporting man trick, or is there something else going on?

At the next performance of the water tank escape, Julia gives Borden a nod and he proceeds with tying the rope around her wrists. However, she can’t slip the bonds and she drowns. The implication is that one can go too far in one’s passion and the result is collateral damage to others. The personal loss Angier noted in his diary is obvious now, and he becomes devastated and full of wrath because of Julia’s death. Borden infuriates Angier even more by saying he doesn’t know which type of knot he used.

With the death of Julia, Milton’s career is over, Borden and Angier go off to establish their own careers. Sarah meets the bearded and bespectacled Fallon. Sarah informs Borden that she is going to have a baby. He says he loves her, but she says, “not today.” She explains that “maybe today you’re more in love with magic.” Sarah seems okay with sharing Borden with his other passion, at least for now.  

Angier continues to read Borden’s notebook. He relates performing in front of a disapproving crowd. Although Borden has great tricks, he is not a showman and does not wrap the magic in an intriguing way. He gains the audience’s attention by starting the bullet-catching trick. Angier shows up in disguise and volunteers to be the shooter. He adds his own round of ammunition to the pistol and demands to know what knot did Borden tie around Julia’s hands. Again, Borden says he doesn’t know. Angier fires the pistol and maims Borden, blowing off the ends of two fingers. Borden’s words reiterate that he agonizes over what knot he tied. Angier is outraged that Borden could not know, since the man was an accomplished magician. The suggestion is that Borden may be working on an unconscious level at times, not sure what is real and what is an illusion, since his magic is so real to him because he lives it, like the Chinese magician.

Angier’s diary recounts how he hooked up with Cutter who couldn’t find work after Julia’s death. They also hired an attractive assistant, Olivia (Scarlett Johansson), whose beauty Cutter said is an effective distraction, which adds to the audience not really wanting to know what is truly happening.

Angier doesn’t want to kill birds when doing the disappearing cage trick. Cutter lectures him, saying he is not a “wizard,” and he must get his “hands dirty,” if he wants to be successful. We again have the theme of how far an artist must go to perfect his work. However, Cutter invented a contraption that collapses the cage while sparing the bird. They get a gig working for Merrit (William Morgan Shepphard). Angier attempts to do the disappearing bird trick. But a disguised Borden seeks revenge and acts as a volunteer from the audience. By mimicking Angier’s attack on himself, he sabotages the trick, killing the dove and breaking the female volunteer’s fingers. Angier’s hands have now been dirtied. Merrit terminated their run, and Angier must come up with a show-stopping performance to redeem his reputation.

By reading Borden’s diary, Angier believes that his antagonist acquired a machine from Tesla to perform his incredible trick, and he asks Alley (Andy Serkis), Tesla’s assistant, a second time to meet Tesla. Alley shows how Tesla can turn on lights without wires. Angier sees how science is magical without tricks. He goes to an alternating current demonstration where Alley argues against Edison’s attempts to “Smear” Tesla’s works (the rivalry was real). The electrical discharges jumping from conductor to conductor frighten the audience, as if they are seeing the power of a god. Angier follows Borden who also attended the demonstration. Angier’s diary says he was envious of seeing Borden with his wife and child, but he also knew that Borden tormented his family with his obsession over his magic. In a way, Borden has a split personality according to Angier. We discover that he is not far from the truth.

By this time, Olivia and Angier have become involved romantically. In Angier’s diary we learn that, in disguise, he witnesses Borden premier his “Transported Man” trick. He goes in one door of a closet at one end of the stage and comes out another door at the other end of the stage in the time it takes to bounce a rubber ball on the raised platform. Cutter says he is using a double, but Olivia noted a gloved hand on the man occupying each closet, revealing the lost fingers. Angier says he will get even with Borden by stealing his trick.

Cutter says the only way they can duplicate Borden’s act is to find a double for Angier, which they do. He is Gerald Root (also played by Jackman). He is a drunken, out-of-work actor. He says to Angier, “Did you think you were unique, Mr. Angier? I’ve been Caesar. I’ve played Faust. How hard could it possibly be to play the Great Danton?” Root as an actor assumes other identities, false fronts, to present the illusion that he is someone else. A performance in its own way is a sham to temporarily convince the audience that what they are seeing is real. Nolan is stressing the illusion versus reality aspect of the performing arts.

Angier’s team dresses up the trick and call it “The New Transported Man.” Instead of a closet they have just two door frames. But there are trapdoors at the thresholds. Angier must be the first man as he has the ability to dramatically introduce the act. Behind the open door he falls through the trapdoor onto padding below. Root emerges at the other end. He overacts his part, and even kisses Olivia. Angier is not able to experience the adulation of the crowd, and enjoy the “prestige,” since he is below the stage. They must keep Root under wraps because if he surfaces and is recognized as working for Angier, the illusion is destroyed. Angier’s life is copying that of Borden, and the two stories begin to blur together as the story unfolds.

Angier is obsessed with learning how Borden does his trick without a double so he can be the one on the stage accepting the audience’s adoration. He sends Olivia to work for Borden as a spy, but she is to tell him the truth, that Angier sent her to discover Borden’s secret of the Transported Man. Angier assumes Borden will want her as a counterspy to access Angier’s secrets. Even though Angier has become very successful, Borden’s keen eye can tell that his double is overweight and drunk. Olivia tells Borden that she is sick of Angier’s obsession with Borden, which turns out not to be too far from the truth.

Angier reads in Borden’s diary that Borden found Root and convinced him that he had the power in the act. Root then acts to subvert the performance unless he gets more money and control. Borden sabotages the act eventually by removing the padding under the trapdoor and Angier injures his leg when he falls through during one performance (remember his limp at the beginning of the film?). Instead of Root appearing through the door, it is Borden, and he tied up Root and has him descend from the ceiling with a sign that says he is Borden’s opening act. Borden has spruced up his performance by adding some of Tesla’s electronics and has Olivia for effect.

Cutter wonders if Olivia is now working for Borden since he discovered Root. It becomes very difficult to know what is a lie and what is the truth. Angier confronts Olivia with his suspicions. She says Borden uses a double since she has seen wigs, glasses and makeup about. Angier dismisses her impression, saying it’s misdirection, because Borden lives his act, the way the Chinese magician did. But sometimes the overly suspicious can no longer accept what is obviously true. Olivia gives him Borden’s notebook, and that is how Angier was able to read it (it took a while for the audience to discover this fact). Angier shows his obsession, and his downfall, as he says he only cares about Borden’s secret, not the death of his wife anymore. Both magicians let their preoccupation with their craft interfere with their attention to others. Olivia is torn, but Angier’s manipulation of her most likely is the reason she reveals that she has fallen in love with Borden.

Angier kidnaps Fallon as leverage to get Borden to explain his Transporting Man trick. He buries the man in a wooden box and when Borden shows up, Angier says Fallon wouldn’t talk, in fact, he says, “He doesn’t talk at all.” We never hear Fallon speak – another clue. Borden writes “Tesla” as the answer to how he performs his trick, and then saves Fallon by digging him up. There are a number of references to being in boxes, or cages, losing freedom and wanting to escape.

Angier wants to see what machine Borden bought and he wants a duplicate. In his diary he writes that he finally met Tesla, who dramatically enters by walking through electrical streams, looking like a modern Prometheus (the mythological reference is used by Nolan in Oppenheimer). He confirms his view of how one can achieve anything if one has the “nerve,” the courage to apply oneself. Money is also a factor, and Angier says it is not a problem. We again get an idea about his background. But, Tesla also means there is a nonmonetary “cost” resulting from obsession. Tesla admits that he is a “slave” to his own obsessions, and “one day they’ll choose to destroy” him. Angier says Tesla knows urging caution about an obsession is pointless, basically saying that an obsession triumphs over all warnings. Perhaps Nolan is implying that the drive to fulfill one’s artistic vision sometimes will not be deterred by whatever negative outcomes surface in the pursuit of that quest.

Angier reads in the notebook as we get a scene which reveals that Olivia says to Borden that she had loved Angier but despised him for using her to steal his competitor’s secret. Borden wrote that Olivia’s loyalty was proven by not only letting him know where Root was, but also because Borden wanted her to give Angier the notebook. He was manipulating Angier by having him read it. “Tesla” was the keyword to the notebook, but not to his trick, he writes as he directly addresses Angier in the notebook. Borden thinks he’s sent Angier on a wild goose chase with Tesla, but it becomes an ironic twist in the plot.

An angry Angier confronts Tesla, saying he made the magician think that he constructed a machine for Borden so he could take Angier’s money to fight Edison. Tesla says the machine needs further experimentation. He tries using a cat as the subject of a test, but the cat is not transported. As Angier exits Tesla’s laboratory he follows the sound of a cat. He finds two cats, the original and a duplicate, as well as many reproductions of his hat (which was the first shot of the film). Tesla’s machine does not transport, it makes copies, so the uniqueness of the individual becomes dissipated.

Sarah is becoming more disenchanted with her marriage and is drinking alcohol more. Borden assures her that he loves her and Jess their child more than anything. Borden promised Jess he would take her to the zoo, yet he tells Fallon to do it and try and reassure Sarah that he loves her. We don’t see if Jess is disappointed his father doesn’t keep his promise. Borden sees Olivia who kisses him and he says he doesn’t want her to call him Freddie. Why? When she says she doesn’t trust Fallon, Borden says that Fallon protects all his interests. These are all clues as to Fallon’s true identity.

Edison’s henchmen have burned Tesla’s property, but he delivered the machine to Angier saying in a note that those interested in magic will accept it because they like to be “mystified.” Could that not also be said for us in the audience as we watch Nolan’s cinematic magic? Tesla also delivers a warning that although he has provided the goods for which Angier paid him, he tells him to destroy the machine since it will only be a source of grief. We have again the warning of going too far for one’s artistic passion. And, we see the overreaching danger of science (obviously a theme Nolan is interested in later in Oppenheimer). Borden receives this information by reading Angier’s diary. Angier’s writing addresses Borden directly (just as Borden did so in his notebook). Angier’s words say that he knows Borden awaits the death sentence for killing Angier. But, if the man is dead, how can he have written this closing? Borden tells Owens, the lawyer, that the diary is a fake, but Owens says it is in Angier’s handwriting. The theme of illusion versus reality continually surfaces, and it appears that here the diary is genuine. That would mean that Angier is not dead. Or, is he?

Sarah is unable to live in Borden’s world of lies, secrets, and tricks. She wants honesty, and he can’t do that because he puts his profession above all else. They go back and forth as to whether that day he loves her, and he admits that this day he does not. She can no longer continue in this state of imprisonment, which is like a life in a cage or a box, or a tank of water. Her escape is suicide as she hangs herself (a foreshadowing). Now both magicians have lost their wives, which shows them to have surrendered what they hold most dear because of their craft. Later, Borden tells Olivia he never loved Sarah, but only loves her. Is he a lying jerk, or is there something else going on? She says he is a cold man to be so dismissive of Sarah. She leaves, saying he and Angier deserve each other. In a way, they are psychological twins to her.

Angier reconnects with Cutter and says he wants to do the transported man to show Borden that he can do the trick without Root. Angier doesn’t want Cutter backstage and has hired blind stagehands (remember there was a blind worker at the very beginning of the film, which of course is now chronologically at the end of the tale). He wants total secrecy as to how his trick works. Angier turns on the machine for a patron, Ackerman (Edward Hibbert) Angier disappears and almost instantaneously appears at the back of the auditorium. Has Tesla perfected his invention? Borden shows up at Angier’s performance and although he saw that Angier disappeared through a trapdoor, he berates Fallon for not being able to figure out how Angier can show up fifty yards away almost instantaneously.

Borden sneaks under the stage and witnesses Angier falling through the trapdoor into a water tank that then locks. Borden tries to break the glass with an axe, but can’t save the drowning Angier. He has died as his wife did. Cutter shows up and Borden is found guilty of the murder of Angier, as has already been shown. Cutter meets with Owens and says although Lord Caldlow has purchased all the equipment, Cutter wants Tesla’s machine.

That same Lord Caldlow shows up with Jess at the prison since Borden struck a deal with Owens that he would deliver the prestige part of his tricks if he could see his daughter once more. Caldlow is Angier, and he says he “always have been.” We now know that Angier comes from an aristocratic family and that is why money was no object when it came to buying Tesla’s machine. Borden concedes that Angier no longer fears getting his “hands dirty.” Just like Borden, he is all in when it comes to his craft. Borden hands Angier the “prestige” parts of his tricks so that Jess will not be under Angier’s control. Angier is stealing what’s left of Borden’s family for himself. Angier says that Borden was the better magician, but Angier’s trick is better, so he rips up the papers. Borden shows Jess his rubber ball, the one he used in his transported man trick, and here symbolizes that he has a bit of magic left to get his daughter back. He screams that the man he was supposed to have killed is walking out the door, so he is innocent.

Cutter discovers Caldlow’s address and sees that Angier is still alive. Cutter wants the machine destroyed and Angier says it will never be used again, and will be placed with the rest of the show’s equipment. Meanwhile, Borden meets with Fallon, says he is sorry about Sarah, and throws him the rubber ball, telling him to live life for the both of them.

As Borden goes to the gallows he asks the guard, “Are you watching closely?” Is there one more trick to be played? Just before he is hanged (like Sarah, so poetic justice?), Borden says “Abracadabra!” There is a cut to the rubber ball bouncing toward Angier and a shot rings out as he is shot. The man with the pistol is Borden. Or is it? Just before his death Angier realizes that Fallon is Borden’s twin brother. His shooter reveals that they were both Borden and Fallon, sharing one life. They alternated who disappeared and reappeared in the transported man trick. The other brother sacrificed his fingers to make the illusion seem real. It was one who loved Sarah, and one who loved Olivia, so depending on who was with which woman, the truth was actually told.

Angier tells Borden the truth. Tesla did not perfect his machine. Angier used it to create a double of himself, shot the first duplicate, and drowned the other versions of himself so that there would only be one Great Danton remaining. His storage facilities have several water tanks with drowned versions of himself. As he said often in the film, “no one cares about the man in the box” and the film has repeatedly shown imprisonment and various, even lethal ways, of escape. There is always that risk for the sake of the magic. Angier paid the ultimate price, his own death, to come back in the prestige, to create wonder. Now that the show is over, the remaining duplicate Angier takes a figurative his last bow. He drops a lantern, and the resulting fire destroys his secrets.

Jess walks away with her “father.” Is it Fallon, or was it Fallon who was hanged, and Borden reunites with his daughter? Nolan keeps his secret, as all good magicians do, but he brings the man back, to earn the prestige.

The next film is Europa, Europa.

LA Confidential

SPOILER ALERT! The plot of the movie will be discussed.

This Curtis Hanson directed film came out in 1997, and, if Titanic had not been its competition, would probably have received the Best Picture Oscar. Based on the James Ellroy novel, the movie never lets you forget that Hollywood, and how it is mirrored in others, with its selling of surface beauty at the expense of underlying ugliness, is the focus here.

The title of the motion picture tells you upfront what the story is about – the glamorous draw of the promise of the City of Angels, and the dirty secrets it tries to hide as people there vie for success. Hanson said that the movie industry settled here because filmmakers liked shooting in the soft, soothing sunlight that saturated this part of California. But, as someone said about LA, “you come for a vacation, and go home on probation.” So, there is that underbelly of its people that Hanson wants to expose, and ironically contrast with the celebrity of stardom.

The movie begins in 1952 with a voice-over from tabloid sleaze master Sid Hudgens (Danny DeVito) of Hush Hush magazine. To “hush” is to stifle speech, which is what the successful want done concerning their nasty actions. But, while on one hand, the public doesn’t want its ideal version of the town of dreams shattered, at the same time, it craves to hear the dirt. Why? Maybe for the same reason that people want to look away from a car crash, but can’t because of a perverse morbid curiosity. Or, perhaps they envy the success of movie stars, and want to cut them down, lower them to the level of the drudgery of the lives of everyday working people. Sid says that “Life is good in Los Angeles. It’s paradise on earth. Ha, ha, ha, ha. That’s what they tell you anyway.” We eventually see a collage of murderous hits, as the audience hears Sid relate how crime boss Mickey Cohen, (the criminal version of a star), is now in jail, and a vacuum of illegitimacy exists. However, someone is killing all of his pretender mob lieutenants. At one of the killings, an unidentified person steals a suitcase full of heroin. And, the LA Police Department has a public relations problem because of its inability to solve these crimes.

Detective Bud White, (Russell Crowe), is out on a liquor run with his partner, Dick Stensland (Graham Beckel) for a Christmas party. They come across a house where a man is beating his wife. Bud sent the man to prison before, and is checking up on him. There are holiday decorations on the outside of the building, contrasting the surface appearance of the season of good cheer with the cruel actions inside the home. White rips down the Santa sleigh and lights to get the man to come outside. But, symbolically, the tearing away of a façade shows him to be a man who does not tolerate deception or phony appearances. LA is a strange place for him to be, since Hollywood specializes in presenting illusions. He beats up the man and handcuffs him to the porch so the police will arrest him. White offers comfort to the woman, asking her if she has a place to stay. His name is “White,” suggesting that he is one of the “good guys,” despite his brutal behavior. When they get to the party at the precinct, Stensland says they were late because his partner’s helping the battered woman shows how White has his “priorities all fouled up.” We have an upside-down world here, where decent acts are denigrated.

When the abusive man comes out of his house he asks Bud who is he, and the cop says, “I’m the Ghost of Christmas Past.” The line refers, as we later learn, to Bud’s childhood history. His father was an abuser. As a boy, he tried to stop his father from hurting his mother. His dad tied him to a radiator and then beat his mother to death with a tire iron. The father left, and was never found. Bud later talks about wanting justice, and his anger towards criminals, and especially those who hurt women, may be his attempt to exact the punishment his father never received. Actor Crowe said he wanted Bud’s clothes to be tight-fitting, as if confining the man. The character does look like he is ready to burst out of them at any moment as his rage for criminals builds. It may be that wanting to get free of constraints reflects a desire to make up for having been restrained to that radiator.

On the way to the Christmas party, White goes into a liquor store to buy the booze. He encounters Lynn Bracken (Kim Basinger, in an Oscar-winning Best Supporting Actress role). There is a definite contrast between the way the two appear. He wishes her a merry Christmas. She returns the favor adding, “officer” to her greeting. He says was it that obvious, and she says, “It’s practically stamped on your forehead.” Again, we see that Bud is the man who has nothing to hide. Not so Lynn. Her head is symbolically covered by a hood, so that Bud at first only sees a bit of blonde hair and some of her profile. When he goes outside, Bud notices that the fancy car Lynn is heading towards has a woman with a bandage over her nose. Sensitive to abused women, Bud investigates. The woman, who turns out to be Susan Lefferts (Amber Smith), tells Bud, as does Lynn, that Bud has it all wrong. Honest Bud again comes up against deceptions. The owner inside of the car is Pierce Patchett (David Strathairn). Great name for a man, as we later learn, who sometimes uses plastic surgery to have hookers look like movie stars. Their skin is “pierced” for the surgery, and then they are “patched up” to look like the intended person. Putting a “patch” over something also is an attempt to cover up what is wrong underneath. In Pierce Patchett’s name, we get the theme of surface phoniness. The “pierce’ part also suggests sexual penetration (Psycho anyone?). Pierce has his driver/bodyguard, Buzz Meeks (Darrell Sandeen), deal with Bud. White overcomes the man, and from his wallet discovers the man’s name. Bud gets him to admit that he was an ex-cop, which Stensland confirms, but does not act like he knows the man personally, or the bruised woman in the car.

We encounter Sergeant Jack Vincennes (Kevin Spacey), a narcotics detective, at a glamorous Hollywood party. Jack is the technical adviser on a TV show entitled “Badge of Honor,” an ironic title, since, at this time, honorable policemen are in short supply, and many corrupt cops hide behind the superficial legitimacy of their badges. Jack tells his dancing partner that he teaches the star of the show how to walk and talk like a cop. She says that the actor on “Badge of Honor” doesn’t walk and talk like Jack. He counters with, “Well, that’s ‘cause he’s the television version. America isn’t ready for the real me.” Hollywood presents the sanitized version of reality, the dream in which the people want to believe, in contrast to the seedy reality. The show uses the line from the real TV series “Dragnet,” where the policeman says he wants “just the facts,” which is the opposite of what Hollywood, and corrupt cops want exposed. The “real” Jack works with Sid Hudgens, who gets Jack leads on movie stars having sexual encounters while using drugs. Sid pays Jack for “acting” in his set-up. Jack arrests them, while Sid has the caught actors and actresses filmed at the scene (as reality and staged filmmaking merge). We have invasion of privacy and destruction of careers so that Jack can enhance his career, and Sid’s manipulation of events can increase his readership at the expense of others.

The first time we see Sergeant Edmund Exley, he is being interviewed by a reporter, because in LA, how one appears, one’s public image, is what dominates. His father was a well-known policeman, who was killed in the line of duty. The precinct captain, Dudley Smith (James Cromwell), tells Exley he is a political animal and shouldn’t go into homicide, where he will be called upon to plant evidence on an obviously guilty person, beat a confession out of a suspect he knows to be guilty, and may have to shoot a hardened criminal in the back if there was a chance a lawyer would get the man off. (This last example is an ironic foreshadowing of the end of the film). Exley believes he can mete out justice by not doing any of the above. It is significant that Dudley, as do others, advise Exley to lose his eyeglasses. He looks too cerebral if he wears the lenses, and they want him to play the typical role of the macho cop. It may also symbolize that the removal of his glasses signifies the loss of his clarity of moral vision.

All of the above occur on the same evening. At the precinct, while Exley acts as Watch Commander, Jack arrives and tries to give him a payoff, which Exley refuses. Bud and the others party it up. Then, three Mexicans suspected of assaulting policemen are brought in. Instead of trying to find out “just the facts,” the inebriated cops spread rumors about one of the attacked officers losing an eye and another being in a coma. Exley tries to set them straight by saying they only suffered muscle bruises. The cops tellingly put Exley in a cell, as if truth and justice are being locked out of sight, hidden away from view so the “fake news” can flourish without contradiction. White first tries to control Stensland, but when one of the Mexicans curses him, he, too, joins in the fight, as does Jack, when his clothes are dirtied. (As opposed to Bud’s outfits, Jack dresses the part of a Hollywood leading man, showing he has strayed from his true role in life). The press, who interviewed Exley, are there, and, they photograph the beatings of the Mexicans, adding to the already compromised image of the police department. The newspaper headline is “Bloody Christmas,” mirroring the brutality that Bud exposed at the abuser’s house, which is in sharp contrast to the purpose of the holiday season.

The LAPD need to provide the public the look of an agency that is trying to clean up its mess, while at the same time not shaking things up too much. But, Bud White and others will not snitch on fellow cops who participated in the precinct braw. The Chief of Police suspends White for not cooperating. Using his considerable political skills, Exley agrees to give testimony, saying what he truly believes, that “Justice must be served,” and that the cops “confuse silence with integrity.” But, he bends the concept of justice with pragmatism, by suggesting that those punished should be ones close to retirement. That way they can leave early with full benefits. But, he argues there must be a sacrifice that doesn’t look convenient. Dudley is willing to let Stensland go, but wants to keep Bud because he is willing do the things that Exley said he wouldn’t. At Exley’s urging, the higher-ups use Vince’s love of working on “Badge of Honor” as leverage to get him to testify against those who can retire. In return, Exley receives a promotion. On his way out the door, Stensland turns down Bud’s offer of going for a drink because he says he has a “date.” Dudley gives Bud his badge and gun back, but only if he switches to homicide, not to solve cases, to Bud’s disappointment, but instead to use his muscle to intimidate others from taking over Cohen’s operations. It is interesting that when Dudley asks Bud if he follows everything he told him, Bud says, “In technicolor.” The use of a movie term, which is meant to imply vivid understanding, also has a connotation of something exaggerated, and staged. The place where the physical intimidations take place is the deceptively patriotic named Victory Motel, situated next to an ugly oil rig that plunders the earth in the midst of such an otherwise beautiful setting. 

In his new position, Exley is hated by the other cops for being a snitch. One evening, he takes a call about homicides at the Night Owl Diner. It turns out that many people were shot there, and it appears to be a robbery. Again, what something appears to be on the surface is not necessarily the case in this town. One of the dead is Stensland. But, it turns out that one of the women killed at the restaurant was Susan Lefferts, the surgically altered woman in Patchett’s car. Dudley says they have information that three African Americans were in the vicinity driving a Mercury coup. Exley goes with Jack, and after following a lead, show up at the home of one of the black suspects. However, two of Dudley’s men are already there, and they have found money (presumably the cash stolen from the diner), and the shotguns, which are a ballistics match in the Night Owl case. Exley stops one of these officers from killing the suspects, who look at each other as if some plan was thwarted.

Back at the precinct, Exley again shows his mental skills by playing the suspects off one another. He may not be willing to do Dudley’s required extreme actions to get a felon, but he is not above manipulating, even lying, to incriminate them. (There is a shot which shows the reflections of the police in the window of the interrogation room so that they are seen at the same time as the suspects inside, thus equating the cops with the criminals).  But, the suspects say they had no shotguns, and do not admit to killing anyone. It comes out that they have abducted a woman, and have raped her. Bud, exploding because of harm done to a female, plays forced Russian Roulette with one of the men, getting an address. White rescues the woman after basically murdering her captor and making it look like the man fired at Bud. White is willing to do what he feels must be done for what he calls “justice.” Exley yells at him, and says Bud doesn’t know the meaning of justice. Bud significantly says to Exley that he should go after criminals, instead of cops, referring to his snitching. These words are ironic considering what happens at the end of the film.

Conveniently, the three black suspects escape from jail. Exley remembers the address they disclosed where they acquired drugs. Exley goes there with other men. A gunfight ensues after one of the cops fires first after a bottle accidentally breaks. Exley, the man everyone thought was just good for the use of his brains, uses a shotgun to kill the suspects. He is now accepted as “Shotgun Ed,” and receives the department’s highest commendation. Again, appearances are deceiving as there is more to Exley than first meets the eye. But, those eyes get stained with blood during the shootings, as Exley did not wear his glasses, indicating that he does not yet see that he has been made complicit in a corrupt plot.

Jack was suspended for a while for his participation in “Bloody Christmas,” and as part of the deal, has to work in Vice temporarily before resuming work on the TV show. At one of the busts set up by Sid, he found a business card with the phrase “Fleur de Lis” on it. In Vice, he sees the same name on evidence involving a pornography ring. We later learn that Patchett runs this service, which involves the prostitutes, and since Lefferts was at the diner, there is also a link to the Night Owl killings.

Bud is not satisfied concerning Stensland’s murder, and the coincidental presence at the diner of both his former partner and Lefferts. He goes to the liquor store where he saw Lynn, and tracks down Patchett, who admits to the prostitution ring, but nothing else. Bud also finds Lynn’s address. Director Hanson said that her home was divided into two levels. The downstairs is where she entertains her clients. It represents the fake pretense of having sex with her as a Veronica Lake lookalike. It, like the movies, is a fantasy world. Upstairs is where Lynn Bracken, the real person from Arizona, lives. When Bud first arrives at her place, she is with a man, on the first floor, who acts tough (emphasis on “acting”), wearing an undershirt and a fedora hat. They are watching a movie starring the real Veronica Lake. Thus, the illusion is doubled, since there is only a film of the real person, and just a pretend real actress. When Lynn answers the door, the man asks if she wants him to get rid of Bud. Bud tells the man to get lost, knowing that he is no tough guy, but really a married city councilman, who Bud threatens with the possibility of notifying his wife about his unseemly activity. We are again shown the underside of the supposedly respectable surface of LA in the form of this man.

Even though Bud is on the job, he is obviously attracted to Lynn. She basically says that girls like her, who came to Hollywood to become stars, can only get a chance to act by playing sleazy versions of their idols. She says he is the first man who hasn’t immediately said she looks like Veronica Lake. He says she looks better than the actress. By delivering that line, he is telling her that he sees beyond the pretense, and is perceiving the real Lynn Bracken, who only has changed her hair, but nothing else. She has already observed in the liquor store how he has nothing to hide. When he doubts his intellectual ability to solve cases, she tells him he found Patchett, and her, and that he is smart enough. They become genuine lovers on the second floor of her place, which is free of any false illusions. There is a happy scene where Bud and Lynn go to, where else in this film, the movies, to escape the stressful world they travel in.

After checking out the evidence, Bud concludes that Stensland’s “date” was with Susan Lefferts. He visits Mrs. Lefferts (Gwenda Deacon), who identifies Stensland as Susan’s older boyfriend. Bud searches the house, smells a bad odor which Mrs. Lefferts attributes to a rat that died in the walls, and finds the body of Buzz Meeks. The decaying body, infested with rats, buried under the crawlspace of the house, symbolizes the ugliness beneath the surface of sunny, beautiful LA. Significantly, when Bud emerges, after being asked by Mrs. Lefferts if it was a rat, he says, “Yeah. A big one.” Buzz also finds out from a Mickey Cohen enforcer, Johnny Stompanato (Paolo Seganti) that Meeks came into a large supply of heroin (the missing suitcase), and Bud concludes that he was murdered for stealing the drug.

Jack Vincennes meets up with Sid at a party. Sid takes compromising photos of people for his exploitative version of journalism. (Photography can present illusions, reality, or even manipulated versions of the truth). He gives Jack money to catch the DA, Lowe (Ron Rifkin), in a homosexual encounter with the actor Jack previously arrested at a pot bust, and from whose apartment he picked up the porno ring card. The actor, Matt Reynolds (Simon Baker), thinks he recognizes Jack from a Fleur de Lis party. At a bar, Jack starts to feel guilty about his sleazy actions, and leaves the $50 Sid gave him on his whiskey glass. Hanson drives home the theme of the story when we see Jack under a movie marquee with the film title The Bad and the Beautiful, stressing the dual nature of LA, and, given America’s obsession with the film industry, the country in general. Jack decides to go to the motel and call off the sting, but is horrified to find Reynolds murdered.

Exley, wheeling the Hispanic girl, who was held captive and raped, out of the hospital, learns from her that she lied about the time she was with the black abductors. She gave out the false information (more deception) to tie them to the Night Owl killings, in order to get the justice (that word again, which everyone wants, no matter the cost) she did not think a girl like her would get. (While they are exiting the hospital, they are photographed by the press, the pictures painting a picture of a victim and a hero, but what is not seen is that they are also a liar and a manipulated killer). Since the African American men, who Exley thought he had righteously killed, had an alibi, Exley now starts investigating. When he finds Bud White was also checking evidence, he approaches Jack Vincennes to help him, since Exley wants someone outside the compromised homicide division. When Jack questions Exley why he wants to reopen the Night Owl case, Exley relates how his father was killed by a guy Exley calls Rollo Tomasi, the guy who gets away with the crime. Exley says he forgot for a while why he joined the force. He says, “it was supposed to be about justice.” He, like Bud, lost a parent to somebody who got away with it, and they both want that to stop. When Exley asks Jack why he became a cop, Jack hesitates for quite a while, and says he can’t remember, emphasizing how corrupt he has become. So, he works with Exley for redemption.

 Exley also visits Mrs. Lefferts’ house after finding out that was where Bud went. He too discovers the body and has it sent to the coroner, who identifies it as Meeks. Jack was tailing Bud for Exley, and they find White at Lynn’s house, where they spy on the two who act affectionately toward each other. Since Lynn is one of Patchett’s prostitutes, as was Susan Lefferts, Jack realizes that the there is a connection between The Night Owl, Reynold’s death, and Fleur de Lis. Exley, also attracted to Lynn, goes to interrogate her. She tells him that she sees Bud “because he can’t hide the good inside him.” She sees him because he “doesn’t know how to disguise who he is.” The woman who is a phony in her profession is drawn to the man of no deception. She also says she sees Bud because he not like Exley, who is a master at political deception, but who she does not realize is trying to aim for the higher good. She seduces Exley, because Patchett has sent Sid to photograph their sexual encounter, which Lynn thinks will be used as leverage to protect Bud. Sid’s spying is similar to that of Exley and Jack’s earlier, again showing how the police and the criminal are echoes of each other, and how, as before, photography can manipulate reality.

There is actually a humorous scene in the film, but one which still furthers its theme. Exley and Jack go to a restaurant to question Stompanato. There is a woman there with him. Exley comes on strong, and says the woman is a whore who was cut to look like Lana Turner. A smiling Jack tells Exley it really is Lana Turner, who throws a drink in Exley’s face. Back in the car the two laugh, with Exley saying, tellingly, “How was I to know?” The line between legitimate and illegitimate has become so blurred, even a detective can’t tell the difference, and it is Jack, the man traveling between both worlds, must be the one to reveal the truth.

Jack goes through police records and finds a connection between Meeks, and Stensland concerning an investigation into blackmail, which Dudley signed off on. Jack goes to Dudley’s house, tells him that he and Exley are working on something together, and asks him about what he has discovered. When Dudley is satisfied that Jack has not yet talked to Exley, he shoots Jack. We now realize Dudley is behind all of the killings. With his last laughing breath, Jack utters the name “Rollo Tomasi.” Dudley removes the body, and then starts a sham investigation into Jack’s death. He tells his men, “Our justice must be swift and merciless,” an ironic statement since he has perverted the practice of “justice” through his covert actions, and now in his overt words, exhorting a type of law enforcement that is not deliberate and without compassion. Dudley asks Exley if he knows of a person of interest in Jack’s death, Rollo Tomasi. Exley now knows that Jack sent him a message as to who killed him, and he realizes Dudley is the enemy.

To get Exley out of the way, Dudley tells Bud he needs him at the Victory Motel to interrogate someone he feels will lead them to Jack’s killer. It is all a setup to get Bud to go after Exley. They brutally question Sid, who admits that he had a business relationship with Jack to photograph people in compromising positions, arrest them, and Sid ran stories on those taken into custody. He says about Patchett that he used his prostitutes to be photographed by Sid with people to be blackmailed. He says he has pictures in his car of Exley and Lynn, which the enraged Bud discovers. As he drives away, Dudley says he wouldn’t want to be in Exley’s shoes. Dudley then kills Sid, as he starts to tie up loose ends.

Bud first stops at Lynn’s, who says she thought she was protecting him. His anger then takes over, and it subverts his caring for women, as he hits Lynn. He then feels so much guilt that he quickly and silently leaves her. He goes after Exley, who has checked work reports and sees the link that Jack discovered between Stensland, Meeks, and Dudley. Bud bursts in on him shows Exley one of Sid’s photographs, and then attacks Exley. The latter holds him off long enough to tell him “Think!” He previously called Bud a mindless thug, but now he appeals to his investigative intelligence, as he tells him about Dudley’s conspiracy, and how he pointed Bud at Exley. Bud reveals that Stensland lied to him about not being familiar with Meeks or Lefferts. Stensland and Meeks stole the heroin, Stensland killed Meeks to have it all for himself, and received retribution for the rip off. They start to see how Dudley had his men plant the weapons and the money at the African American suspect’s house before Exley arrived there. They also see how Dudley and Patchett manipulated all of them including Lynn to take over Mickey Cohen’s operation. Bud asks Exley does he want to tear down the Night Owl case that made him. Exley says yes, “with a wrecking ball. You want to help me swing it?” These two who misread each other, now realize they both have the smarts and the guts to exact justice, and they can do it together.

The two visit DA Lowe, and after threatening the man’s life, get him to admit to his being blackmailed, and poor Reynolds was killed because he heard too much about what was going on. Bud’s beating the man up and dangling him from the window raise the question of how far are these two willing to go to exact justice. However, the question is what do you do when the people in charge of the legal system are themselves the criminals? They then go to Patchett’s house. They find him dead and a suicide note left behind. But, Bud sees that his fingers were broken, showing again, that what really happened is not what appears to be the truth. Since Dudley is covering his tracks, they then realize Lynn is in danger. Bud, feeling ashamed of hitting her, sends Exley to protect Lynn. Bud goes to see Sid, who he finds dead. He gets a call to meet Exley at the Victory Motel. When he arrives there, Exley says he thought Bud wanted the meeting. Bud suspected it to be a setup, and says this way may be how the story must end. Dudley shows up with his men. There is a fierce gun battle, and Bud and Exley take out everyone, except Dudley. Exley is wounded in the process, and Dudley shoots Bud, but not before he stabs the captain in the leg, and Exley aims a gun at him. Dudley promises Exley he will be rewarded if he just walks out to greet the police cars arriving. He tells Exley to hold up his badge so the cops will know he is a policeman. This advice echoes the title of the TV show “Badge of Honor,” which is as fake as Dudley’s false presentation of integrity. Exley then does what he told Dudley he wouldn’t do. He shoots Dudley in the back, and then holds up his own badge, his honor, though extralegal, intact. Bud earlier told him to go after criminals instead of policemen. It turns out, they were one in the same.

Exley tells the whole truth to the Chief of Police, who again sees how disastrous it would be for the force if the real story came out. The DA starts to think how to spin it, saying that maybe Dudley can be painted as a hero. Exley, he himself now in the interrogation room, seems to read their minds, and says there has to be more than one hero. We then see the story in the newspaper that Dudley is depicted as a crusader rooting out corruption. Exley is again awarded the Medal of Valor. The ugliness of the truth is once again hidden by the illusion of a happy ending.

Bud somehow survives, and will be going with Lynn back to Arizona, away from La La Land. Exley tells her that even though the police department is using him, he will be using them, presumably to try to have it live up to the standards of a true badge of honor. Exley and Bud exchange a brotherly handshake, and Bud and Lynn drive away. It is ironic that in LA, the two redeeming angels are these flawed ones. The song heard over the closing credits contain the lyrics, “Accentuate the positive.” It is, after all, Hollywood.

The next film is Medium Cool.