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Dancing_P [ 5.0 ]
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Although Duvall / DeNiro doesn't really have the cachet of some other legendary star pairings, I had high hopes for True Confessions. Two strong leads, a story loosely based on the Black Dahlia murder and an underrated helmer in Ulu Grosbard (although a sign of trouble should be the irredeemable shittiness of DeNiro's second collaboration with Grosbard, Falling in Love) all boded well for this would-be neglected gem. And, of course, I was wrong. True Confessions isn't terrible in the way that many terrible wastes of talent are; it's a handsome production and the two leads give predictably strong and interesting performances. These performances, however, are hung on a sluggish, overstuffed story that develops drop-by-drop into a massive bore. It has perhaps the least involving homicide investigation of the 80's, led by the least involved police officers to hit the screen. All this is enmeshed in an arcane plot about land development, the Church and corruption that will eventually tie into the bigger picture - if you're still following.
Duvall stars as a homicide cop in 1948 LA who comes across the body of a young woman cut in half. She's thought to be a prostitute, which is convenient for Duvall since he has close ties with a local madam. He also finds ties between the girl and a rich businessman (Charles Durning) who just so happens to be a close associate of Duvall's brother, a Monsignor played by Robert De Niro. All of this plods along in a talky drama that finds the characters meeting and blurting out exposition at regular intervals.
The premise itself isn't entirely uninteresting; it's the plodding, disinterested delivery that is. So much municipal wheeling and dealing is thrown into the film that we're expected to feel the same way about the murder of a young girl and the rightful owner of a plot of land. Grosbard's always been better at directing actors than pacing and whatnot. This is incredibly obvious from the film: Duvall and De Niro give great, measured performances and dig into the characters more than the minutiae-obsessed script would allow while practically everything else sits and rots in the sun. Nice period detail and a decent score help keep things watchable if not exactly entrancing but this is more Runaway Jury than Heat.
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| Weighted Rating | : 6.5 |
| No. Ratings | : 2 | |
| No. Reviews | : 1 | |
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