Blood Work (2002) - Eastwood churns out uninspired thriller adaptation

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Star/producer/director Clint Eastwood looks determined here on a simple poster for Blood Work in black and reds

McCaleb is a locally famous homicide detective, who is retiring just as he suddenly requires a heart transplantation. A couple of years later he is contacted by a woman, whose sister's heart he now has, who comes to him with a sincere plea: Find her murderer!

Blood Work is written by Brian Helgeland (Payback (1999)), adapting Michael Connelly's (Echo Park (2006)) same-titled 1998 novel, and directed by Californian master filmmaker Clint Eastwood (Play Misty for Me (1971)), whose 23rd feature it is. Eastwood also produced and plays the protagonist McCaleb in the film.
Eastwood seems hopeful to recapture the success he enjoyed with previous cop thrillers like Richard Tuggle's great Tightrope (1984), which he starred in, but Blood Work lacks more than the sex of that fine film.
Wanda de Jesus (CSI: Miami (2002-03)) plays the young Latin-American woman who comes to McCaleb with her plea for him to help, while she falls for him despite their enormous age difference; a romance which the film doesn't make entirely credible. McCaleb also has a somewhat closer age-wise African-American ex whom he could have gone back to, but instead the filmmakers make this other reach.
Several elements in Blood Work don't come together: Jeff Daniels (Steve Jobs (2015)) is a comic sidekick 'dude' on a boat, SPOILER - who turns out to be a psychopath. His character's 180 degree turn from sympathetic to a racist madman is also not made credible.
An Eastwood fan will have patience with Blood Work due to the star's presence in it, but it is undeniably one of his poorest films, heavy on clichés, unoriginal and lacking in suspense. A big oops.

Related posts:

Clint Eastwood: Sully (2016) - Eastwood's miracle landing biopic is inert and overrated  2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
Top 10: The best biopic movies reviewed by Film Excess to date 
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
American Sniper (2014) - Eastwood conveys an American man and myth in electric masterpiece  
2011 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2011 in films - according to Film Excess   
J. Edgar (2011) - Eastwood, Black and DiCaprio's great, intense biopic   
Gran Torino (2008) - Eastwood's actor persona comes full circle in absolute smash (co-producer/director/starring actor)
The Changeling (2008) or, The Christine Collins Story  
2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]    
2006 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess
Letters from Iwo Jima/硫黄島からの手紙 [Öjima Kara no Tegami] (2006) - The Japanese side of Eastwood's remarkable WWII two-parter   
Flags of Our Fathers (2006) - Eastwood's Iwo Jima portrayal is captivating and profoundly moving

2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]  
The Dead Pool (1988) - The highly entertaining last Dirty Harry movie (starring actor)
City Heat (1984) - Eastwood and Reynolds wrestle dispassionately in Benjamin's messy period affair (co-starring actor)
Tightrope (1984) - An undervalued Clint Eastwood sex killer thriller (starring actor)
Any Which Way You Can (1980) or, More Monkey Business! (starring actor)
Escape from Alcatraz (1979) - Siegel, Tuggle and Eastwood's phenomenal prison escape thriller (starring actor)
Every Which Way but Loose (1978) or, Honky Tonk Monkey Business! (starring actor)
The Enforcer (1976) - Eastwood teaches revolutionaries a lesson in third, less punchy Dirty Harry (starring star)
The Eiger Sanction (1975) - Eastwood's mountain climbing dud
The Beguiled (1971) - Intense, erotic Civil War kammerspiel thriller (starring actor)  
Dirty Harry (1971) - Eastwood's great, signature renegade cop character comes to life (starring actor)
Coogan's Bluff (1968) or, Dopes and Hippies, Beat It! (starring actor)  
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) - Leone ends his poncho trilogy with certified classic (starring actor)
For a Few Dollars More/Per Qualche Dollaro in Più (1965) or, Return of the Poncho Killer (co-starring actor)
A Fistful of Dollars (1964) or, Killer in a Poncho (starring actor) 

Watch a short trailer for the film here

Cost: 50 mil. $
Box office: 31.7 mil. $
= Huge flop (returned 0.63 times its cost)
[Blood Work premiered 6 August (California) and runs 110 minutes. Shooting lasted 38 days in February - ? in California, including Los Angeles. The film opened #5, behind fellow new release xXx, holdover hit Signs, new release Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams and holdover hit Austin Powers in Goldmember, to a 7.3 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it left the top 5 in its 2nd weekend and grossed 26.2 mil. $ (82.6 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were France with 1.3 mil. $ (4.1 %) and Spain with 987k $ (3.1 %). The film won an award at the Venice International Film Festival. Roger Ebert gave the film a 3.5/4 star review, translating to 3 notches higher than this one. Eastwood returned with Mystic River (2003) as a filmmaker and in his own Million Dollar Baby (2004) as an actor. Blood Work is rotten at 53 % with a 5.54/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Blood Work?

Gorky Park (1983) - Cool Hurt investigates murders in Apted's fine Cold War Moscow thriller

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A simple, elegant poster for Michael Apted's Gorky Park

Three dead bodies are found the snow of Moscow's Gorky Park with their faces peeled off. The city's most successful cop smells KGB on the case, but his investigation also points him towards an American.

Gorky Park is written by Dennis Potter (Tender Is the Night (1985, miniseries)), based on the same-titled 1981 novel by Martin Cruz Smith (The Indians Won (1970)), and directed by Michael Apted (The Triple Echo (1972)).
It is a great proponent of a crime thriller with plenty of local color colors. The film also gives its audience a feeling of the repression the people suffered under in the USSR.
William Hurt (Syriana (2005)) is excellent as our cop protagonist; Lee Marvin (The Killers (1964)) doesn't seem to actually act much, but he's there and it works. Also in the solid cast; Ian McDiarmid (Spooks (2004, TV-series)) as a morbid coroner.
Gorky Park is a cold-looking place and its score (by James Horner (Avatar (2009))) is very much of its time. But the film is full of suspense and action, and it has a showdown in Stockholm.

Watch a 4-minute scene from the film with Hurt and Marvin here

Cost: 6.5 mil. $
Box office: 15.8 mil. $ (North America alone)
= Uncertain - but at least a box office success (returned 2.43 times its cost in North America alone)
[Gorky Park was released 16 December (USA) and runs 123 minutes. Shooting took place in Glasgow, Scotland, Helsinki, Finland, Stockholm, Sweden and in Moscow, then the USSR, from February - May 1983. Helsinki stood in for Moscow for most of the film, as the crew were denied permits to shoot there. The film opened #13 to a 1.2 mil. $ first weekend in 629 theaters in North America, where it peaked at #5, behind holdover hits Terms of Endearment, Silkwood, new release Reckless and holdover hit Never Cry Wolf. The film's international gross numbers are regrettably not available. If it made a realistic 20-30 mil. $ worldwide it would rank as either a box office success or a big hit. It was nominated for a Golden Globe and a BAFTA. Roger Ebert gave the film a 3.5/4 star review, translating to a notch higher than this one. Apted returned with Firstborn (1984). Hurt returned in Kiss of the Spider Woman (1985); Marvin in Dog Day (1984). Gorky Park is fresh at 75 % with a 6.53/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Gorky Park?

The Keeper of Lost Causes/Kvinden i Buret (2013) or, Grumpy and Ethnic Find a Woman in a Pressure Chamber

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Nikolaj Lie Kaas and Fares Fares stare down at Denmark's underbelly on this heavily animated poster for Mikkel Nørgaard's The Keeper of Lost Causes

A rebel murder detective gets send down into the basement of the police HQ with some old, unsolved cases and a friendly immigrant cop, and they go after a case of a woman who has been missing for 5 years, who is said to have committed suicide.

Keeper is a dead movie, an exercise in form and fixed ideas, nurtured out of the European film support system as a Danish-Swedish-German co-production. It hasn't an ounce of personality behind it, no soul or meaning or ideas; The Keeper of Lost Causes is sheer Nordic noir surface.
Nikolaj Lie Kaas (The Green Butchers/De Grønne Slagtere (2003)) and Fares Fares (Jalla! Jalla! (2000)) are agreeable as the two partners, and technically, Keeper is a neat film.
But the script, written by Nikolaj Arcel (A Royal Affair/En Kongelig Affære (2012)), based on the first 'Department Q' crime novel by bestselling Jussi Adler-Olsen (Fasandræberne (2008)), ends prematurely, and the psychology, which 'explains' the killer's motivation, is wholly unconvincing and almost ridiculous. In addition, the cage of the film's title (the original Danish title translates to The Woman in the Cage) turns out to be a pressure chamber, which is not a cage, really, and the scenes in there aren't dramatically exciting in any way.
The Keeper of Lost Causes is, in short, a bad film.
It is directed by Mikkel Nørgaard (Klown/Klovn - the Movie (2010)). 

Related posts:

2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED V]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]  
2013 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]

Watch the trailer with English subtitles here

Cost: 6.6 mil. $ (39 mil. Danish kr.)
Box office: Unknown
= Unknown
[Keeper did get more than 700,000 to buy tickets for it in Denmark alone, but, reportedly, more than half of them through Biografklub Danmark (a cinema club), meaning that they only paid half prize. Though the number makes it a success in the Danish context, it is most likely still a financial failure due to its relatively high budget.]

What do you think of The Keeper of Lost Causes?
If you have seen the sequel, Fasandræberne (2014) (in Danish cinemas right now), how was it?

Cop Land (1997) - Stallone faces corruption and turns in some good acting in fine crime drama

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+ Best Crime Drama of the Year

Big leading men on the poster for James Mangold's Cop Land

QUICK REVIEW:

A taciturn cop in Garrison, New Jersey (Sylvester Stallone (First Blood (1982)) will have to be stumped on his feet many times, before he decides to clean up his town.
Cop Land is a very well-played cop crime thriller with a dream cast who all worked for scale to make it happen: Harvey Keitel (The Piano (1993)), Robert Patrick (The Sopranos (2000)), Robert De Niro (Casino (1995)) and Ray Liotta (Goodfellas (1990)) are some of the dirty cops, but Stallone trumps them all in his best acting performance to date. 
The film is well-written and directed by James Mangold (Walk the Line (2005)), who is unfortunately now fixed on throwing years of his career away into yet another superfluous Wolverine film. Before Cop Land, Mangold had only made one other feature, the romantic drama Heavy (1995).
Cop Land may not be unforgettable, but SPOILER the shoot-out at the end with the tinnitus is hard to forget and has real power, and it is a fine movie.
Paradoxically, considering its relatively small budget, this was a star-studded Miramax production with some very high pressure on its shoulders, and although it received good reviews and made money, it still wasn't considered enough. Stallone went out in 2008 to say that Cop Land "hurt" his career and started "the beginning of the end, for about 8 years". He's back in business now, and it's curious to think that he thought himself down for those 8 years considering the credits he still have from the period, but now, apparently, Stallone wants to risk career-slump again, because he is venturing out of the action genre for some 'real' acting again now in John Herzfeld's upcoming Reach Me (2014).

 

Related post:

 

1997 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess

Sylvester Stallone gained 40 lbs. to play Sheriff Freddy Heflin in James Mangold's Cop Land

Watch the trailer here

Cost: 15 mil. $
Box office: 44.8 mil. $ (US and Canada only)
= Big hit

What do you think of Cop Land?

The Pledge (2001) - Maddening, realistic, unpleasant child-killer story

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Jack Nicholson as the restless cop on the poster for Sean Penn's The Pledge

The Pledge is Sean Penn's (Into the Wild (2007)) third foray into directing following The Indian Runner (1991) and The Crossing Guard (1995), which is also with Jack Nicholson (About Schmidt (2002)). Of the two, I definitely prefer The Crossing Guard, but it may be a matter of taste more than quality difference.
The Pledge is based on Swiss author/playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt's novella Das Versprechen:Requiem for den Kriminalroman/The Pledge: Requiem for the Detective Novel (1958), which has been adapted before in Germany and the UK.
It is a story of a retiring cop in a country county, who on the eve of his retirement party helps out at a crime scene, where a little girl has been found ravaged and murdered. He pledges to the girl's grieving mother (Patricia Clarkson (The East (2013)), who is strong in the part) that he will find the killer, and then watches at the station, as the accused, mentally disadvantaged Indian (Benicio Del Toro) is more or less coaxed into an ambiguous confession by a colleague with a hard-on for closing the case (Aaron Eckhart), before the Indian SPOILER steals a gun and blows his brains out. Jerry (Nicholson) is retired, but he can't let the case rest: What if the killer wasn't this Indian? What if the monster is still out there?
The story is told so that we have no problem understanding why this will not let Jerry's mind rest. An important decision in that regard is that we see crime scene photos of a similar crime a little while into the film, which is truly horrifying and aligns us with Jerry completely.
But then kicks in the Requiem for the Detective Novel-part in The Pledge, because Jerry's efforts are essentially SPOILER fruitless: His hunger for justice and peace of mind turns into an obsession and eventually crumbles his mind completely, as we see in the film's last shots of Nicholson spazzing out. Even more maddening is the fact that we see that he was close to the solution and salvation, - but just missed it. It bears reminiscence to the ending of Penn's later Northern tale, Into the Wild, in which the lead Christopher dies of sickness and hunger isolated in an abandoned bus in Alaska much closer to civilization than he thinks he is.

The details:

The Pledge is well-played, although I think there was a single mis-tune to Nicholson's performance, when he has to make us and some colleagues understand why this case is so obsessively important, and I could see the actor taking the leap to up the stakes for his character, but a little too late. - He's good in the film, granted, but it's not among his greatest performances. Also the character seems somewhat lean: When asked about why he isn't married at one point, he replies that he's a "two-time loser". - Which could mean at least two and really several things, but we never learn. - Never learn much about Jerry besides his obsession. In that sense, The Pledge remains strictly a detective movie and stays clear of drama-elements about the character's past, but since it is a detective story about not finding a solution, (although we as audiences do see the solution), it is an almost maddeningly frustrating time.
- Also because of the subject matter, child abduction, -rape and -murder, which made me uncomfortable before the film was also about the killer being an elusive son of a *****, AND Jack Nicholson losing his mind. Thiscombined weight of this whole stack of unpleasant things is too much for me to still basically enjoy the film, which I must say that I didn''t. Also because it is fiercely realistic and very well-made, photography-wise (Chris Menges (The Reader (2008)) and acting-wise: Vanessa Redgrave also gives a great performance in a single scene as the murdered girl's grandmother. And the ensemble cast is very impressive with additional stars Sam Shepard, Robin Wright Penn, Helen Mirren, Tom Noonan, Mickey Rourke (who is also moving as a father of a missing daughter) and Harry Dean Stanton.
Penn is in pre-production with another film right now which he will direct called The Last Face.

Related reviews:

Sean Penn as actor:  Gangster Squad (2013) or, Good Men vs. Bad Men! 
The Tree of Life (2011) or, Mother, Father, Sharks, Dinosaurs, My Brothers, Sunflowers, the Desert, the Wind and Me 
21 Grams (2003) or, Hardcore Life 

Watch the trailer here

Budget: 35 mil. $
Box office: 29.4 mil. $
= Flop

What do you think of The Pledge?

The Crimson Rivers/Les Rivières Pourpres (2000) - Se7en-type action crime flick in the French Alps

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Jean Reno and Vincent Cassel star in Mathieu Kassovitz's The Crimson Rivers

QUICK REVIEW:

4 small hearts for this easily forgotten but entertaining, stylized and pictorially heavy (cinematography by Thierry Arbogast (Léon (1994)) buddy cop-action-thriller from the French Alps, in which a bitter, beautiful, young woman and her twin sister abuse and murder with much ingenuity.
The film stands in great debt to David Fincher's Se7en (1995), but is no match to the modern serial killer classic.
The enthusiastic genre-play in Rivers, - for instance in the artistic fight scene with Vincent Cassel that seems to come out of the blue, - takes, - together with several other misrepresentations, - credibility from the mystery that otherwise sparkles with humor and an irreverent treatment of the university-world.
Director Mathieu Kassovitz went to Hollywood after the success of Rivers and made forgettable Gothika (2003) and Babylon A.D. (2008). His most recent film is the French Rebellion (2011) about hostages in a French colony, starring himself in the lead. His best film seems to be widely recognized as his small, early drama Le Haine (1995) that stars Cassel.
Rivers was followed by the sequel Crimson River 2: Angels of the Apocalypse (2004) by Olivier Dahan with  returning Jean Reno and Christopher Lee. 

Related reviews:

Vincent Cassel: Mesrine: Killer Instinct + Mesrine: Public Enemy No. 1 (2008) - Epic Cassel gangster extravaganza
Jean Reno: The Big Blue (1988) - Dolphin mishap # uno

Jean Reno with a shotgun in Mathieu Kassovitz's The Crimson Rivers

Watch the trailer for the English dubbed (yes) version of the film here

Budget: 14 mil. $
Box office: 60 mil. $
= Big hit

What do you think of The Crimson Rivers?
Please contribute your opinion, if you've seen other Kassovitz-films

Bullitt (1968) - Yates and McQueen's iconic urban cop thriller

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A gun and turtleneck wearing star Steve McQueen oversees some speeding car action on this ultra-cool poster for Peter Yates' Bullitt

When the mob witness, who San Francisco detective Frank Bullitt is assigned to protect, gets killed, Bullitt is pressured from above. But soon he finds out that the deceased witness wasn't who he appeared to be.

 
Bullitt is written by Harry Kleiner (Cry Tough (1959)) and Alan Trustman (Lady Ice (1973)), adapting Mute Witness (1963) by Robert L. Fish (Always Kill a Stranger (1967)), and directed by Peter Yates (Summer Holiday (1963)).

It is a subtle cop thriller/car movie, mostly because Steve McQueen (The Great Escape (1963)) says very little in the title role.
Argentinian Lalo Schifrin (Mission: Impossible (1996)) made a characteristic, jazzy score, and the film has a car chase scene through San Francisco that is deservedly remembered and hailed as one of the best (and first long, city-spanning car chase scenes) in film history. Bullitt is chased and then chases the bad guys around in his '68 Ford Mustang GT.

There's lots of the highly cinematic Bay area in the film, which ends in the San Francisco Airport. Bullitt encompasses the bright, happening San Francisco that was, not the city that is decaying in human travesty today.
Some scenes of Bullitt appear almost hypnotizing, being so downplayed, - perhaps something to do with Yates' British heritage, - but for my money, I think the film was topped by Clint Eastwood and Don Siegel with the very similar Dirty Harry (1971) just three years later, which somehow feels a lot more like an American movie to me.

 

Related posts:

 

Peter Yates: Top 10: Best cop movies reviewed by Film Excess to date 

Top 10: Best car chases in movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

 

Watch the original trailer here

Cost: 4 mil. $
Box office; 42.3 mil. $ (North America only)
= Mega-hit (returned at least 10.57 times its cost)

[Bullitt was released 17 October (North America) and runs 113 minutes. McQueen was paid 1 mil. for his performance in the film. Shooting took place from February - May 1968 in California, including in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and in Chicago, Illinois. The film grossed 19 mil. $ in 1968, becoming the year's 4th highest grossing, with a reported 42.5 mil. $ domestic total gross. It is impossible to guess its total world gross, but it may well have crossed 60 mil. $. The film was nominated for 2 Oscars, winning for Best Editing. It lost Best Sound to Oliver!. It was also nominated for 5 BAFTAs. Roger Ebert gave it a 4/4 star review, translating to 2 notches over this one. Yates returned with Koroshi (1968, TV movie) and theatrically with Jack and Mary (1969). McQueen returned with The Reivers (1969). Bullitt is certified fresh at 98 % with a 7.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Bullitt?

15 Minutes (2001) or, Bad Cynics in New York City

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Stars Edward Burns and Robert De Niro caught in a moment of intensity on a video camera on the poster for John Herzfeld's 15 Minutes

15 Minutes is about a famous New York City cop and a pair of Eastern European crooks on a crime spree in the Big Apple, whose paths cross.

Very critical towards mass media and the US, this film sometimes feels like a debate commentary more than a movie. Writer-director John Herzfeld's (2 Days in the Valley (1996)) ambition seems to have been to go further into extremes with every new scene.
The aesthetics of the villains' video-tapes leave a confused impression, although bearing in mind the way video capture has revolutionized the lives of normal people since the film's release, - as well as the world of crime, - the element may be considered interesting regardless.
15 Minutes, (the title is taken from the famous Andy Warhol quote that everyone will get their 15 minutes of fame in the future), keeps afloat due to its great ensemble cast which includes Robert De Niro (Silver Linings Playbook (2012)) working at top speed; Edward Burns (Saving Private Ryan (1998)) as his young apprentice; Kelsey Grammer (Frasier (1993-04)) as a cynical TV host, and great Czech actor, Karel Roden (The Abandoned/Los Abandonados (2006)) as a delusional bad guy.
Also co-starring are attractive actresses Vera Farmiga (The Conjuring (2013)), Kim Cattrall (Sex and the City (2008)), and Charlize Theron (Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)).
Herzfeld's career has been going downhill since the film: He has only directed the two little-seen features, The Death and Life of Bobby Z (2007) and the recently poorly received drama Collection/Reach Me (2014) with Sylvester Stallone and again an impressive ensemble cast.

Watch the trailer for the somewhat hyperbolic 15 Minutes right here

Cost: 42 mil. $
Box office: 56.3 mil. $
= Big flop (returned 1.34 times the cost)
[15 Minutes premiered 1 March (USA) and runs 120 minutes. Shooting took place on location in New York and Los Angeles, ending in May 1999. The release was pushed out one year after trailers had been playing for unknown reasons. It opened #2, behind holdover hit The Mexican, to a 10.5 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent one more week in the top 5 (#5) and grossed 24.4 mil. $ (43.3 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets seems to have been the UK  with 2.3 mil. $ (4%) and Australia with 1.3 mil. $ (2.3 %). Roger Ebert gave the film a 3/4 star review, translating to a notch higher than this one. Herzfeld returned with Bill Stanton Project (2003, TV-series), Dr. Vegas (2004, TV-series) and theatrically with Bobby Z (2007). De Niro returned in The Score (2001), Burns in Sidewalks of New York (2001). 15 Minutes is rotten at 32 % with a 4.4/10 critical average on Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of 15 Minutes?