Miami Blues

Alec Baldwin sports a great haircut in Miami Blues and knows it. He struts and swaggers through the movie like the cock of the walk, having a high old time and giving us one, too. It's an exhilarating, watch-this performance that can't help but call attention to itself but luckily happens to fit the character.

The character isn't so much fun. He's a happy-go-lucky psycho just sprung from prison and landed in Miami, where he brushes off a Hare Krishna acolyte in the airport by breaking his finger (the poor guy dies of shock). At his hotel he orders up a hooker (Jennifer Jason Leigh); they hit it off and pair up, mainly because `Princess Not-So-Bright' has trouble with independent thought. Then Baldwin is off and running through Dade and Broward Counties, stealing wallets and identities, staging impromptu holdups, and running giddily amok.

Tired old cop Fred Ward picks up his scent, and even shares a meal of many brews and Leigh's pork chops with the couple. But Baldwin turns the tables and ambushes Ward in his ratty old residential hotel, putting him in the hospital. The upside is that now Baldwin's got a new identity – Ward's – with a gun and a badge to prove it. Flamboyant and reckless, he continues his felonious spree like an overgrown kid playing cops and robbers. But he can't keep it up forever, not even in the anything-goes milieu of South Beach....

Miami Blues is drawn from a crime novel by Charles Willeford, who wrote (he died before the picture was adapted) in the playful, inventive Elmore Leonard vein. There's not much plot, just enough to hold together the characters, which it's about (and the movie's full of quirky characters, memorably including Shirley Stoller). But, though Ward gets top billing and Leigh flashes her credentials as a graduate of the Meryl Streep Academy of Accents, it's Baldwin's movie. If you're fond of ham, you're in for a feast.

This has a mean edge to it which usually doesn't excite me, but I really like this movie, because the meanness is tempered with comedy. It's pure entertainment, one of the fastest-moving 97 minutes you will find, thanks to a good combination of violence and humor.

The three main characters in here are all low-life scumbags but interesting and definitely fun to watch. Alec Baldwin plays a psycho thug and exhibits a good flair for comedy, which he has pursed several times in movies after this one. He's also a legitimately tough guy, or at least sounds like one. Jennifer Jason Leigh, perhaps the all-time female sleazoid in movies, is a lame-brained prostitute. I was very impressed with her southern accent.

Fred Ward is a strange cop in pursuit, one who has problems with his false teeth! Hey, this IS kind of an odd crime movie.

Despite the above, the violence in here can get rough with a few unpredictable happenings that will get your attention. There's also a good soundtrack, capped off at the end by Norman Greenbaum's classic "Spirit In The Sky."

'Miami Blues' fans nod at each knowingly like they share a secret. For some reason this super cool movie isn't all that well known by most movie buffs, but those that appreciate it see it for the highly original and quirky piece of work that it is. Writer/director George Armitage served his apprenticeship with exploitation king Roger Corman in the early 70s, as did Jonathan Demme who co-produced. If you like Demme's mid-period movies like 'Something Wild' and 'Married To The Mob' you'll love 'Miami Blues'. Armitage even uses Demme's mascot Charles Napier, the craggy faced character actor beloved by Russ Meyer nuts. The movie is based on a book by Charles Willeford which features his regular protagonist Hoke Mosely. Quentin Tarantino is a major Willeford fan, and much of 'Miami Blues' prefigures Tarantino's fresh mix of crime and comedy. Mosely is played by Fred Ward who gives one of his very best performances. Alec Baldwin also lucks out as Junior. You'll rarely see either actor as good as this anywhere else. Both of them are just brilliant in this movie, as is Jennifer Jason Leigh. The three of them together are just a joy to watch. Add to that small supporting roles by Napier, Nora Dunn ('Three Kings') and Shirley Stoler ('The Honeymoon Killers') and it's a film buffs dream. You even get a totally pointless cameo by cult favourite Martine Beswick! I don't know why she's even in the movie, but it's alright by me! I always enjoy watching 'Miami Blues' every time I pull it out of my collection. Lots of old favourites lose their appeal as the years go by, not so this one, which just gets better and better to me. Highly recommended fun!

It's hard to peg this movie. "Miami Blues" seems to dance along the lines of black comedy, quasi-psycho thriller and pastel noir. And it's offbeat, to say the least; something like this doesn't just come along every day. But the comedic elements didn't work for me; I guess I was just never in sync with its sense of humor.

I was much more interested in Jennifer Jason Leigh's character, of the three (Ward and Baldwin are certainly no amateurs). Her character's not bright, but just sweet enough to make you feel bad when she's emotionally abused. It'd be an understatement to say she walks away with this movie.

5/10

You know what this reminds me of? Godard's "Breathless," one of the first of the shockingly original Nouvelle Vague flicks of the early 60s. I remember first seeing "Breathless" with some friends in a theater in Ithaca, NY, and emerging arguing about what it meant. I don't mean trying to identify any great load of symbolism or moral lesson it might be towing behind it. I just mean, what happened, and why? As I recall we decided that "Breathless" was an "existential" movie and didn't really need to be specific about what was going on. It was a story about a man making a life choice. You can be or do anything you want, said Sartre, and you can break all the rules -- as long as you're willing to take the consequences.

In "Miami Blues" the Belmondo part is played by Alec Baldwin, a guy fresh out of prison who has chosen a life of wilful disobedience. His girl friend (who really ought not to be in college) is a part-time hooker with aspirations that are utterly bourgeois. Jennifer Jason Lee wants to live with her husband and babies in a house with a white picket fence. Fred Ward, looking grizzled and great, is a homicide detective whom Baldwin clobbers and whose identity he steals.

I don't know why certain things happen. For instance, I have no idea how or why Baldwin manages to dig up Ward's home address, then goes there and beats hell out of him, and winds up stealing his false teeth, handcuffs and other cop accoutrements. What was THAT all about? I'll give one more example. Baldwin is in a convenience store and stumbles on an armed robbery. "I'm the police! Drop that gun and walk out of here!" he shouts -- and threatens the armed robber with a jar of spaghetti sauce.

See, in an existentialist movie like this, the characters don't really need to have motives. They do whatever they feel like doing.

There IS continuity though, even if in its details the movie makes very little sense. The characters are consistent, and there is a rudimentary plot, engaging and amusing without being in any way memorable.

I did enjoy the movie though, even the second time around, or maybe even MORE the second time around, since I'd learned not to expect an abundance of logic in the narrative.

The acting of the three principles is also admirable. Alec Baldwin had just appeared in "The Hunt for Red October," in which he struck me as not much more than a handsome leading man. Here, he's a different character entirely. Watch him as he struts down the street, arms swinging jauntily, grinning through pain, happily throwing off non sequiturs in dramatic situations. ("Do you own a suede coat?" he asks a criminal before murdering him.) Lee is more than childlike. She's positively childish with her overflowing emotions. I loved Fred Ward in this. He's full of quirks and rarely seems to be taking the role seriously. Instead of soaking his precious false teeth in -- what is that stuff, Polydent? -- he soaks them overnight in a glass of left-over booze.

Interesting exercise in style and acting.