The Negotiator

The film was largely based on the events surrounding the St. Louis pension fund scandal of 1988. In the 1988 case, the ex-policeman, Anthony D. Daniele, had just been sentenced to eight years in prison for stealing from the police and fire department pension fund via a kickback scheme that cost the fund $333,000. The scheme involved the paying of artificially high commissions to a brokerage firm and receiving kickbacks. The sentence also required Daniele to pay back $200,000. The attorney with the firm was sentenced to nine years and the other participants, who pleaded out, were sentenced to serve between six months to three years.

Although he was not a negotiator, Daniele, like the Danny Roman character, had been a member of the police hostage-response team. The day after sentencing, he went to the office of the man who exposed him, John Frank, vice president of the city police board, and took him hostage. As with the film, this standoff took place on a high floor of a high-rise office building. The stand-off lasted 15 hours before Daniele gave up.

Police negotiators and entry teams conduct their activities independent of one another so that the negotiator doesn't inadvertently let the hostage taker know what the entry team is doing.

In the Blu-ray, the 75th anniversary variant of the Warner Bros. Pictures logo is plastered at the beginning with the silent version of the 2003 variant. However, closing 1992 variant is retained at the end of the film.

Featured in Siskel & Ebert: Saving Private Ryan/The Parent Trap/Jane Austen's Mafia!/Disturbing Behavior (1998)