8.13.2007

Exhibit 1.17


I'm pretty sure that picture is from Carlito's Way. It could also be Sylvester Stallone in Cobra, I can't tell. In any case, I happened to turn on the television this weekend and stumble upon the first few minutes of Carlito's Way, which I've seen a half dozen times but now appreciate on a much deeper level. I only watched five minutes or so, and I am ready to say the movie is one of the all-time great five minute movies. No matter what five minutes you watch, you're going to be entertained by any or all of:

  • Pacino actually eating the sets. He walks with so much swagger in this movie that at times he's practically horizontal. At the beginning of the movie, Pacino is an actor, but by the end of the movie he is the character Al Pacino has played in every movie since. In some ways, Carlito's Way actually ruined his career as he apparently thinks he's still playing Carlito. That Al Pacino can play Shylock in The Merchant of Venice and a Puerto Rican gangster without changing his demeanor or accent is what makes him so fascinating. I love Al Pacino.
  • Sean Penn's character who I think is actually named Jewish Lawyer. Look at him:
  • It's fun to imagine Pacino playing the lawyer and Carlito and holding conversations with himself. Does anyone else do this during Al Pacino movies? Anyone? No? Try it some time with Dog Day Afternoon. If you try it while watching Scent of a Woman, it's like watching the tape from The Ring.
  • Penolope Ann Miller as Carlito's girlfriend/stripper trying desperately not to get eaten by Al Pacino. I'm pretty sure I've never called anyone this before, and I don't really know what it means, but Penolope Ann Miller is a drip. Her name even sounds bland. Yet somehow in the early 1990s she was in movies where Al Pacino, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Richard Tyson were madly in love with her. If at any point in her career someone had told her to go by just Penolope Ann, she'd probably be Julia Roberts right now. Keep this in mind when David Collin is winning his 2nd Pulitzer.

  • Viggo Mortensen as lowlife, wheelchair-bound snitch who at one point cries hysterically and complains about how he can't "hump" anymore. Um, I'm pretty sure this performance wasn't on the reel he sent in for TLOTR.

  • Carlito saying something crazy. Just read IMDb's memorable quotes page.

Seriously, it's that good. Heather and I caught it just as Pacino was doing some of his strutting and watched through when he yells, "HERE COME THE PAIN!" Needless to say, I've pretty much been saying that all day, going so far as to run it through babelfish to see if it sounds cooler in Spanish. It does.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFGhgDa2c7E