Date: Fri 29-Sep-1995

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Illustration: C

Location: A-11

Quick Words:

Suspects-Singer-Byrne-Spacey

Full Text:

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"Suspects" Carries Tarantino Influence

By Trey Paul Alexander III

On the Bantam Cinema's program notes for The Usual Suspects , a new crime film

from unknown director Bryan Singer, the movie's complex narrative is compared

to the convoluted plot of the Humphrey Bogart/Lauren Bacall classic, The Big

Sleep , from director Howard Hanks. It is not an unwarranted comparison, but

this lean offering also has much in common with today's Quentin

Tarantino-influenced cinema milieu.

The Usual Suspects , opening at the Bantam Cinema September 29, is a

densely-plotted affair told mainly in flashback. A fierce explosion on a

California pier claims the lives of over 20 people and serves as the catalyst

for this tale. One of the survivors of the blaze, a crippled criminal

nicknamed "Verbal" (Kevin Spacey), becomes the narrator of the piece as he

unfolds the tale for the cops, who are trying to piece together the mystery

surrounding the events of that fateful evening.

Verbal takes the authorities (and viewers) back several weeks before the

incident, to when the circumstances which eventually led to the pier

conflagration first began to evolve. In New York, five known felons are

rounded up for a police lineup as the cops try to smoke out the culprit of a

gun-running charge. None of the five come clean, but while Verbal, Keaton

(Gabriel Byrne), McManus (Stephen Baldwin), Hockney (Kevin Pollack) and

Fenster (Benicio Del Toro) are left stewing in a cell, the wheels of their

wicked minds begin churning.

"It was all the cops' fault," Verbal explains. "You don't put guys like that

in a room together." Apparently not, for soon the cell mates begin to cook up

a crime scheme that ultimately, and unwittingly, gets them caught up on a

proverbial conveyor belt that leads to the fiery events that began the story.

As the tale unfolds, more and more elements are introduced that add greater

weight to events in Verbal's story. First of all, the intensity of Verbal's

interrogator, Customs agent Kujan (Chazz Palminteri), is fueled by the

knowledge that Keaton was a former cop who turned dirty. Kujan would like

nothing less than to pin the events on the pier to Keaton, whom he views as

one of the lowest, but most dangerous, minds around.

Meanwhile, another investigator stumbles upon another survivor of the blaze, a

Hungarian who mumbles the name "Keyser Soze." This revelation takes things up

another notch, as the authorities seek to uncover the identity of Soze, a

mysterious figure believed to be the mastermind behind heinous crimes untold.

He is the Boogie Man of the underworld, a fabled Hungarian who is often

referred to as "the devil himself."

Once it is known that Keyser Soze may have shown his face at the pier, the

cops push even harder to solve the mystery. Thus, the later half of the film

becomes obsessed with the question, "Who is Keyser Soze?"

Tarantino's style is evoked by the film's meaty, eclectic assemblage of main

characters. Their profanity-laced sparrings is right out of Reservoir Dogs or

Pulp Fiction , but that is not to say it's an outright copy. Director Singer

and his screenwriter, Christopher McQuarrie, have carved out a slightly

different niche in this genre by making their characters thoroughly

interesting to the audience, but keeping up from becoming emotionally attached

to any of them.

While some may feel this to be a weakness, it is definitely one of the film's

strengths. It doesn't ask us to sympathize with these criminals or excuse what

they do. The filmmakers instead convince us to get wrapped up in the mystery

of "Who is Keyser Soze?", a question that becomes utterly more interesting as

the motion picture runs on. By the time the film is over, it will have won you

over.

The Usual Suspects is rated R, for frequent profanity and explicit dialogue.

It also contains some graphic violence, although nothing as strong as that in

Pulp Fiction . However, the spectre of Pulp Fiction is always present, thus

many audiences may lie uncomfortably in wait - as I did - cringing as the

thought of when the next gruesome scene of violence would occur.