Bad Lieutenant
| Bad Lieutenant | |
|---|---|
| File:Bad Lieutenant.jpg Film poster for Bad Lieutenant | |
| Directed by | Abel Ferrara |
| Written by | Abel Ferrara Zoë Lund |
| Produced by | Mary Kane Edward Pressman |
| Starring | Harvey Keitel Victor Argo Paul Calderon |
| Cinematography | Ken Kelsch |
| Music by | Joe Delia |
| Distributed by | Lions Gate Films |
Release dates | November 20, 1992 |
Running time | 96 min. |
| Language | English |
Bad Lieutenant is a 1992 film crime drama directed by Abel Ferrara and starring Harvey Keitel as the titular "bad lieutenant". The screenplay was co-written by actress-model Zoë Tamerlis Lund (credited as Zoë Lund). She also played a small role in the film. Lund had been discovered by Ferrara and had starred in his earlier film, Ms. 45.
Plotline
We first see Keitel's nameless character advising his two sons on how to answer back to their aunt Wendy, which serves as a foreshadowing of his behavior through the rest of the film, in which he takes a twisted delight in humiliating women, most notoriously in the scene where he stops a couple of under-age girls without a driving license and demands sexual favors in exchange for letting them off.
The "Bad Lieutenant" also is a drug-using gambler who finds himself plunged into debt when the New York Mets win the National League Championship Series after trailing the Los Angeles Dodgers and former Met Darryl Strawberry 3-0. The Mets' comeback is a sort of "minor miracle" that defies the Lieutenant's lack of faith and parallels his eventual redemption. The Lieutenant is also regularly linked with the prodigal Strawberry. The turning point in the film arrives when the Lieutenant investigates the rape of a nun and uses this as a chance to confront his inner demons and perhaps achieve redemption.
Alternate Versions
Blockbuster Video, the largest video rental company in the United States, had a policy prohibiting the purchase and rental of NC-17 movies. An R rated cut was created specifically so that Blockbuster would rent out the film. The R rated version is a full 5 minutes shorter than the original.
Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page got upset when he found out that the song Kashmir was sampled in the Schoolly D song Signifying Rapper, which is played several times during the movie. The sample had not been cleared by Schoolly D's record company. A lawsuit forced the removal of the song from the soundtrack on some VHS and all DVD versions of the film.
Critical evaluation
- Mark Kermode has mentioned that the movie was praised as "a powerful tale of redemptive Catholicism". [1]
- Roger Ebert stated: "in the bad lieutenant, Keitel has given us one of the great screen performances in recent years" [2]
Life Imitating Art
Suburbanite Steve Chapman has been known to base his entire abrasive repetoire from Keitel's character in Bad Lieutenant. However, he only demeans neighborhood children and those incabable of retorting to his incendiary derision.[3]