Good concept, poorly executed.

Crappy film

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

I've often wondered why Bruce Dern chose not to be credited with his appearance in this movie. The green glass at the test site emits enough gamma radiation to fog the x-ray photograph of Allison Pond's foot. Nick Nolte scoops up a handful of the same green glass shards and wraps them in his handkerchief, yet a few minutes later he is stopped at a road block where an MP scans him with a Geiger counter which doesn't get any reading. How come? Continuity error at Ellery Coolidge's funeral, the three surviving members of the police squad place their hats on Ellery's coffin as a mark of respect, yet in the very next frame Nick Nolte is seen wearing his hat, did he bring two hats to the funeral?

Lee Tamahori's Mulholland Falls gets a bad rap in some circles for being boring and uneventful despite its charismatic cast and opulent setting that's ripe for peppy action sequences. I think they are confusing boring with the concept of a paced and very slow burn, yet one with all the texture and richness of an action film, one that admirably decides to take the route of the old school noir, with loving care put into story and character, two elements which the action and violence live simply to serve, and not to take the driver's seat against. Or it's simply not some people's cup of tea, which is totally okay too. Personally though, I love a good L.A. cop yarn that has a story to go with the toughness. This one bears striking similarity to 2013's Gangster Squad, which also had Nick Nolte playing a 1940's Los Angeles cop in charge of a squad that operates outside of the law. That film is pure cheese, all razzle dazzle and no plot. Mulholland Falls falls somewhere between Gangster Squad and L.A. Confidential; not quite up to delving into the serpentine intrigue of the latter, yet infinitely more interested in telling a worthwhile story than the former. And tell it does, in high flying style that only a crime film set in that time period can do. Nick Nolte plays Hoover, a whiskey voiced, take no prisoners LAPD badass who heads up an elite anti corruption task force that operates far outside the red tape and pretty much do what they want to stomp out corruption. His squad consists of Michael Madsen, Chris Penn and a scene stealing Chazz Palminteri as the oddball of the bunch, with serious impulse control issues. A straight up dream cast of tough guys, and although I'll admit that Penn and Madsen are a tad underused, their presence alone boosts the film's credentials into an epic pantheon. The film revs up with a kicker of an opening sequence in which the squad severely roughs up a troublesome mobster (an uncredited William L. Petersen). "This isn't America, it's Los Angeles" Nolte growls to him, stating the tone of perverse lawlessness which permeated the city back then. Soon he's drawn into a tawdry scandal involving the murder of a young prostitute (Jennifer Connelly) who he previously had encounters with. The search leads him far and wide, crossing paths a sleazy photographer (Andrew Mcarthy), a dying air force tycoon (John Malkovich manages to ham it up even at his most laid back) and his stern lieutenant (Treat Williams). Nolte also has a poor jilted wife played nicely by Melanie Griffith in limited but effective screen time. The plot is hard boiled to the bone, with Nolte in one his most gruff mid career roles and loving every stressed out, rage fuelled second of it. The conclusion is his show, with a whacked out Palminteri in tow for a spectacular sequence set aboard a doomed military aircraft. The cast gets deeper, believe it or not, with Daniel Baldwin, Ed Lauter, Kyle Chandler, Titus Welliver, Louise Fletcher, Rob Lowe and Bruce Dern contributing gamely. This one's got style on it's side and then some, replicating a sense of time and place with the torque ramped up to near Sin City levels. Admittedly not perfect, but a pure and simple blast of a flick, in my opinion.

I've found that if I somehow leave the room for food or a break, the film probably isn't really very good. Good or better keep me glued. I never left my seat during Mulholland Falls and from the opening sequences with the four LA cops in hats riding up sunny 1950's Hollywood Hills in a big black convertible, I was hooked.Hooked especially by a galvanizing, snappy performance by Nick Nolte as Hoover, head of his squad of four, a man of action before words, a man who simmers and glares and loves with passion: it's a performance that somehow should have been given more attention at the time of the film's release, a cops and crime film which somehow didn't match the zeitgeist of its period, lost in the shuffle.Almost every noir mystery past 1949 is a retread of some sort (Chinatown being a major exception),but what makes Mulholland Falls work is not the plot but the heady collection of dedicated supporting actors whether Melanie Griffith as a quietly restrained wife of a cop, or Chazz Palminteri, the wry right hand partner who talks about his psychiatrist without hesitation.The mystery deals with corruption in high places, of course, and John Malkovich and Treat Williams are good supports for Nolte to play against--but it's Nolte's show from start to finish and his intensity nails it!

This film looks fantastic and is chock-full of great actors(Nick Nolte, Melanie Griffith, Chris Penn, Bruce Dern, John Malkovich, Chazz Palminteri, and more).A low-brow Chinatown. The 'look' of this film, and Nick Nolte's performance are the only things that are even close to the level of that earlier, finer work.However, this is well worth a view - especially if you are looking for a throwback escape from all the new release trash that's out there today.Sidenote: Jennifer Connelly's breasts should be the standard of perfection.Some of the fine actors have to take a backseat because there are just so many involved here. Nolte, however, is the star of this show, and his performance is definitely noteworthy.It's Nick's performance, and Tomahori's attention to graphic detail that make this film above average. The plot is an atomic bomb.You'll like this if you liked: Black Dahlia, L.A. Confidential(note: this movie is nowhere near that level), Miller's Crossing and Basic Instinct.64/100