| Night Falls on Manhattan | | Cast : | Andy Garcia, Lena Olin, Richard Dreyfuss | | Director : | Sidney Lumet | | Studio : | Paramount Studio | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby | | Released Date : | May 16, 1997 | | DVD Released Date : | November 17, 1998 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), French (Dubbed), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | R (Restricted) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | February 22, 2005 | | Summary | Decent Noo Yawk Corruption Melodrama, But.... | Content
 | .....is Ron Lieberman the prototypical overacting DA in all of these crime and punishment dramas and who told Dreyfuss that he could channel Allan Dershowitz?
The Story: Two cops are staking out the most wanted drug dealer in Harlem--one ready for retirement, the other street wise and youthful. They are itching to get this scum off the streets and into the pen, so when their snitch tells them that the dealer is in the house they decide to make their move, search warrant in hand, guns raised. The younger cop radios in for back-up before the duo goes up. The dope dealer is however ready for them. He blasts through the door with a semi-automatic which riddles the old cop with bullets and finds an escape by killing two policemen with a silencer and stealing an unattended police cruiser...by the time the dealer escapes 3 districts of cops are on the scene.
The district attorney assigns neophyte assistant under-District attorney Andy Garcia the case to get this guy, because the DA figures it's nothing but good publicity if the son of the cop who got riddled with bullets try the case to get the dealer off the streets...good publicity could mean re-election (even campaigning for the mayor's seat) to the DA. The under DA does a great job of prosecuting the drug dealing and bests the Defense's Dershowitzian attorney, which makes him the 'it Boy' in the city. Because the DA gets sick, Garcia runs for the DA's position and he wins....that's when the stuff starts hitting the fan.
I know this is a story whose plot has often been trod, but it makes for an entertaining view time anyway; you DO get the feel that the makers really didn't know what to do with some of the co-stars. Lena Olin, who seems too mature to play the smitten lover role here, (but is still babelicious, dig?) initially comes off as someone who is gonna turn in the Garcia's dad because of that forged Search warrant, but she melts: Gandolfini seems like he's about to rat on his partner for taking some kick backs, but he ends up shooting himself in the head instead....their facial expressions didn't match what they were gonna do. They must've been writing script and dialog along the way...anyway you can get a load of Junior Soprano Chianese playing a judge (of all things) and a youngish Gandolfini playing street cop. |
| Rating | | | Date | June 26, 2004 | | Summary | Awesome legal battle with one's conscionce | Content
| I just watched this movie on TV, and I would definitely wanna see it again one day. Garcia is brilliant and shows strong character facettes in acting. The movie is about more than the legal ins and outs of corruption and partnership. It's about the fact that one has to stay a human being in life. |
| Rating | | | Date | August 16, 2003 | | Summary | Justice does not always follow the strict letter of the law. | Content
| This 1997 film is based on a novel by James Daley and directed by Sidney Lumet, who also wrote the screenplay. It's a fast-moving police procedural with constantly shifting questions about the law, political favors and what is really right and wrong. There are quite a few obstacles in the path of righteousness, but in the end I was satisfied with the conclusion, which shows that justice does not always follow the strict letter of the law. Andy Garcia stars as a young assistant district attorney whose father, Ian Holm, is a cop who's been injured in a shootout with a drug dealer, played by Shiek Mamud-Bey. Ron Liebman, the District Attorney, lets Garcia prosecute the case, which seems to be simple. But the defense lawyer, played by Richard Dreyfus, introduces the concept of police corruption. And so, even though the outcome of the case is clear, other issues come into play, especially since the young prosecutor's own father might be involved. The film moved fast, the plot deepening as the story moved along. And it was nice to recognize two actors who later went on to fame in The Sopranos: James Gandolfini is cast a cop and Dominic Chianese, who plays Uncle Junior, is cast as the judge. The story held my interest, the acting good and the ending was satisfactory and believable. You'll enjoy it if you like cop dramas. Recommended. |
| Rating | | | Date | January 02, 2003 | | Summary | Implausible Plot + Distracting Casting | Content
| Watching this movie in late 2002 makes it difficult to avoid indulging in typecasting. Wow - there's Bilbo Baggins and Tony Soprano, sitting in a car together!! Hey, isn't that Uncle Junior Soprano playing the Judge? Well, it's obviously not Sidney Lumet's fault - he had no idea when he made this movie that those actors would end up in such hugely popular roles. As for the movie itself, other reviewers here have remarked about the implausible plot, which is mainly silly due to the unlikelihood of a lowly assistant DA suddenly having a career zoom up to the highest office of DA solely on one case. As for the case itself, for the cop-killing drug dealer, I found the whole thing laughable, and the part of the drug dealer was written and played as a horribly one-dimensional stereotypical character. The whole "morally-conflicted prosecutor" concept wouldn't seem so boring now if we hadn't already been pounded over the head with it on TV in the last 5 years or so - "Law and Order", etc have managed to make the legal process interminably boring for me, and I am going to avoid any such movies or shows like the plague for the time being. |
| Rating | | | Date | April 14, 2001 | | Summary | Overlooked, Masterpiece | Content
| This film was totally overlooked at the Oscars, especially Andy Garcia, (who seems to get overlooked a lot) and the brilliant directing of sydney Lumett. The screenplay in this film is great, and so is the story,(very realistic). I highly recommend this movie as I'm sure anyone would appreciate all the fine performances. |
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