CITY HALL

For half of the movie, I felt like I was trying to decipher the adults in a Charlie Brown cartoon, "wah wah wah jobs wah wah bank exchange wah wah."

City Hall is the first speed bump I've hit in my private Al Pacino film festival.  I love the sense of immersion in his movies, where you start to forget yourself and become completely involved in the story.  Unfortunately, City Hall constantly reminds the viewer of the barrier between audience and film with its over-complicated dialogue and nebulous plot.

In essence, City Hall is not that complex. A little boy and a police officer are shot and killed by a member of the mafia who suspiciously received probation in lieu of jail time. The Deputy Mayor (John Cusack) smells corruption, and spends the movie trying to sniff it out. Unfortunately, our protagonist is a bit of a drag, and forces us to endure his Louisiana accent and tiresome Louisiana jokes.

In contrast, Al Pacino is a charismatic ball of fire as the Mayor of New York City. He practically turns the little boy's funeral into a revival meeting, and wins approval through his bold, politically incorrect approach to politics. He is The Deputy Mayor's hero, and it seems that he is one of the few morally centered men in New York...or is he? We soon learn that the Mayor falls into a bit of a moral grey area, where a little fudging in the ethics department is sometimes used for the greater good. Of course this approach is bound to backfire, and the movie illustrates the tragic results.