Carlito’s Way (1993)

Directed by Brian De Palma. Starring Al Pacino, Sean Penn, Penelope Ann Miller, Luis Guzmán, John Leguizamo, Jorge Porcel, James Rebhorn, Viggo Mortensen, Ingrid Rogers, Frank Minucci, Richard Foronjy, Joseph Siravo, John Ortiz. [R]

De Palma reteams with Pacino for another gangland saga and manages to top Scarface; Pacino again plays a Latino gangster (Puerto Rican this time, instead of Cuban), but after a five-year prison stint, he actually wants to go straight—you know what they say about good intentions, though. Script by David Koepp (based on two Edwin Torres novels) is full of familiar scenes and types, and some of the dialogue could have used a punch-up (the final piece of narration from Pacino is hoary enough to earn laughs), but its basic tale of a reformed crook undone by an outdated code of honor is a solid one, and De Palma brings his usual flashy bag of tricks to make the cinematic qualities jump off the screen. Pacino is an arresting screen presence (as expected), though he seems to be wavering between his sybaritic Scarface thug and his cantankerous Scent of a Woman colonel; Penn, nearly unrecognizable as his sleazy cokehead lawyer, is even more exuberant, a dangerous high-wire act of a performance; Miller, sexy but vulnerable, brings more to the “gangster moll” role than most others before her. The climactic chase starting at a nightclub and ending up in Grand Central Station is a virtuoso piece of filmmaking, but the suspense is diluted because the audience already knows the outcome from the opening credits!

78/100