Movie recommendation: Falling Down (1993)
Falling Down
Runtime: 1h 53m
Budget: $25m
Tomatometer: 75% 6.8/10 (Audience 88% 4/5)
IMDB Rating: 7.6 / 10 - 188k ratings (Top 1000 7.5/10)
Language: English
Michael Douglas plays Foster, a man with 1950's era mentality who is having a really bad day. He just wants to make it across LA in time for his daughters birthday. The increasing setbacks he faces from modern 1990's society see him increasingly break down into a string of violence episodes. But his violence is guided by his 1950's era set of morals. And in spite of Fosters nerdy 50's appearance, he is surprisingly good at the modern violence thing. Does the movie glorify the violent anti-hero? Not so fast.
Robert Duvell plays Prendergast. A retiring cop on desk duty who is the only who connects the violent dots together. But because he is a retiring desk jockey who is clearly too afraid to take on a real cops job, almost no one listens to him. Almost no one. There is one person on the force who knows Prendergast has a lot more going on than people realize.
This story is an interesting analysis of the male psyche under pressure. Foster reacts with anger and aggression. Predergast bends to the point of being a doormat, and he just lies there and takes it.
What the movie uncovers at the end, is there is a middle ground, that handling life's setbacks sometimes requires patience and grace, and sometimes requires assertiveness and boldness, and that wisdom is knowing what you can and should try to change and what you can and should try to accept.
This movie has always been a favorite of mine, because I love a little bit of the old ultra violence, and I love an unusual ending that makes you rethink about the entire movie with a new perspective.
But what is really interesting, is this movie touches on the 1950's era males ideals and expectations men are still raised with today, and the outrage that arises when that sense of entitlement goes unfulfilled.
Absolutely one of the best movies I've ever seen. I've always thought D-FENS would make a great Batman villain.
Joel Schumacher going from this to Batman Forever is pretty funny.
Schumacher took Batman in a more light hearted direction after Burton, which in hindsight now seems really weird, even more so after Schumacher made two fantastic movies that tended towards dark comedy (The Lost Boys & Falling Down.)
At the time, I think the reviewers were saying it made sense for a movie to be more cartoonish, because it was effectively based on a cartoon and a comic.
It was counter to the trends, but it did make sense. There was a lot of silly things in the early Batman comics, not to mention the existence of 60s TV Batman.
I just asked OpenAI for a list of the worst movies... Batman & Robin made the cut according to our AI overlord.
There is no definitive answer to this question as people have different opinions. However, some of the movies that have been commonly cited as being among the worst include "Plan 9 from Outer Space" (1959), "Gigli" (2003), "Showgirls" (1995), "Batman & Robin" (1997), and "The Room" (2003).
That film has been one of my favorites for a long time. The cinematography is significantly above average, really makes you feel that oppressive >40'C city pavement heat that sets everything off. Drinker has a glowing review of the film on his channel.
Lots a plot spoilers and spittle in that review :)
I can't open the link in my current WiFi network, but it sounds interesting. Who's Drinker?
Critical Drinker. He’s one of those Anti-SJW movie channels. Like the type that say “go woke go broke.”
God, that lazy fudgewit. I'd rather pass blood than listen to someone try to be as popular as RLM by wasting hours of my life complaining about women and minorities. Guess it's easier and pays better than the novel-writing.
I'd call it an anti-shitty-movie channel. He did do a seven part series on why modern films that drop plot and character depth and time tested writing techniques in favor of political lectures can't seem to make bank, though.
Nah. He’s pretty comfortably in that MauLer type of space. Sort of late-2010s pseudo-analysis “video essays” complaining about movies having “forced diversity” type of thing.
'The Critical Drinker' is Will Jordan, author of the Ryan Drake novels, which are a good bit of fun if you're into the spy/thriller genre. He reviews film and television on his youtube channel and I find my own taste jives rather well with his which is why I follow him. If he plugs a movie I make it a point to check it out and so far he has never steered me wrong.
This is a offtopic, but also a pretty weird coincidence. One of my favorite reaction channels, You, Me, & The Movies, just watched Falling Down yesterday!
@Hotpants, is there a reason this movie is suddenly getting attention again after all these years, or is Baader-Meinhof just striking me again?
I think it's Baader-Meinhof.
I was originally going to write a review of Ambulance (which I liked but has mixed reviews), but there really wasn't anything interesting to say, so I switched to one of my favorite movies (which also has mixed reviews).