![]() For decades, the revered Hollywood actor is known for his aura which sometimes overwhelms the narrative dimensions. And, this is perfectly established through Robert Mitchum’s non-performance. The film’s tension comes from the awareness that Coyle is no brainiac who has no idea or doesn’t care about the strong forces gathered around him. The film strictly refuses to indulge in any sort of conventional, fatal violence for embellishing the dramatic purpose. ![]() The Friends of Eddie Coyle is the kind of low-key, intelligent character exploration which stands as the testament to the glorious standards of 70s Hollywood cinema (it’s almost impossible to imagine such films being made under studio banners). Then, there’s Dave Foley (Richard Jordan), a crafty Federal agent who hopes Coyle will rat out his friends in desperation over the prison stretch. There’s Dillon (Peter Boyle), a pragmatic bartender with strong roots in the underworld, who figures out the connection between Eddie and Jimmy Scalise. Eddie’s anxieties about a doomed future pushes him to interact with other complex individuals of criminal underworld, but there’s nothing generic in how these interactions evolve. Eddie is buying guns from the guy to pass on to his ‘friends’: a group of smug bank robbers, led by Jimmy Scalise (Alex Rocco).Īlthough Eddie remains as the connecting thread to the narrative’s striking characters, he can’t be labeled as the protagonist in the traditional sense. He earlier provides no-nonsense wisdom, earned through years of hard experiences, to a young, reckless gun-seller Jackie Brown (Steven Keats). Eddie wants to evade the impending imprisonment and make some money for his family, before being forced into retirement. He lives in the cramped quarters with his wife and three children with a stolid, resigned expression. Iconic actor Robert Mitchum plays Eddie Coyle aka Eddie ‘Fingers’, an aging low-level runner for the mob who is facing two-year stretch in prison for a stolen-liquor rap in New Hampshire. Similar to The Friends of Eddie Coyle: Thief - A Crafty, Existential Heist Thriller With Criterion release and glowing reviews from contemporary cinephiles, this tale of low-lives and their shifting loyalties occupies an important place in the celebrated canon of 70’s crime films (which includes The French Connection, Mean Streets, Dirty Harry, Get Carter, The Getaway, Charley Varrick, etc). What now makes Eddie Coyle distinct was back then considered as tedious repetition. It stayed perfectly truthful to the novel’s under-dramatized, laconic nature. However, The Friends of Eddie Coyle was received with disdain and disappointment. Peter Yates was brought in to take the directorial rein, who was well known for his meticulous aesthetics and mastery of technique, witnessed in British heist thriller Robbery (1967) and San Francisco-set crime feature Bullitt (1968). As a screenwriter, Monash spectacularly brings alive the clever and gritty dialect of Higgins’ novel. Monash also served as the producer who produced acclaimed films like Slaughterhouse-Five and Carrie. The novel was adapted by Paul Monash, the winner of Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award for lifetime achievement in television. Higgins’ 1974 novel Coogan’s Trade was adapted by Andrew Dominik under the title ‘Killing Them Softly’). The Friends of Eddie Coyle is based on his 1970 novel which was a restrained and unglamorized study of low-level thieves, mobsters and cops (Mr. He was the famous Boston crime novelist (and one of key figures in American crime fiction) before Dennis Lehane. Higgins was a multi-faceted individual who took on the role of columnist, professor, lawyer, and author. Before this particular setting wholly led to a sub-genre of its own, there was the much-cherished The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973), a multi-dimensional character study and crime/drama, directed by British film-maker Peter Yates. Clint Eastwood’s Mystic River (2003), Martin Scorsese’s The Departed (2006), and Ben Affleck’s Gone Baby Gone (2007) and Town (2010) have picturized the despair, miseries of Boston criminals in a way that’s as marvelous and moving as the tales of Greek Tragedy. From crumbling housing sectors, overcrowded bus-stops to broken-down public parks and gloomy pubs, the suggestion of urban rot finely reflects the characters’ struggles to survive in the fringes of gangland. What’s more fascinating about Boston-set crime films is the realization of a mundanity or unadorned reality. Although the characters survive through unlawful means, there’s no attempt to turn them into brave outlaws. There’s a kind of world-weariness attached to the characters of crime dramas set in Boston, Massachusetts.
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