Subject: The beat goes on via Ebert- WSJ-Rolling Stone
From: <[email-masked]>
To: <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 16 Feb 2012 18:34:08 -0500 (EST)

FRIENDS,
 
I promise, I will stop soon.  But the movement keeps moving...
And I'm assuming you've made many new friends since my last email.  

Send them over.

Please spread the word and read the great reviews at the bottom of this  
email (did you expect me to send you the bad one?)  It's all word of mouth  
from hereon in...
 
Many thanks.
 
O

 
RAMPART EXPANDS THIS  WEEKEND:

NEW  YORK CITY 
_Landmark Sunshine_ 
(http://www.landmarktheatres.com/market/newyork/sunshinecinema.htm)  — 143 East Houston Street, New York, NY 
_Lincoln Center_ (http://filmlinc.com/)  — 144 West  65th Street, New York, 
NY 
_AMC Empire 25_ (http://www.amctheatres.com/Empire/)   — 234 West 42nd St., 
New York, NY 
BOSTON 
_Kendall Square Cinema_ 
(http://www.landmarktheatres.com/market/boston/kendallsquarecinema.htm)  — One Kendall Square, Cambridge, MA 
CHICAGO 
_AMC River East  21_ (http://www.amctheatres.com/RiverEast/)  — 322 East 
Illinois Street, Chicago, IL 
_Century 12 Evanston/CinéArts 6 and XD_ 
(http://www.fandango.com/century12evanstoncinéarts6andxd_aaozm/theaterpage)  — 1715 Maple Avenue  Evanston, IL 
DALLAS 
_Cinemark West Plano 20_ 
(http://www.cinemark.com/theatre-detail.aspx?node_id=1521)  — 3800 Dallas Parkway, Plano, TX 
_Angelika Film Center_ 
(http://angelikafilmcenter.com/angelika_index.asp?hID=7915)  — 5321 East Mockingbird Lane, Dallas,  TX 
LOS  ANGELES 
_Arclight Cinemas_ (https://www.arclightcinemas.com/)   — 6360 W. Sunset 
Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 
_The Landmark_ 
(http://www.landmarktheatres.com/market/losangeles/thelandmark.htm)  — 10850 West Pico Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 
_Laemmle Noho 7_ (http://www.laemmle.com/viewtheatre.php?thid=22)  — 5240 
Lankershim Blvd. North Hollywood, CA 
_Century 10 Downtown_ 
(http://www.fandango.com/century10downtown_aajay/theaterpage)  — 555 East Main Street Ventura, CA 
_Laemmle  Playhouse 7_ (http://www.laemmle.com/viewtheatre.php?thid=6)  — 
673 East Colorado Boulevard Pasadena, CA 
_Century Stadium 25 and XD_ 
(http://www.fandango.com/centuryhuntingtonbeachandxd_aattf/theaterpage)  — 7777 Edinger Ave #133 Huntington  Beach, CA 
_Century Huntington Beach and XD_ 
(http://www.fandango.com/centuryhuntingtonbeachandxd_aattf/theaterpage)  — 5240 Lankershim Blvd. North  Hollywood, CA 
_Edwards University Town Center 6_ 
(http://www.fandango.com/edwardsuniversitytowncenter6_aabhi/theaterpage)  — 4245 Campus Drive Irvine,  CA 
_Regency Rancho Niguel 8_ 
(http://www.regencymovies.com/main.php?theaterId=21)  — 25471 Rancho Niguel Road Laguna  Niguel, CA 92677 
_Century Theatres @ The River and XD_ 
(http://www.regencymovies.com/main.php?theaterId=21)  — 71800 California 111  Rancho Mirage, CA 
SAN  FRANCISCO 
_Embarcadero Center Cinema_ 
(http://www.landmarktheatres.com/market/sanfrancisco/embarcaderocentercinema.htm)  — One Embarcadero Center, San  
Francisco, CA 
Everybody's friend, Roger Ebert gives Rampart 4 out  of 4 stars saying: 

Rampart 
BY  ROGER EBERT / February 15, 2012  
Cast & Credits
Dave Brown _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDa
te=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Joan Confrey _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&Fr
omDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Barbara _Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=1915
0101&ToDate=20121231) 
Catherine _Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101
&ToDate=20121231) 
Linda Fentress _Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate
=19150101&ToDate=20121231) 
Kyle Timkins _Ice  Cube_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&
ToDate=20121231) 

Millennium Entertainment presents a film directed by Oren  Moverman. 
 
Written by James Ellroy and Moverman. 
Running time: 
112 minutes. 
 
Rated R (for pervasive language, sexual content and some violence).  
 
 (http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php) 
_Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDate=19150101
&ToDate=20121231)  is leaner in "Rampart," the skin tight over the skull, 
the jawline  defiant. His eyes are busy. He is a cop in the Los Angeles 
police district that  became notorious in 1999 as a cesspool of corruption, but 
this man takes  corruption with him wherever he goes. The movie is co-written 
by the unsurpassed  crime writer James Ellroy, who no doubt knows enough 
stories about Rampart to  write a dozen movies, but his inspiration here is to 
make this cop a stand-alone  character study, isolated within himself. He 
doesn't require the reprehensible  environment of Rampart. He's self-fueled.  
Harrelson is an ideal actor for the role. Especially in tensely wound-up  
movies like this, he implies that he's looking at everything and then 
watching  himself looking. His character, Dave Brown, has no moral center, but he 
has the  survival instincts of a rat, and I say that with all due respect for 
rats. He  always likes to know the way out of a tight corner. He knows an 
angle he can  play or a squirm he can call on. 

Why is he this way? That question helps  explain why the movie is so 
absorbing, because there is no answer. "Rampart"  lacks the usual plot engines 
behind crime films, in which motivation comes from  money, lust or revenge. 
Brown behaves in this film primarily just to do bad  things. 

He reminds me of one of the most evil characters in American  fiction, 
Judge Holden in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, a man who  likes to torture 
and kill for no other reason than simply to cause pain. The  Harrelson of 
"Rampart" could play Judge Holden, and not many actors  could.

He is an overt racist. He has such contempt for women he cannot  always be 
bothered to use them sexually. He was married to two women (_Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&Sear
chType=1&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  and 
_Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=
20121231) ) who are sisters, and apparently this meant so little to all of 
them  that they live in houses next to one another. There was no emotional 
commitment  there for them to engage. He has a daughter by each and is said 
to have once  murdered a rapist because of his feelings for his daughters. 
Only with a man  like Brown would you suspect that was an excuse; more likely, 
he got started  killing the man and didn't feel like stopping.

It's that feeling that  seems to empower Brown when he does the last thing 
Rampart district needs in  1999. Eight years after the brutality against 
Rodney King, Brown is videotaped  while beating a suspect. He seems to approach 
this task like a skilled workman  performing a job he loves. Recently 
there's been a movement to make videotaping  of police officers illegal. That 
would get Dave Brown's vote.

This time  he doesn't seem to have an escape route ready. The district 
attorney's office  sees him as an ideal target, and _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType
=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  is 
finely focused as an assistant DA who has him in her sights. He  also makes the 
error of trying to pick up a defense attorney (_Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=
Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231) ) in just the 
wrong way at just the wrong time. And he casually  insults a black investigator 
for Internal Affairs (_Ice  Cube_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=
19150101&ToDate=20121231) ). 

"Rampart" is deeply embedded in Los Angeles in the  summertime, every day a 
reminder of the desert that waits patiently to take back  the land stolen 
from it by sprinkler systems. It is hot, the sun is blinding,  Brown is 
sweating, he feels rotten. You cannot live forever with amorality and  sadism 
eating away at you. Even other immoral people around you stand back,  because 
they recognize themselves and fear to go that far.

"Rampart" was  directed and co-written with Ellroy by Oren Moverman, whose 
directorial debut  was "_The  Messenger_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=REVIEWS01&TITLESearch=The%20Messenger&ToDate=
20121231) " (2009). He was nominated for an Oscar for that screenplay. It  
also starred _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromD
ate=19150101&ToDate=20121231) , playing an Army veteran whose job is to 
inform the next of kin  that a soldier has been killed. He's training his new 
partner on the job and  advises him not to take it personally: Don't have 
physical contact with anyone,  let alone hug them. Better for you, better for 
them. These are their lives. They  need the news, not a new best friend. 

In that film, Harrelson's  character turns out to have feelings after all. 
He's such a versatile actor,  able to point one way and act in another. We 
know he can do that, and maybe  that's why he's so fascinating in "Rampart." 
Is it really possible for a man to  be as evil and indifferent as Dave 
Brown, and be empty inside? Apparently so.  What made him that way? Maybe nothing 
did. Maybe it's just the way he is.  
_The Wall Street  Journal_ (http://online.wsj.com/home-page)  Arts &  
Entertainment 
'Rampart' 
by John Anderson 
"I'm not a racist," says Dave Brown. "I hate all people equally." You 
believe  half of what he says and, as inhabited by Woody Harrelson, all of what 
he is: A  misanthropic street cop in 1999 Los Angeles who is smoking, 
drinking and  not-eating himself to death, brutalizing suspects and, thanks to 
others just  like him, watching the sun set on his special brand of community 
policing. 

 

 

 
 
They say westerns are out, but writer-director Oren  Moverman has made one, 
in the tradition of "Shane," "The Gunfighter" and "Lonely  Are the Brave," 
stories about men who see the writing on the wall but refuse to  heed it. 
With Mr. Harrelson, Mr. Moverman has created an antihero of epic  proportions 
and indiscretions. Nicknamed "Date Rape" for having avoided  prosecution for 
the murder of a serial rapist, Dave lives next door to his two  ex-wives, 
who happen to be sisters (Cynthia Nixon, Anne Heche) and whose  daughters are 
both sisters and cousins (Brie Larson, Sammy Boyarsky). Having  failed the 
bar exam for an unspecified but probably perverse reason, Dave can  thrust 
and parry with any bureaucrat the city throws at him (Sigourney Weaver,  
Steve Buscemi). They can't touch him. To get Dave, they'd have to capture him on 
 video, beating a black motorist with a blackjack. Which is precisely what  
happens.

The grossly underrated Mr. Harrelson looks menacingly gaunt throughout, and 
 recaptures the intensity he brought to Mr. Moverman's "The Messenger." 
Framing  Dave against the azure Los Angeles sky, or a taco joint, the 
Israeli-born  director puts a fresh spin on Old West-style rugged individualism, and 
it isn't  pretty. But, like Dave's blackjack, it earns our attention. 

 

_Rolling Stone _ (http://www.rollingstone.com/) 
Rolling Stone: star rating  
3.5 out of 4

 
(mailto:?subject=Rampart&body=http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/rampart-20120210)  
(http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/rampart-20120210?print=true) 

By Peter  Travers

As Dave Brown, a sexist, racist, trigger-tempered police officer carving 
out  his own definition of justice on the mean streets of 1999 Los Angeles, 
Woody  Harrelson climbs to the top of the acting mountain. It's a monumental 
portrayal  of a cop in meltdown – bruisingly brilliant and coiled to spring. 
Director Oren Moverman (_The Messenger_ 
(http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/the-messenger-20091112) ), who co-wrote the script  with James 
Ellroy, is a filmmaker with rare skills. He can let us inhale the  toxic 
atmosphere of crime and corruption and then startle us with unexpected  feeling. 
Dave has spent nearly 25 years on the force doing things his way,  bending 
rules out of shape as a matter of course. His record is shadowed by the  
killing of a serial rapist that won him the nickname "Date Rape." But the  
department can no longer turn a blind eye when Dave is caught on camera beating  a 
suspect. Comparisons to the Rodney King incident fill the air, something the 
 department can't abide in light of a recent scandal involving more than 70 
cops  in the Rampart division charged with brutality, evidence tampering 
and  cover-ups. Dave offers no apologies: "I am not a racist. Fact is, I hate 
all  people equally." Assistant district attorney Joan Confrey (Sigourney 
Weaver,  radiating fire and ice) wants Dave's head on a platter. 
In the hands of a lesser director, that would be that. But Moverman cuts  
deeper. Without going soft, he refuses to let us ignore the humanity in Dave. 
 And so we see this cop at home with his wife. Make that two wives. Anne 
Heche  and Cynthia Nixon play the sisters Dave married and divorced in turn, 
having a  daughter with each. Dave is fine sharing the same household, but 
the women are  getting fed up. Dave is allergic to true connection. Yet we get 
the attraction –  such is the force of the cop's appealing-appalling vibe. 
Harrelson dropped 25  pounds to make Dave a lean, mean sex machine. And it 
pays off in magnetism. At a  bar, Dave picks up lawyer Linda Fentress (Robin 
Wright), and we see disaster  coming. It does. But the erotic sparks are 
undeniable. 
Moverman is merciless in laying out Dave's faults.  The great 
cinematographer Bobby Bukowski uses the hard blaze of the L.A. sun to  put Dave under a 
microscope that even investigator Kyle Timkins (Ice Cube) can't  match. And 
as Dave tangles with a homeless informant (Harrelson's  Messenger co-star Ben 
Foster) and his ex-cop guru (a terrific Ned  Beatty), we understand that 
the trajectory of Dave's life is nowhere but down,  down, down. 
Yup, it could have been a bucket of bleak. But the  electric talent of 
Harrelson and Moverman is too exciting to be anything but  exhilarating. These 
two are playing a game of ferocity and feeling that makes  others look like 
rank amateurs. No chance you'll forget Rampart. Only  stupid Oscar voters do 
that. Thanks to Harrelson and Moverman, this baby  stings.

Read more: 
_http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/rampart-20120210#ixzz1mafPBIxp_ 
(http://www.rollingstone.com/movies/reviews/rampart-20120210#ixzz1mafPBIxp)  
Rampart (R)  
Ebert: Users: You:_Rate  this movie right now_ 
(javascript:NewWindow('300','200','/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=userrate&LinkID=93258&Title=Rampart'))

Rampart 
BY  ROGER EBERT / February 15, 2012  
Cast & Credits
Dave Brown _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDa
te=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Joan Confrey _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&Fr
omDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Barbara _Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=1915
0101&ToDate=20121231) 
Catherine _Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1
&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231) 
Linda Fentress _Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate
=19150101&ToDate=20121231) 
Kyle Timkins _Ice  Cube_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&
ToDate=20121231) 

Millennium Entertainment presents a film directed by  Oren Moverman. 
Written by James Ellroy and Moverman. Running time:  112 minutes. Rated R (for 
pervasive language, sexual content and  some violence).  
_Printer-friendly_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20120215/REVIEWS/120219988&template=printart)   » 
_E-mail  this to a friend_ 
(javascript:NewWindow(400,300,'/apps/pbcs.dll/art_tips?Date=20120215&Category=REVIEWS&ArtNo=120219988&SiteData=EB&SectionCat=
AN');)  »  
 (http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php) 
_Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDate=19150101
&ToDate=20121231)  is leaner in "Rampart," the skin tight over the skull, 
the  jawline defiant. His eyes are busy. He is a cop in the Los Angeles 
police  district that became notorious in 1999 as a cesspool of corruption, but  
this man takes corruption with him wherever he goes. The movie is  
co-written by the unsurpassed crime writer James Ellroy, who no doubt  knows enough 
stories about Rampart to write a dozen movies, but his  inspiration here is 
to make this cop a stand-alone character study,  isolated within himself. He 
doesn't require the reprehensible environment  of Rampart. He's self-fueled. 
 
Harrelson is an ideal actor for the role. Especially in tensely  wound-up 
movies like this, he implies that he's looking at everything and  then 
watching himself looking. His character, Dave Brown, has no moral  center, but he 
has the survival instincts of a rat, and I say that with  all due respect 
for rats. He always likes to know the way out of a tight  corner. He knows an 
angle he can play or a squirm he can call on.  

Why is he this way? That question helps explain why the movie is  so 
absorbing, because there is no answer. "Rampart" lacks the usual plot  engines 
behind crime films, in which motivation comes from money, lust or  revenge. 
Brown behaves in this film primarily just to do bad things.  

He reminds me of one of the most evil characters in American  fiction, 
Judge Holden in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, a man  who likes to torture 
and kill for no other reason than simply to cause  pain. The Harrelson of 
"Rampart" could play Judge Holden, and not many  actors could.

He is an overt racist. He has such contempt for women  he cannot always be 
bothered to use them sexually. He was married to two  women (_Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&Sea
rchType=1&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  and 
_Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate
=20121231) ) who are sisters, and apparently this meant so little to all of 
 them that they live in houses next to one another. There was no emotional  
commitment there for them to engage. He has a daughter by each and is said  
to have once murdered a rapist because of his feelings for his daughters.  
Only with a man like Brown would you suspect that was an excuse; more  
likely, he got started killing the man and didn't feel like  stopping.

It's that feeling that seems to empower Brown when he  does the last thing 
Rampart district needs in 1999. Eight years after the  brutality against 
Rodney King, Brown is videotaped while beating a  suspect. He seems to approach 
this task like a skilled workman performing  a job he loves. Recently 
there's been a movement to make videotaping of  police officers illegal. That 
would get Dave Brown's vote.

This  time he doesn't seem to have an escape route ready. The district  
attorney's office sees him as an ideal target, and _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType
=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  is 
finely focused as an assistant DA who has him in her sights.  He also makes the 
error of trying to pick up a defense attorney (_Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=
Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231) ) in just the 
wrong way at just the wrong time. And he casually  insults a black investigator 
for Internal Affairs (_Ice  Cube_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=
19150101&ToDate=20121231) ). 

"Rampart" is deeply embedded in Los Angeles in the  summertime, every day a 
reminder of the desert that waits patiently to  take back the land stolen 
from it by sprinkler systems. It is hot, the sun  is blinding, Brown is 
sweating, he feels rotten. You cannot live forever  with amorality and sadism 
eating away at you. Even other immoral people  around you stand back, because 
they recognize themselves and fear to go  that far.

"Rampart" was directed and co-written with Ellroy by Oren  Moverman, whose 
directorial debut was "_The  Messenger_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=REVIEWS01&TITLESe
arch=The%20Messenger&ToDate=20121231) " (2009). He was nominated for an Oscar for that screenplay.  It 
also starred _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDa
te=19150101&ToDate=20121231) , playing an Army veteran whose job is to 
inform the next of  kin that a soldier has been killed. He's training his new 
partner on the  job and advises him not to take it personally: Don't have 
physical contact  with anyone, let alone hug them. Better for you, better for 
them. These  are their lives. They need the news, not a new best friend. 

In  that film, Harrelson's character turns out to have feelings after all.  
He's such a versatile actor, able to point one way and act in another. We  
know he can do that, and maybe that's why he's so fascinating in  "Rampart." 
Is it really possible for a man to be as evil and indifferent  as Dave 
Brown, and be empty inside? Apparently so. What made him that way?  Maybe 
nothing did. Maybe it's just the way he is.  

Rampart (R)  
Ebert: Users: You:_Rate  this movie right now_ 
(javascript:NewWindow('300','200','/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=userrate&LinkID=93258&Title=Rampart'))

Rampart 
BY  ROGER EBERT / February 15, 2012  
Cast & Credits
Dave Brown _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDa
te=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Joan Confrey _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&Fr
omDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  
Barbara _Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=1915
0101&ToDate=20121231) 
Catherine _Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101
&ToDate=20121231) 
Linda Fentress _Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate
=19150101&ToDate=20121231) 
Kyle Timkins _Ice  Cube_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&
ToDate=20121231) 

Millennium Entertainment presents a film directed by  Oren Moverman. 
Written by James Ellroy and Moverman. Running time:  112 minutes. Rated R (for 
pervasive language, sexual content and  some violence).  
_Printer-friendly_ (http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll
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_Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDate=19150101
&ToDate=20121231)  is leaner in "Rampart," the skin tight over the skull, 
the  jawline defiant. His eyes are busy. He is a cop in the Los Angeles 
police  district that became notorious in 1999 as a cesspool of corruption, but  
this man takes corruption with him wherever he goes. The movie is  
co-written by the unsurpassed crime writer James Ellroy, who no doubt  knows enough 
stories about Rampart to write a dozen movies, but his  inspiration here is 
to make this cop a stand-alone character study,  isolated within himself. He 
doesn't require the reprehensible environment  of Rampart. He's self-fueled. 
 
Harrelson is an ideal actor for the role. Especially in tensely  wound-up 
movies like this, he implies that he's looking at everything and  then 
watching himself looking. His character, Dave Brown, has no moral  center, but he 
has the survival instincts of a rat, and I say that with  all due respect 
for rats. He always likes to know the way out of a tight  corner. He knows an 
angle he can play or a squirm he can call on.  

Why is he this way? That question helps explain why the movie is  so 
absorbing, because there is no answer. "Rampart" lacks the usual plot  engines 
behind crime films, in which motivation comes from money, lust or  revenge. 
Brown behaves in this film primarily just to do bad things.  

He reminds me of one of the most evil characters in American  fiction, 
Judge Holden in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian, a man  who likes to torture 
and kill for no other reason than simply to cause  pain. The Harrelson of 
"Rampart" could play Judge Holden, and not many  actors could.

He is an overt racist. He has such contempt for women  he cannot always be 
bothered to use them sexually. He was married to two  women (_Anne  Heche_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&Sea
rchType=1&q=Anne%20Heche&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  and 
_Cynthia  Nixon_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Cynthia%20Nixon&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate
=20121231) ) who are sisters, and apparently this meant so little to all of 
 them that they live in houses next to one another. There was no emotional  
commitment there for them to engage. He has a daughter by each and is said  
to have once murdered a rapist because of his feelings for his daughters.  
Only with a man like Brown would you suspect that was an excuse; more  
likely, he got started killing the man and didn't feel like  stopping.

It's that feeling that seems to empower Brown when he  does the last thing 
Rampart district needs in 1999. Eight years after the  brutality against 
Rodney King, Brown is videotaped while beating a  suspect. He seems to approach 
this task like a skilled workman performing  a job he loves. Recently 
there's been a movement to make videotaping of  police officers illegal. That 
would get Dave Brown's vote.

This  time he doesn't seem to have an escape route ready. The district  
attorney's office sees him as an ideal target, and _Sigourney  Weaver_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType
=1&q=Sigourney%20Weaver&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231)  is 
finely focused as an assistant DA who has him in her sights.  He also makes the 
error of trying to pick up a defense attorney (_Robin  Wright_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=
Robin%20Wright&Class=%&FromDate=19150101&ToDate=20121231) ) in just the 
wrong way at just the wrong time. And he casually  insults a black investigator 
for Internal Affairs (_Ice  Cube_ (http://rogerebe
rt.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Ice%20Cube&Class=%&FromDate=
19150101&ToDate=20121231) ). 

"Rampart" is deeply embedded in Los Angeles in the  summertime, every day a 
reminder of the desert that waits patiently to  take back the land stolen 
from it by sprinkler systems. It is hot, the sun  is blinding, Brown is 
sweating, he feels rotten. You cannot live forever  with amorality and sadism 
eating away at you. Even other immoral people  around you stand back, because 
they recognize themselves and fear to go  that far.

"Rampart" was directed and co-written with Ellroy by Oren  Moverman, whose 
directorial debut was "_The  Messenger_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=REVIEWS01&TITLESearch=The%20Messenger&ToDate=2
0121231) " (2009). He was nominated for an Oscar for that screenplay.  It 
also starred _Woody  Harrelson_ 
(http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/classifieds?category=search1&SearchType=1&q=Woody%20Harrelson&Class=%&FromDa
te=19150101&ToDate=20121231) , playing an Army veteran whose job is to 
inform the next of  kin that a soldier has been killed. He's training his new 
partner on the  job and advises him not to take it personally: Don't have 
physical contact  with anyone, let alone hug them. Better for you, better for 
them. These  are their lives. They need the news, not a new best friend. 

In  that film, Harrelson's character turns out to have feelings after all.  
He's such a versatile actor, able to point one way and act in another. We  
know he can do that, and maybe that's why he's so fascinating in  "Rampart." 
Is it really possible for a man to be as evil and indifferent  as Dave 
Brown, and be empty inside? Apparently so. What made him that way?  Maybe 
nothing did. Maybe it's just the way he is.  

Dive in -  Rampart in theaters - check your local listings