For Rampart, writer-director Oren Moverman has reteamed with Woody Harrelson and Ben Foster, the stars of his Oscar-nominated debut, The Messenger, and he’s made what I think is the best cop crime drama since L.A. Confidential. I got to see the film at its UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival back in October, and I absolutely loved it; it deserved every one of the 5 stars I gave it in my review (which you can read here).
Since then, we’ve seen the release of the film’s terrific first poster, along with an immense first trailer that really whets the appetite – and makes me want to see it again so much – and ComingSoon.net have now got a great new extended clip to share with us from the film.
Co-written by James Ellroy, often heralded as one of the greatest crime novelists in America, Rampart is led by Harrelson in what is being described as the best performance of his career, supported by a cast that includes Foster, Ice Cube, Robin Wright, Ned Beatty, Brie Larson, Anne Heche, Sigourney Weaver, Steve Buscemi, and Cynthia Nixon.
“Los Angeles, 1999. Officer Dave Brown (two-time Academy Award nominee Woody Harrelson) is a Vietnam vet and a Rampart Precinct cop, dedicated to doing “the people’s dirty work” and asserting his own code of justice, often blurring the lines between right and wrong to maintain his action-hero state of mind. When he gets caught on tape beating a suspect, he finds himself in a personal and emotional downward spiral as the consequences of his past sins and his refusal to change his ways in light of a department-wide corruption scandal seal his fate. Brown internalizes his fear, anguish and paranoia as his world, complete with two ex-wives who are sisters, two daughters, an aging mentor dispensing bad advice, investigators galore, and a series of seemingly random women, starts making less and less sense. In the end, what is left is a human being stripped of all his pretense, machismo, chauvinism, arrogance, sexism, homophobia, racism, aggression, misanthropy; but is it enough to redeem him as a man?”
In this new clip, we get to see Harrelson at the head of his dysfunctional family, involved with two sisters, each of whom has mothered one of his two daughters, and we see him here as a terrible father, a terrible partner, a terrible human. It’s an incredible performance from him, and I am truly hoping that it will be recognised when the nominations are announced for the Academy Awards in January, and again when the winners are announced at the end of February.
Rampart has had its Oscar-qualifying run in the US and will be opening wide there on 27th January, and will be coming to the UK very shortly after on 10th February. I can’t tell you how excited I am to see it again.
