Q&A (film)

Q & A is a 1990 American crime film written and directed by Sidney Lumet, based on a novel by New York State Supreme Court judge Edwin Torres. It stars Nick Nolte, Timothy Hutton and Armand Assante.

Plot

Mike Brennan, a tough, crude, decorated NYCPD detective, has a hidden dark side as well as a partnership with certain figures of organized crime. Brennan shoots and kills a small-time Puerto Rican criminal and then threatens witnesses to testify that he acted in self-defense. The Commissioner of Police Kevin Quinn assigns the case to Deputy Attorney Aloysius "Al" Francis Reilly, a young lawyer with a past as a police officer and son of a well-known cop who died in service. Reilly collects Brennan's deposition, who claims to have been acting on a tip from an informant and was forced to shoot in self-defense. Reilly's case leads him to a Puerto Rican crime boss called "Bobby Tex," whose wife Nancy Bosch was once the love of Reilly's life. She ended their relationship years ago after interpreting Al's reaction of surprise as racist when she introduced him to her father, a black man. Al tries to rekindle their past romance, but she rejects him because with Bobby, she feels loved, protected and accepted.

Al, along with detectives Sam "Chappie" Chapman and Luis Valentin, has doubts about the dynamics of the event. Knowing the environment of the Puerto Rican underworld. Investigations reveal a link between Quinn and Brennan, while the latter goes on the trail of Montalvo, the only witness who can disprove his testimony of self-defense. Brennan tries threatening Valentin and bribing Chappie for help in finding Montalvo and shutting him up. Meanwhile, Bobby Tex is "invited" by the Mafia to step aside, as Brennan's support is still useful to them. Bobby, in turn, begins looking for Montalvo to use as leverage against Brennan. At the same time he begins to shut down his business in order to retire to private life with Nancy.

Bobby finds Montalvo before Brennan, and together they leave for Puerto Rico, where the smuggler owns a mansion and a yacht. Here he is joined by Al, called secretly to give him an important information about the case. Al, after informing Bloomenfeld, goes to the island, where it is revealed that Quinn was once part of Bobby's gang, and took part in a murder. Brennan appears to be hunting down all of the gang's old members on Quinn's orders, with the intention of erasing his past so as to fulfill his political ambitions. Brennan is forced to go along with it because Quinn is holding an abuse of authority charge over him.

Even the Mafia intends to close accounts with both Bobby and Brennan, whose position is becoming increasingly untenable. They fail in an attempt to kill Bobby, who has announced his retirement. Meanwhile, Brennan is able to find Montalvo's lover, the transgender José Malpica, and kills him on his boat after listening to a message from Montalvo on his answering machine that reveals his location. Brennan then slices the boat's fuel line and waits for Bobby to arrive. A phone call made by Al saves Nancy at the last moment, but Bobby is killed in the subsequent explosion.

Al procures an arrest warrant for Brennan but fails to catch him at the airport. He returns to the DA's office to find Brennan waiting for him. Brennan reveals the truth about Al's father to Al; that his father was a bagman and a bigot, who was sort of a "line" to keep minorities down, and shoots Chappie when he tries to intervene. Brennan is then shot dead by another officer.

Al is summoned by Quinn, who informs him that he is aware of his activities, but the Department of Justice is going to hush up the incident to avoid embarrassment. When Al threatens to go to the papers, Bloomenfeld tells him that he has ways of preventing that as well, and in turn threatens to leak evidence of misconduct on the part of his late father, which would deny his mother a service pension.

Feeling betrayed and disillusioned, Al trashes his desk and resigns from the DA's office. He searches for Nancy, hoping she will return to him.

Cast

• Nick Nolte as Lt. Mike Brennan
• Timothy Hutton as ADA Al Reilly
• Armand Assante as Texador
• Lee Richardson as Leo Bloomenfeld
• Patrick O'Neal as Kevin Quinn
• Jenny Lumet as Nancy Bosch
• Charles S. Dutton as Det. Chapman
• Luis Guzman as Det. Valentin
• Paul Calderón as Roger Montalvo
• Fyvush Finkel as Pearlstein
• Dominic Chianese as Pesch

Production

To prepare for his role in the film, Timothy Hutton went on squad-car runs with NYPD officers in order to get an idea of the challenges they faced on the streets. Hutton said, "In many cases the hands of the officer on the street are tied".^[1] Nick Nolte put on 40 lbs. for the film because he felt that the character he played required it: "Just the sheer mass of brutality. I felt that would be the right kind of thing. He had to be on the edge of his own dissipation".^[2]

Reception

Q&A received positive reviews from critics, as the film holds an 87% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 23 reviews.

Roger Ebert gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four and wrote, "It is fascinating the way this movie works so well as a police thriller on one level, while on other levels it probes feelings we may keep secret even from ourselves".^[3] In his review for The New York Times, Vincent Canby wrote, "Great little scenes overshadow bigger, more important ones. Characters come and go at speed. Watching the movie is an entertaining ride, but when it is over it is difficult to remember where, exactly, one has been".^[4]

Rolling Stone magazine's Peter Travers wrote, "Lumet tries to cram too much in ... But he's onto something, and you can sense his excitement. This is Lumet's boldest film in years -- a combustible drama with a vivid, shocking immediacy. The director is back at the top of his game".^[5]

In his review for The Washington Post, Hal Hinson praised Nick Nolte's performance: "This actor doesn't flinch in the least from his character's unsavoriness; instead he seems to glory in his crumpled suits and unwashed hair, as if they were a kind of spiritual corollary. Nolte gives Brennan a kind of monumental brutishness -- he makes him seem utterly indomitable".^[6]

USA Today gave the film two-and-a-half stars out of four and wrote, "Overkill ultimately wears Q & A down, despite two bravura performances and some Hutton understatement that's adequate to the task. So, too, does unrelenting sordidness, a deadly love angle and a score (Ruben Blades) almost as awful as Cy Coleman's sabotage of Lumet's Family Business".^[7]

In his review for the Globe and Mail Rick Groen praised Armand Assante's performance: "in a role that could easily descend into cliche - the crook with a moral code - Assante does his best work to date, always keeping on the safe side of the stereotype".^[8] Newsweek magazine's David Ansen wrote, "Nolte, with a big paunch and a walrus mustache, is a truly dangerous presence here; he uses his threatening body and a high, strained voice to stunning, scary effect. Like the movie, Nolte really gets in your face and, for a long time afterwards, sticks in you craw".^[9]

Entertainment Weekly gave the film an "A-" rating and Owen Gleiberman wrote, "Q & A is a major film by one of our finest mainstream directors. As both a portrait of modern-day corruption and an act of sheer storytelling bravura, it is not to be missed".^[10]

References

External links

• Q&A at the Internet Movie Database
• Q&A at Box Office Mojo
• Q&A at Rotten Tomatoes