The Sicilian (1987, Michael Cimino), the director’s cut

The Sicilian is based on a Mario Puzo novel about a real person and real events. The director’s cut runs about thirty minutes longer than the original theatrical version, which no doubt desperate distributors and financiers took away from director and co-producer Cimino in hopes of recouping some of their cost. Alas, no luck. It stars Christopher Lambert as The Sicilian. Lambert is not Sicilian; most of the principal actors in the film do not appear to be Sicilian or Italian. There might be a joke about Cimino trying to avoid the wrath of a Sicilian-American Civil Rights League showdown but in reality… they just couldn’t get the people. But Cimino professionally muscles through it and gets what might be the best performance Joss Ackland could give as a Mafia King of Sicily. Cimino doesn’t have as much luck with anyone else, though he comes closest with guys like Andreas Katsulas, Michael Wincott, and Ramon Bieri. Sicilian’s a troubled production with a terrible script (Steve Shagan), what would be bad for a late nineties, made-for-cable disaster movie cast, and an obstinate, ludicrously confident director.

For a terrible film, The Sicilian is very watchable. You don’t have to pay much attention and sometimes it’s better when you don’t. You might not realize how obvious the looping is on some of the main actors—I’m not familiar enough with Barbara Sukowa and Giulia Boschi to recognize their voices on the looping, but it’s obvious Terence Stamp did the looping on his own stuff. And then there are occasionally times it really doesn’t sound like Lambert, usually during scene transitions, in medium or long shot. Troubled production, Christopher Lambert playing a Sicilian Robin Hood, at some point what do you even expect.

The photography’s glorious. Alex Thomson gets to light all sorts of scenes—lots of exteriors in the Sicilian mountains (on location, which is cool) and it’s kind of fun to pretend you’re watching something really weird like Lambert doing a Highlander sequel (the guy he’s playing also dies and comes back to life magically here in Sicilian, though through force of will and good looks; more on those in a bit). But then Thompson gets to do terrible night club scenes, which are really badly directed and silly but at the sets are great and the lights are great. Even in Cimino’s most tedious shots, Sicilian always looks great. Oh, and there are palaces or great houses or whatever because Stamp and Sukowa are royalty. Plus lots of Catholic churches because the Church conspired to kill the guy Lambert’s playing.

Lambert’s playing Salvatore Giuliano. The movie starts with the origin story. Lambert and John Turturro—who is not good—steal some grain to feed the peasants, who the royalty and the mafia are somehow starving. With the church helping. I’m not being vague because it seems like bullshit, I’m being vague because of course they are. No shit they’re screwing over the peasants. To be a peasant means to be one being screwed over. So Lambert’s going to be a Robin Hood… or something. Because during the origin story, he gets shot and then miraculously recovers—to the point one of the very not-Sicilian priests in Sicily post-war (Richard Venture) tells him God was on his side until he turned against mother church, because obviously. He’s been blessed.

I think that scene is where you realize Lambert just can’t move his face muscles. Because everyone else in the car—Turturro, turning it up to eleven like he’s convinced himself he’s the Sonny Corleone in this one, Katsulas (who seems to know what kind of movie he’s in), and a trying super hard Wincott—they all can do immediate reaction. Lambert can’t be phased. But everyone around him acts phased, which just makes it more obvious. The love scenes in the movie are painful. Though given the film introduces Sukowa stripping on her way to the bath while making it shitty for her Sicilian maid? Oh, and then how Sukowa’s attempt to seduce Lambert goes… they could be worse. Cimino’s really tiresome with it.

Actually, with the female characters… I’m not sure Cimino got what Shagan’s script was going for. It would explain why Boschi has a really great character but a really shitty part and a not very good performance. Cimino’s really not interested in her. Sukowa’s an American-born duchess who flashes the local boys for goodness sake; she’s super interesting. Hashtag sarcasm.

But then, if Sicilian actually had any good ideas, it’d be less amusing a disaster. Part of it being digestible is its inability to challenge or surprise. It’s like a two hour and fifteen minute justified eye roll (the end credits are ten glorious minutes). Cimino’s really convinced he can get over the hurdles and somehow it’ll connect. This tale of a vain narcissistic heartthrob—everyone wants to be Lambert’s friend because he’s so cool (it’s occasionally cringe-worthy, especially when Turturro whines about Lambert’s greatness)—who doesn’t end up sticking up for the peasants and getting a lot of innocent people killed because he was full of shit. I’m not sure what the actual guy did, but in the movie, Lambert screws people over and then says he’s sad when they don’t forgive him. Then there’s a bunch of intrigue and sort of Godfather ending montage homage slash Puzo-verse thing.

The first act is the worst, before Lambert shows up and it’s just his godfather, Richard Bauer (who acts out his heart and is never any good), introducing the ground situation—Ackland the Sicilian mafia boss, Stamp the Sicilian prince, Sukowa the American duchess, all very silly, all immediate fails. Ackland works up from a very low place to be as close to adequate as possible. It’s incredible.

Not Stamp or Sukowa sadly.

Hopefully they bought nice things with their paychecks.

There are some familiar faces in the supporting cast. It’d be kind of embarrassing to call them out. Again, if it filmed on location, maybe a paid trip to Sicily isn’t the worst thing.

Besides the stunning Alex Thomson photography, the film’s technically middling. Françoise Bonnot’s editing can’t work actual miracles, but it doesn’t make anyone’s acting worse. Cimino’s direction is tedious, obvious—outside the film neon noir finish, which is actually good—but while a scene’s never efficient, they’re rarely ever too too long. They’re too long, but only by a line or two. Cimino does Sicilian with a really straight face, mirroring perhaps the emotional output of the lead.

David Mansfield’s music always seems like it’s going to finally take off but never does. It’s pretty though. It’s really pretty.

Great production design, set decoration. Costumes aren’t great but they’re occasionally amazing. Turturro goes around in a Christmas sweater for half the movie with no explanation. And what if the explanation for Lambert’s performance is as simple as costume designer Wayne A. Finkelman telling him he couldn’t move in the clothes or something.

Thanks to history, there’s now an audience for The Sicilian, it hits on just the right amount of film studies (Cimino and his John Ford shots are exhausting), bad movie standards (I mean, Lambert, plus Joss Ackland as a Sicilian mafia boss), and, hopefully, Thomson aficionados. But. Wow. It’s a stinker.

Year of the Dragon (1985, Michael Cimino)

Year of the Dragon is going to be so racist it opens with a disclaimer from the distributor, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, basically saying they didn’t realize how racist director Cimino and co-screenwriter Oliver Stone were going to get and they’re sorry. Please enjoy the film.

It came out in 1985. Year of the Dragon was too racist in 1985. Against Asian people. 1985. The disclaimer’s kind of astounding and yet, doesn’t really prepare for the film.

Because it’s about a cop who’s too racist even for the other cops—Mickey Rourke (thirty-three playing thirty-seven to forty—getting assigned to Chinatown to clamp down on gang violence, only it turns out the increase in gang violence is junior gangster John Lone orchestrating a takeover. The takeover thing has to be from the source novel because it makes sense and almost nothing in Dragon makes sense.

Unless you look at it through some very twenty-first century critical lenses; now, a disclaimer of my own. I’m going to pay this film as much respect as it’s due, given the only way Stone and Cimino have to move Rourke’s character—not even character development, just getting his character to be active in the plot—is to make the women in his life suffer. They suffer rape, they suffer murder, their humiliation serves as a stage for Rourke to speak on about how much their suffering affects him. It is a lot. The further Year goes, the more reasons there are not to watch it. Other than a dissection, there isn’t a reason otherwise. Not in the 2021, not after The Wrestler and Rourke finally getting to prove his ability. Because there’s some raw talent in his performance here, but it’s a big swing and a bigger miss.

Now. A plot description, using the most appropriate terms to examine Cimino and Stone’s screenplay. Year of the Dragon is about white guy Chad (Rourke) and an Asian guy Chad (Lone). Rourke is married to a white Becky (Caroline Kava)—from the old neighborhood—but is after a younger Stacy, Asian newscaster Ariane. The newscaster thing is important for a few reasons. First, Ariane’s not even believable as a bad newscaster, much less the up-and-comer she’s apparently supposed to be but they never cover her work because who cares she’s a girl. Second, somewhere in the plot there’s something about Rourke feeding Ariane tips for her reports, only it’s never clear how he’d get the information. Second, Cimino and Stone are going to use the newscaster stuff for exposition through the entire film.

And they do have other ways to dumping exposition. At one point Lone’s bodyguard—who doesn’t appear to be in the credits—does an entire recap of their reason for going to Thailand because it serves absolutely no purpose in the narrative. Unless Stone and Cimino actually thought Lone’s arc was dramatically compelling, which it is not. Though them thinking so might explain a lot.

It’s pretty bad. Like, it’s so bad if Ariane and Rourke had bonded over their love of Chinatown and it ended with a “This is Chinatown, it would’ve been better. Instead, they bond over Rourke’s seduction techniques, which are basically ignoring Ariane or Kava saying no until they stop saying it. Again, no reasons to watch this movie.

Stone and Cimino have some other big macho moments for Rourke and company in the film, like Rourke very obviously suffering from untreated Vietnam-related PTSD (no, man, you don’t get it, see his racism isn’t racism, it’s just applied classical liberalism). But Cimino and Stone don’t believe in PTSD; when concerns about Rourke’s mental status come up—from childhood rival for Kava’s affects Raymond J. Barry, who’s grown up to be a cuck cop boss—they’re dismissed.

Also a car explodes when it crashes.

Year of the Dragon’s bad. It’s very obvious in how it’s bad, like thinking you’re inspecting vegetables for a mold spot only to discover it’s intentionally moldy.

Okay photography from Alex Thomson. They use a too spherical lens to the point if you cropped out the distortion it might actually look better, not a good situation. Really good editing from Françoise Bonnot in the first act, not so much for the other two hours of the movie. Not good David Mansfield music. Cimino’s composition is occasionally decent, but mostly it’s low middling.

Really bad dialogue.

Really bad plotting.

Victor Wong might give the most wholly successful performance as the old guy Lone’s trying to muscle out.

Rourke’s doing his best in a bad part, ditto Lone, ditto Barry, ditto Kava. Ariane’s got the crappiest part—Rourke approaches her because she’s Asian and therefor no one can accuse her station of anti-Asian racism when she runs his stories—and gets an exceptional amount of pointless nude scenes. Cimino doesn’t even pretend. He’s never more artful than her nude silhouette sequences.

So while the film exploits Ariane as an actor and her character in general, Ariane’s still pretty terrible. She exists in the universe where twenty-two year-old newscasters are stars but not star stars. Her amazing apartment isn’t in Manhattan, for instance. Not yet. The apartment appears to have been designed to facilitate the nude shots, which is again more effort than anywhere else in the film gets. Rourke doesn’t even have an office. Most of the transitional dialogue is excuses about him not being at his own police precinct, which is either budgetary or Stone and Cimino just being bad at writing this script.

Dennis Dun is the Asian cop who looks up to Rourke for treating him like a real man, being racist to his face.

Given Rourke’s too racist even for the movie cops, you’d think there’d be some kind of redemption arc. But it’s actually about how no one’s racist enough. Or fascist enough. I skipped the fascist stuff because it’s so insipid.

Year of the Dragon’s like a can of garbage. Some stuff in it used to be good, some stuff in it was never good, some stuff in it should be recycled, but all of its covered in unidentifiable, odious liquid.

Thunderbolt and Lightfoot (1974, Michael Cimino)

Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is the story of men in all their complexities. Their desire for money, their desire for women, their desire for stylish clothes. Whether a young man–Jeff Bridges–or an older man–Clint Eastwood–how can any of us truly understand these deep, complex beings.

I wish the film had that level of pretense, but it doesn’t. Writer-director Cimino has a lot of machismo issues to work out and he also wants to draw a lot of attention to Eastwood’s character’s Korean War valor. Is it a commentary on the Vietnam War? It would suggest a deeper level to the film, which is otherwise initially Bridges and Eastwood’s comedic misadventures avoiding George Kennedy, while the second half is Bridges, Eastwood, and Kennedy teaming up to rob a bank. Thunderbolt and Lightfoot’s Eastwood-lite second half is a sequence of questionable sight gag “comedy” and boring car chases. Oh, and the lamest heist sequence ever. Cimino’s direction is all about the Idaho and Montana vistas. He doesn’t pace well, though editor Ferris Webster does no favors.

Frank Stanley’s photography is fine. It’s occasionally too impersonal, but it’s not like a better lighted pool hall was going to fundamentally fix the film. Cimino’s script–and his resulting film–are real shallow. Kennedy’s the closest thing to a full character just because Kennedy has to contend with big contrary actions. Cimino forcefully shoehorns them into the script, complete with dialogue to foreshadow, and Kennedy manages to make them work. No one else is as lucky.

Except maybe Geoffrey Lewis. He’s the film’s comedy relief, someone everyone–Kennedy, Bridges, and Eastwood–can bully. Men like to bully. It makes them men. Bullying and knowing almost nothing about concussions, even though all implied backstory is to the contrary of the latter. Lewis actually works in the background, just because Cimino treats him like scenery. But Lewis stays busy.

Eastwood’s got a nothing character. Initially he’s just running away from Kennedy. Then he teams up with Bridges and they have cinema’s lamest bromance. Cimino forces in some exposition on Bridges, which Bridges delivers in an annoying, obnoxious, insipid fashion. Eastwood gets none. He has no character. He delivers a decent performance nonetheless, apparently able to pretend there’s some depth to not just his character, but the film itself.

And Bridges. As it turns out, Bridges maybe gives the film’s most appropriate performance. He’s doing something, it’s not working, so he just does more of it. Also the perfect description of Cimino and Thunderbolt and Lightfoot.

A weak score from Dee Barton rounds it out. Besides the Montana travelogue, which is gorgeous, a lot of cameos from seventies character actors, and Kennedy’s performance, there’s not much to the film. It needs a better director and a much, much better script.