The Usual Suspects (1995)

I don’t see how rabid fans of The Usual Suspects can see much replay value in the film for any reason other than studying the elegant long-distance shots or the John Ottman score (it evokes a sense of conspiracy with music alone, nevermind the images). Once you know that 85% of the story is just the suspect ramblings of a liar, there’s no reason to go back and piece it all together, because there is no “it” there; more than ¾ of the film has been pulled out of Verbal Kint’s ass, some of it on the spot, from looking at random shit nailed on the bulletin board in the office of a police station where he sits explaining, and explaining, and explaining, all of it being more or less a lot of nothing; in short, a complete waste of time.

And all that exposition he pulled out of his ass (you know, the movie) is hopelessly complicated for one reason, and one reason only: if it wasn’t, you’d realize you’ve seen it all before. But because there are flashbacks, and crisscrossing timelines, and double-crosses, and false leads, and red herrings, you find yourself concluding that there was a lot there: it’s the shaggy dog story in the form of a thriller: you’re told this, and that, and how they connect and where they diverge, and this goes over here, and that goes there, and then at the end, you learn that none of it really matters. It’s sort of like the titular joke in The Aristocrats: the point is not the long-winded time-consuming set-up but the two word punch line. The problem is, once you learn the punch line, it doesn’t make up for the precious 15 minutes you stood there listening to the set-up, and if you’d known better, you’d have preferred to have not heard it all together. However, "the Aristocrats" joke reveals insight into the unique pathology and dysfunction of the individual who tells it, and the joke, while inherently of no value, becomes valuable because the procedure snowballs into a dissection of the fundamental essence of comedy, how so much of it derives from a twisted alienation, the nature of taboos, why one taboo is more severe than another, the motivation for speaking the unspeakable, and lots of interesting tributaries break off from what seemed like a stagnant little puddle. The Usual Suspects is all puddle.

Christopher McQuarrie’s screenplay seems to have been written with the end first. The premise is interesting: a meek, bullied little two-bit thief is actually a fearsome and dangerous criminal mastermind...


...and he’s right there in plain sight the whole time.


But the premise is only as good as the elaboration on it, and the elaboration on it, McQuarrie’s screenplay, is (basically) 95 minutes of pedestal built to make the 5 minutes of twist look, well, like it’s on a pedestal. And the 5 minutes is pretty cool, but not worth the 95 minutes it took to get there, 95 minutes of dialogue and situations which amount to watching the hard-boiled posturing of two insecure bullies glowering at one another in a schoolyard. The dialogue between the five Suspects of the title is especially awful when they are sizing one another up in a holding cell in which they are all being kept while being held for weapons charges:

“I’ve eaten scum like you for breakfast, chum”

“Chum rhymes with scum, tough guy.”

“You’re missing the point.”

“Oh, am I? Or are you?

“I got a big job I’m working on.”

“Why don’t you take your job and shove it up your ass?”

“This job is big, pal, real big. You want in, or am I talking to the Dean Keaton of legend?”

“What legend? I’m just a guy and you’re kitty litter.”

Et cetera, ad infinitum. I made that up of course, but you get the idea; this dialogue is such juvenile, clichéd tough-guy speak it could’ve been written by Frank Miller. There is actually a scene where two groups of criminals thump their chests in each other’s faces, and Stephen Baldwin’s character on one side sarcastically calls Peter Greene’s character on the other side, “tough guy,” to which Greene replies back with, “You know McManus, you think you’re such a tough guy.” These thugs would pick up their skirts and drop the act as soon as Jimmy Conway and Tommy DeVito got in their faces. According to some positive reviews, the clichéd dialogue is intended to be ironic, but that would require the film to have a certain tone which the film most definitely does not have - It tells Soze’s story in a straightforward manner, soberly. The movie, I’m afraid, actually thinks this is how “tough guys” talk. More examples of the writer’s pathetic idea of what equals “a bad dude:” Verbal Kint tells numbskulled Agent Kujan (the Neanderthal-looking Chazz Palminteri) that Keyser Soze is so bad, sooo bad that he kills his enemies, then his enemies’ parents, then their kids, then their friends. Then he kills their friends’ friends, and their friends’ friends’ friends, and their friends’ friends’ friends’ friends, and even their friends’ friends’ friends’ friends’ pets, the employees of the pet store who sold the pets, the employees of the pet stores’ friends, parents, pets, mailmen, that one guy they kinda knew in high school, his parents, etc. etc. If this was intended to be ironic, then it’s hilarious, but it’s not, and it’s the sort of laughable demonstration you’d see a scowling high schooler scribble in a handmade comic book: “He kills their children, and their parents, and their pets…yeah…this dude is fucking evil…”

There is a scene in the film where Pete Postlethwaite (in a chilling performance) shows up as Soze’s #2, Mr. Kobayashi, and offers the five guys a deal. Kevin Pollack’s character, Hockney, with knee-jerk overcompensating machismo, aims his gun (sideways), at Kobayashi and snarls something like, “Why don’t I kill you right now (tough guy)?”


Kobayashi talks for a while, explains himself, and Hockney, realizing he's performing a pointless action by aiming a gun he has no intention of shooting (and really had no intention of shooting in the first place), gradually, pathetically lowers his gun. That’s a perfect symbol for what The Usual Suspects does: it makes mean faces and makes sure you know it has a gun, but it doesn’t pull the trigger. It’s a movie for 15 year old boys, of which I was once, and back then I recall thinking The Usual Suspects was pretty cool.


But when I read reviews and hear fans calling it, absurdly, “smart,” I wonder if they’d be fooled by Kevin Spacey’s crooked left foot and obviously affected “I’m so timid” pantomime. Oversell it much, Verbal? See his foot? It’s crooked. And he quivers a lot. And he’s called a “stupid cripple” about 1,396 times through the course of the film. He’s a weakling, get it? No way could a weakling as weak a weakling as that could ever be a nefarious, pet-killing criminal mastermind, no sir.


Grade: C-