The Spanish Prisoner....HUH? (Spoilers to follow!)

Cafe Society
1

I am relatively bright. Not a genius. Never the smartest man in the room.

But I like sophisticated movies. And I thought this one would be a good flick.

Despite Mamet’s choppy dialogue (yeah! I said it!) and the over the top acting, I was enjoying the flick.
A little spoiler space because it is the OP…

In the end, it left me scratching my head. I have so many questions, not so much about the con, but about the circumstances that led to the final scene.

Specifically the role of Klein. What was going on there? How long were they watching?

Were they really cops at the end?

If they let it happen, why and didn’t they let a guy DIE in the process?

I must have missed something big. This film got UNIVERSALLY great reviews. 89% on RT (100% cream of the crop).

Anyone?

2

I agree with you about some of the stilted acting in this film (especially the female lead). And I’m curious about the question you asked as well. Couldn’t it be, though, that the cops were only watching during the action in the last third of the movie?

3

I suppose that is possible. But the big “explanation” scene at the end said something about Klein wanting Campbell Scott to be the one to use the key. I replayed the scene a few times and still couldn’t make out the dialogue.

I’ve read a few reviews that say Mamet was playing with us. Intentionally creating plotholes to show how silly caper movies are. Sounds like Mamet has written so many good movies that he can “do no wrong” to me…

I like movies that keep you guessing. Memento had me asking a dozen questions. But this one left me with little basis to come to an intelligent conclusion. I haven’t been this dissatisfied with an ending since Magnolia.

I know the critics loved it, but in my review, the phrase “sucks balls” would have appeared!

4

Oh, yeah. About the female lead being particularly off, that is David Mamet’s wife.

Kind of a Sophia Coppola/Godfather 3 moment.

5

Klein wanted the “process” for himself. So he made it out so it would look like Ross stole it.

The guys at the end were U.S. Marshals. They were on the trail of Dell. Just why the U.S. Marshals would care about such a matter is unclear. It’s also unclear just when they started actively getting involved in the case. They said they were tracking Dell for a long time, but if they were they weren’t doing a good job. And why would they be ready to find him in Boston when Ross wasn’t supposed to be in Boston.

As for the dialog, it’s not stilted because the acting is bad, it’s stilted because that’s how Mamet wants it to sound. All of Ricky Jay’s lines are weird proverbs. That’s just the way the movie is supposed to be. There are plot holes by design.

Personally, I don’t think Rebecca Pidgeon is all that bad of an actress.

6

Why would someone intentionally include plotholes? Parody? It didn’t feel like parody. It just felt sloppy.

I’m not sure I buy that. It feels like the Doper’s theory that Showgirls is a great movie because Verhoeven really wanted it to be bad.

7

I just want to point out, here, that as a director, Mamet demands (and receives) very mannered performances from his cast. As a stage director, Mamet used to have actors say their lines in time with a metronome to get the particular cadence he wanted.

Campbell Scott, for example, has actually quite a good range of acting ability, as can be seen from watching his very different character in Roger Dodger, The Secret Lives of Dentists, and Big Night. In The Spanish Prisoner, however, he simply comes off as being an emotionless pawn…because that was his role. Think of it as an update on Kafka’s Der Process crossed with an Agatha Christie novel, rather than an emotionally-grounded story. Mamet is all about plot and rhythm and above all, left-field twists and snappy dialog. He’d be a good writer of Hepburn-Grant comedies, and he likes to satirize the standard conventions of screenwriting by embracing them and then making them over-the-top absurd, but in a clever way (see the McGuffin-within-a-McGuffin in Ronin) rather than the ham-fisted manner of Joe Esterhas. It’s not to everyone’s taste–Mamet definitely takes some getting used to–but once you’ve got it, you can recognize his touch in any film, even when he’s not credited.

Stanley Motss: I bet you’re great at chess.
Conrad ‘Connie’ Brean: I would be if I could remember how all the pieces moved.

Blake: We’re adding a little something to this month’s sales contest. As you all know, first prize is a Cadillac Eldorado. Anybody want to see second prize? Second prize is a set of steak knives. Third prize is you’re fired.

Sam: Whenever there is any doubt, there is no doubt. That’s the first thing they teach you.
Vincent: Who taught you?
Sam: I don’t remember. That’s the second thing they teach you.

I could go on…let’s just say, it doesn’t get much better than Robert DeNiro reading a Mamet-penned line (especially, it seems, if Mamet isn’t directing.)

Rebecca Pidgeon (Mamet’s wife and the afformentioned female lead in the The Spanish Prisoner) has been a lead balloon in everything I’ve ever seen her in, though. Ditto for Lindsay Crouse (Mamet’s ex-wife). He seems to have a fetish for crappy actresses.

Stranger

8

If you watch any of Mamet’s films, you will see similar styles of speech as “The Spanish Prisoner” (to a lesser extent in “Heist”). William H. Macy (who’s been in many of Mamet’s plays) describes it as “Mametspeak”. He said it’s hard to learn at first and takes a lot of practice.

Obviously the OP didn’t like the movie. If so, I would suggest he skip other Mamet films because they will be much of the same.

9

I’ll agree with you about Rebecca Pidgeon, but I thought that Lindsay Crouse was excellent in House of Games (1987), which Mamet wrote and directed.

10

I enjoyed The Untouchables, Wag the Dog, About Last Night, and Hoffa.

None of those had the problems with delivery of the dialogue the way SP did. The words he wrpte were interesting, but the performances were WAY off for me.

But those films were directed by De Palma, Levinson, Zwick and DeVito, respectively.

I think it was Mamet the “director” that was my problem with the film. Not Mamet the screenwriter.

Except at the end. That was the writer screwing me over!

11

Did you feel as dirty as you do after you see a Michael Bay film? :wink:

Mamet does this on purpose, and he’s winking at the audience when he does it. I think he probably considers himself the cinematic equivilent of an illusionist, drawing you in on one hand, making you think he’s tricking you on the other, and doing something entirely different instead. Either you like being “used” in this way, or you don’t. It is a matter of taste.

The only Mamet film I’ve seen that I absolutely hated was “Oleanna”, which irritated me to no end. Some of the other films he’s directed have taken me a couple of viewings to appreciate, but I’ve grown to like them. However, I have to concur that a Mamet-penned film that is directed by someone else is usually the best option. Ronin, Wag The Dog, Glengarry Glen Ross…good stuff. I thought Spartan was pretty good, though, and didn’t get nearly the promotion from WB that it deserved.

Stranger

12

I couldn’t stand “Spartan” for some reason and felt like I should get those two hours of my life back. But part of that is my dislike for Val Kilmer.

Has the OP tried watching “State and Main”? That’s quite a changeup in the world of David Mamet.
Or even “The Winslow Boy”?

13

Whoa. I would never say something that awful! There are some things you just can’t take back! :smiley: