The crazy eyes and idiosyncratic drawl of Woody Harrelson are enough to carry the dirty-cop study "Rampart," but even such powers as those can't make engaging this weary L.A. noir.
Without Harrelson's inherent intrigue, the heavy-handed provocations of "Rampart" would be difficult to suffer. But Harrelson's intense and committed performance keeps Oren Moverman's film moving, even while the grim and overdone story wallows affectedly.
Among the dirty cops of movies – Harvey Keitel in "Bad Lieutenant," Denzel Washington in "Training Day" – Harrelson's LAPD Officer Dave Brown is particularly ugly. He's nicknamed "Date Rape Dave," a moniker he came by from killing a serial date rapist years ago. The name may hint of Brown's most decent side (a protector of women) but it also serves as a warning.
"Rampart" is set in 1999 Los Angeles and its title refers to a notoriously scandal-plagued police division. The film, which Moverman adapted from crime fiction writer James Ellroy's novel (both are credited for the screenplay), doesn't try to analyze what led to a corrupt division, but rather the specific formation of a badge-wearing monster.
"How do we solve a problem like Dave Brown?" asks police attorney Joan Confrey (Sigourney Weaver).
By then, we've already seen Brown lament "Rodney King wannabes," abuse a handcuffed suspect and beat to a pulp a man who had the misfortune of colliding with Brown's cruiser. That incident is caught on camera and replayed on the evening news, sparking an investigation.
"This used to be a glorious soldiers department," sneers Brown to a mixed-race female officer. "And now it's … you."
Nice guy, right? At home, we see a softer, complicated side. Brown has two ex-wives (Cynthia Nixon and Anne Heche, both looking lost) who are sisters and neighbors, with whom he has a teenage daughter (Brie Larson) and a younger daughter (Sammy Boyarsky). It's an unbelievable arrangement and we can only be glad, for basic clarity, when the younger girl sweetly asks her father if she's inbred. (He laughs and tells her she's "native.")
The bizarre domestic situation aside, Brown's face genuinely glows around his daughters, surely his only possible of salvation.
But Brown is in a self- destructive tailspin: acting out violently, desperate for departmental cover (Ned Beatty plays a sinister LAPD retiree) and picking up women easily. He approaches one (Robin Wright) at a bar by commenting on her "litigator eyes." Their relationship forms as one based on mutual self-loathing, and Wright is captivating in every moment.
How does Brown live with himself? Quite self- assuredly, actually. The most interesting quality of Brown is how hyper-literate he is. He might curse all manner of L.A. citizens as "scum," but, when confronted by superiors or lawyers (Steve Buscemi makes a cameo as one), he responds with a torrent of dubious legalese and moral equivocation.
The story of Brown's unraveling feels increasingly unrealistic and uninteresting while it circles the ideas established in the first half-hour. Instead of leading toward understanding, "Rampart" remains a dirty cop caricature, more a complaint than a story.
RAMPART
1 1/2 stars
Cast: Woody Harrelson, Ben Foster, Sigourney Weaver, Cynthia Nixon, Anne Heche, Ned Beatty, Robin Wright
Director: Oren Moverman
108 minutes
Rated R (pervasive language, sexual content and some violence)
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