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THE BIRDCAGE [1996. Directed by Mike Nichols. Cast: Robin Williams, Nathan Lane, Gene Hackman. United Artists 119 mins.]
Not that it will make any difference to the moral majority, but The Birdcage is the family film of the 1990s. Where Swiss Family Robinson and The Courtship of Eddie's Father once ruled the family roost, Mike Nichols' latest film is closer to the edgy truth of 1990s American "family values." It's more honest- and far funnier- than the recent pasty remakes of The Father of the Bride and Father's Little Dividend.
By contrast, The Birdcage is a daffy triumph of real family values. And like all classic comic fare, it says more about the human condition than drama could ever hope to evoke. By playing his flamboyant cards against an equally outrageous tableaux, Mike Nichols and screenwriter, Elaine May, have taken France's 1978 farce La Cage aux Folies and recrafted it for America's puritanical minions.
Albert (Nathan Lane), The Birdcage's star diva, has had a life-long relationship with Armand Goldman (Robin Williams), his cabaret revue manager. They're going through the ups and downs of their daily routine when Amand's son, Val (Dan Futterman), comes home to announce his engagement to the daughter of a reactionary Republican Senator from Ohio (Gene Hackman).
Then to complicate matters, Val's betrothed, Barbara (Calista Flockhart), brings her parents, the Senator and wife, Louise (Dianne Wiest), to Florida to escape a scandal that threatens her father's career as the force behind the self-styled "Coalition for Moral Decency." Albert's and Armand's attempts to placate their callow son, and preserve enough dignity in who they are, lead to an uproariously surreal dinner party as the film hurtles to its climax.
Each player in The Birdcage nudges the others to outrageous heights. And the film may be the capstone of Mike Nichol's lengthy career. For he has seemed to have lost his ballast from his early break-outs: Whose Afraid of Virginia Woolf, The Graduate, and Carnal Knowledge. Perhaps being reunited with May, his Broadway partner, has rejuvenated his theatrical touch. Where his recent offerings have been dangerously close to being workman-like, The Birdcage is a comedic celebration of life in the highest order.
Granted the characterizations may be offensive to some, but then satire serves best when it stings indiscriminately. By offending the audience equally, Nichols and May universalize the insults to all satisfactions. No one - and certainly no one kind of person - walks away from The Birdcage without taking a well-deserved lump on the head.
Above all else, family values predominate this film from beginning to end. And while the story's original roots stress Val's ultimate discovery that blood is thicker than water, May's interpretation of the material smuggles in all sorts of topics that enliven the film for American audiences.
The totally stressed Armand tries to rationalize his way out of what is rapidly turning into an increasingly irrational situation and Albert copes heroically with the indignities tossed at him for his behavior and manner. As played by Williams and Lane, both men have an integrity that shines through the more commonplace mores which Hackman and Wiest represent .
If The Birdcage has a single moral lesson to impart, it's that we have much more in common with each other - minority/majority cultures and progressive/conservative/ethical standards - than most people might initially suspect. And by so conspicuously forcing us to confront our prejudices where they're deserved, The Birdcage strikes a blow for tolerance. Both propriety and rectitude have rarely been so thankfully deflated with such a deft touch.
THE USUAL SUSPECTS [1995. Directed by Bryan Singer. Cast: Stephen Baldwin, Gabriel Byrne, Kevin Spacey. Gramercy Pictures/Polygram Video. 105 mins.]
The hard-boiled egg is thankfully still alive in the 1990s. New Jack City and Pulp Fiction (among scores of lesser imitators) have taken the starchy street slang of Mickey Spillane, mingled it with Ice T's sly syntax, and spiced it for life on America's mean streets.
For tough-guy dialogue is as patriotic as lacing up one's enemies with concrete booties on the wrong side of the river. And Bryan Singer's The Usual Suspects is merely the latest of a long line of heists extolling the virtues of being bad by sounding good. . .although, in this very special instance, the street jive also comes at the expense of expending the human soul.
Five New York petty hoods-cop-gone-wrong Keaton (Gabriel Byrne); tough guy McManus (Stephen Baldwin), and his partner, Fenster (Benicio Del Torro); demolition expert, Hockney (Kevin Pollack); and street gimp, 'Verbal' Kint (Kevin Spacey)- lay siege on a boat shored off San Pedro, California, for reasons unknown to anybody but themselves.
It looks like a mob-inspired hit, but the plan has gone desperately wrong. The gang's attack kills 27 with only two survivors living through the night: Kint and a Hungarian sailor who claims on his death bed that he saw a mythical mobster named Keyzer Soze stalking everyone on ship side.
Customs agent Dave Kujon (Chazz Palminteri) has Kint in custody and he's waiting upon the Hungarian's description of Soze to set his case. The decision to indict hangs in the balance and he must rely on 'Verbal' to explain why his gang attacked the boat in such a reckless fashion. Indeed, Kujon's unstated question is why would a band of professional criminals proceed in such an unprofessional manner?
This slim premise supports one of the most ingenious capers of 1995. As Kint and Kujon spar relentlessly about the whys and the wherefores of the bungled assault, each dollop of information sits uneasily in the framework of what Kint calls his alibi and what Kujon calls sheer fabrication.
The demonic character of Keyzer Soze figures into each aspect of the story, but Kujon's belief that Soze is a figment of the deluded Hungarian sailor's anxieties - and Kint's feverish imagination- undercuts both survivors' reliability. It's therefore not for lack of trying that Kint is nicknamed 'Verbal.' Spacey's Oscar-winning performance holds the film together through the slightest of pretenses.
But Spacey has a lot of help in The Usual Suspects. Foremost is Ireland's Gabriel Byrne as the disillusioned Keaton and Benicio Del Torro's nervous Fenster. With street slang being slung so quickly, and each character constantly calling the other's bluff, the mysterious Keyzer Soze pulls their collective strings with breathtaking precision.
Likewise, the entire film is one precise clockwork of timing as Soze remains one step ahead of his quarry on both sides of the law. Ultimately, the sole remaining survivor, the near-crippled Kint believes in Soze's hypnotic power. And he's so terrified of what he saw, his impressions of the ship robbery are almost incoherent.
Yet the emphasis is strictly on almost incoherent. For likening Soze to the devil, Kint reminds Kujon that Satan's greatest feat was in convincing man that he does not exist. And thereby, of course, paving the way for his eventual triumphal return.
Between this gang's attempt to outwit the omnipotent- and Kujon's self-assured belief that he can solve this seemingly suicidal fiasco - The Usual Suspects lays out a convincing argument for the evil that lurks in the heart of man. Effortlessly mingling horrific humor with hard-boiled street smarts, Singer and McQuarrie have fashioned an abnormally taut thriller. They- like the bone-chilling Keyzer Soze himself- have us securely locked in the palm of their hand.