LFF Review: Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans - Review
Review by Rob Carnevale
What’s the story? A cop (Nicolas Cage) in post-hurricane Katrina New Orleans must investigate a gangland slaying, whilst coming to terms with his own debilitating injury, drug addiction and his feelings for a glamourous hooker.
Our verdict: Anyone expecting a mere re-tread of Abel Ferrara’s sleazy, disturbing Harvey Keitel vehicle had best think again.
Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant re-imagining is a completely different kettle of fish and, if anything, more of a dark comedy.
Buoyed by an insane central performance from Nicolas Cage, Port of Call: New Orleans is an outlandish rollercoaster ride through the mean streets of post-Katrina New Orleans that really has to be experienced to be believed.
The only question is: did Herzog mean it? Or is Bad Lieutenant unintentionally hilarious and therefore the happiest of big screen accidents?
Whatever, viewers should have a whale of a time figuring it out.
That the film works at all is largely due to Cage’s immense performance. The man doesn’t do things by half measures and throws himself into his performance.
With his back almost permanently arched in pain, and his mind increasingly unravelled as he sinks into a drug induced nightmare, this is Cage at his unpredictable, volatile and madcap best.
Among the many classic Cage moments are his attempts to gain information on a suspect by ‘torturing’ an elderly woman, and his borderline insane reasoning with a drug-dealing psychopath as he gleefully snorts cocaine while setting his rivals up for a fall.
There are nods to the original even though Herzog claims not to have seen it, including an unsettling car park shakedown of two nightclub revellers that Cage’s cop uses to get himself off.
But crucially, as low as Cage’s character stoops, he remains strangely sympathetic – something that Keitel’s sleazy cop never managed to pull off.
And Werzog also manages to pull the rug completely out from under you with an ending that you just won’t see coming.
Bad Lieutenant – Port of Call: New Orleans is by no means perfect – but it is one of the most insanely enjoyable movies of the festival.
Whether or not Herzog meant it is debatable… but like we said, audiences should have immense fun trying to work that out.
Screenings: Friday, October 23