Rampart (2011)

Set in 1999 Los Angeles, veteran police officer Dave Brown, the last of the renegade cops, works to take care of his family, and struggles for his own survival.

Director:

Oren Moverman

Writers:

James Ellroy, Oren Moverman

Stars:

Woody Harrelson, Jon Bernthal, Ben Foster

3 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Woody Harrelson	...	David Douglas Brown
Jon Bernthal	...	Dan Morone
Stella Schnabel	...	Jane
Jon Foster	...	Michael Whittaker
Ben Foster	...	General Terry
Ruben Garfias	...	Pharmacy Security Guard
Deadlee	...	Pharmacy Punk
Dominic Flores	...	Latino Detective
Matt McTighe	...	30-Year-Old Cop
Cynthia Nixon	...	Barbara
Anne Heche	...	Catherine
Brie Larson	...	Helen
Sammy Boyarsky	...	Margaret
Billy Hough	...	Piano Player
Audra McDonald	...	Sarah

Storyline

Dave Brown is a Los Angeles police officer who works out of the Rampart Division. Dave is misogynistic, racist, brutally violent, egotistical and a womanizer, although he defends himself against many of these accusations as he says that his hate is equal opportunity. However unlawful, he uses intimidation and brutal force to defend his ideals. The most notorious of his actions is purportedly murdering a suspected serial date rapist, which is why he has been given the nickname "Date Rape Dave". He lives with two of his ex-wives - sisters Barbara and Catherine - in an effort to keep family together, namely his two daughters, Helen and Margaret, who each have a different sister as their mother. Dave still maintains a sexual relationship with both sisters - whenever the mood suits any of them - while he openly has other sexual relationships. His life is put under a microscope after he is caught on video brutally beating a person with who he got into an automobile crash. This situation is ...

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Plot Keywords:

scandal | beating | vomit | homeless man | bigotry | 

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Taglines:

The most corrupt cop you've ever seen on screen.

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Genres:

Crime | Drama

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for pervasive language, sexual content and some violence

Details

Official Sites:

Official site

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

24 February 2012 (Ireland)

Also Known As:

Brudny glina

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles, California, USA

Box Office

Opening Weekend:

$60,446 (USA) (10 February 2012)

Gross:

$969,239 (USA) (4 May 2012)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Lightstream Pictures, Waypoint Entertainment, Third Mind Pictures, The

Technical Specs

Runtime:

108 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

To achieve Dave's gaunt appearance, Woody Harrelson sought advice from Christian Bale. Bale told Harrelson to eat very little and run as fast as possible.

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Goofs

Dave Brown tells Kyle, who tailed him to a shrimp shack, that "all the Founding Fathers owned slaves." Not True. Second U.S. President John Adams owned a farm, but never owned slaves.

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Quotes

Hartshorn: [to Dave] You know, when you first came into the department I wasn't certain whether or not you were the dumbest rookie ever, or the most bullheaded. I'm still debating it.

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Connections

Featured in Maltin on Movies: The Vow (2012)

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Soundtracks

"Who's Coming To Dinner"
Written by Eric V. Hachikian
Performed by Eric V. Hachikian

User Reviews

Criminally underrated - a dark, honest piece of cinema.

LAPD veteran Dave Brown is a vile, disgusting man. He is a sexist, racist, womaniser, drunkard, dirty cop and patent homophobe. This, incidentally, is not my judgement of him, but that of his own daughter. It's pretty accurate. How much does that tell you?

Co-written by James Ellroy and starring Woody Harrelson in the main role, 'Rampart' serves both as compelling crime melodrama and scorching character study. When we first meet Brown (the Harrelson character), we take an immediate dislike to him. He stinks of corruption and arrogance; he is a control freak, whose selfishness and cynicism damage and infect all those around him. He has two daughters by two different women (both sisters, as chance would have it); despite the fact that his adultery is an almost nightly occurrence, he insists on living together with the two women and their respective children, to 'keep the family' intact. The pain and despair this has caused is devastating.

Yet this is a man quite capable of charisma, and perhaps in the crudest sense possible, charm. He can, after all, be seductive; in a brilliant early scene, we see him pick up a woman at his local bar; first conversation, then sex. His target is sensible, and perhaps looking for a good time, a friend, maybe even a relationship. Her questions are amicable and fair. The disappointment after that vacuous act later on is captured with incredible insight and realism by the filmmaker.

Dave's behaviour is often puerile and savage; the weight of the law begins to force itself upon him when he is caught on camera almost beating a man to death after the latter crashed his vehicle into Dave's police car. The extent of his obstinacy and self-delusion is mind blowing; an amazing piece of cinematography, in which the camera swings round in a circle, abruptly cutting between Dave and his superiors during a heated discussion on the subject of his brutality, emphasises the illogical but never-ending egoism and suppressed insecurity that drive him.

Sex, as in most works with Ellroy's name attached, plays a huge role. At first, we think Dave is just producing excess testosterone, or is simply a chauvinistic pig by nature. But we soon realise there is something desperate about his constant affairs, about his insatiable need to control and assert his authority. Perhaps to confirm his masculinity, or escape his problems. Certainly, the brief relationship he strikes up with a lawyer, as confused and desperate as he is in many ways, sheds much light on Dave's character.

I've seen it argued that Dave is completely immoral in other reviews. This isn't true. He may have ruined the lives of his family, and everyone he has come into contact with, but he does come to realise that. Too long he has spent running away from his responsibilities; at least on the job, he can fall back on the tired, formal jargon that has etched itself on his brain. But what about his children?

I think it would be unfair to give any more specifics on the plot. Technically, this movie is something special: intimately filmed, with heavy usage of artificial lighting (neon red, in particular, is used to great effect), and a handful of brilliant sequences – including but by no means limited to an excursion into an underground bar where easy sex pervades the air. This is where we begin to see Dave at his most desperate and

'Rampart' is a formidable movie about a man well past his sell-by-date, whose brutality, closed-mindedness, insecurity and immaturity have destroyed any chance of happiness he might ever have had, and may well have destroyed the same thing for those nearest to him. There is a heartbreaking sequence near the end where, for the first time, Dave tries to speak to his children honestly, in hope of salvaging his relationship with them. It is a film about despair, about a corrupt society that has moulded a man whose failures and flaws are killing him from the inside out, without mercy. His own childhood is left deliberately ambiguous, but his father, another corrupt cop, seems to have been his role model. Thus the corruption and destruction seems to be continuing through the generations in ripples and circles.

The possibility of redemption has certainly manifested itself by the end of the film. Hope has come, at least for Dave's family. As far as he is concerned, perhaps self-knowledge is the first step. The movie's final scene is a modification of the opening sequence, and we have to ask ourselves, can we see the change in Dave? There is no easy answer. There isn't meant to be.