BAD LIEUTENANT: PORT OF CALL NEW ORLEANS - The Bliss of Evil

Director: Werner Herzog
Writer: William M. Finkelstein
Cast: Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Val Kilmer, Xzibit
Runtime: 122 mins.
2009

I cannot stop thinking about this clip from an interview with director Werner Herzog, so I'll replicate it here in full:

Nicolas Cage would not sign his contract unless I was directing the film and I would not sign my contract unless he was the leading character in the film, so there was an immediate basis. We never had had any contact before, but we watched each other's work in a way, and I think we complemented each other very well. Nicolas knew I would get the very best out of him. I always get the very best out of actors ... He said to me on the second day of shooting, 'Werner, you know I hate to ask you this because I know you cannot stand debating the character development of your figures onscreen, you cannot stand these endless debates about motivation.' Yes, it's true, I cannot stand it. He said to me, 'But one quick question, maybe you'll have some sort of a quick answer. Why is the Bad Lieutenant bad? Is it the drugs? Is it Hurricane Katrina? Is it the corruption of the police force? Is it his messed up family life?' And i said to him, 'Don't enumerate anything more, let's stop it right here. Nicolas, there's such a thing like the bliss of evil. Go for it.'

This brief anecdote perfectly encapsulates the respective essences of Herzog, Cage, and the film itself. Certainly Bad Lieutenant is preoccupied with the matter of evil, but what makes the movie dance is its pursuit of bliss. A film that observes a man careening towards physical and spiritual self-destruction, in a devastated city long abandoned by a racist government, featuring act after act after act of wanton cruelty... well, a film like that ought to be a tough watch. Yet somehow, Bad Lieutenant is the most bleakly funny movie I have seen in quite a long time.


The stuff of the plot is nothing more than boilerplate. The titular Bad Lieutenant (Nicolas Cage) attempts to solve a grizzly drug-related quintuple homicide while also managing his personal penchant for drugs, gambling, and threatening just about anybody who happens to be around. The cliches never have time to wear on us though, as Herzog keeps the pacing light on its feet. Sequences are quick and dirty, lingering just long enough for maximum impact-- then we are whisked away to the next scene, often markedly different in tone. These tonal jumps do not feel like ruptures so much as the many faces of a living breathing world. Peter Zeitlinger's cinematography helps us process the film as it moves through us with amusement park glee. Powerful blues for nighttime corruption. Sickly greens when Cage grows increasingly unhinged. A harshly overexposed highway where the Bad Lieutenant embarrasses himself by interrupting a square-jawed cop handling the aftermath of a bad traffic collision, just so that he can request parking ticket forgiveness. The color grading is not subtle, but it works.

As for the comedy, it emerges entirely from Nicolas Cage's performance. Mind you-- we are not laughing because the performance is bad, but because it is titanic. The laughter comes from a place of delight, but we are also nervous about the way Cage lays bare dark truths of human compulsion. Now that we are in the midst of a late career resurgence* for Cage, we see better than ever that a truly great Cage performance can only rear its head when he collaborates with a director who amplifies his eccentricities rather than reins them in. As Herzog himself indicates, that makes these two a match made in hell. Cage leaps from sedate to frenzied in less than a second. He screams when a few forceful words would do just fine. With each passing minute, his visage becomes more bug-eyed, his voice more nasally. His sweat glands start to work overtime and he becomes properly disheveled in a way we rarely see from movie stars. This is the work of a Caged animal.

*Mandy, Spider-Man: Enter the Spiderverse, and Color out of Space to name a few swell examples

Herzog makes the excellent choice to direct the rest of his cast with a subtle hand, whether they be recurring side characters or surprisingly sympathetic bit parts. There are these amazing little grace notes that we are primed by the rest of the film not to expect. A character who we are sure is going to meet with a grizzly end manages to escape from the movie scot-free. Two substance-addled characters are thrust together against their will, but then agree to seek rehab together offscreen. A nasty one-note goon (played by screenwriter William M. Finkelstein) is given a lovely monologue about being entrapped by the trajectories of life. These are much needed anchors, and the grounded performances are all the better for Cage to springboard off of.

Cage's Bad Lieutenant is the embodiment of mythic chaos, and true chaos means that he is not simply Bad all the time. Amidst all the abuse, blackmail, and irresponsibility are shocking moments of goodness, kindness, and even gentleness. These moments aren't redemptive so much as matter of fact, and this is what keeps the film from tripping into exploitative nastiness. His habits recklessly endanger those around him, but he treats the black characters with far more humanity and respect than the other white cops. He sneaks, steals, and blackmails-- but when he makes a deal he keeps his word.

What drives the Bad Lieutenant is something of an enigma, even to himself. As such, he becomes a prism through which filters all the lust, rage, nihilism, and desperation of a broken city. The producers may have moved the location of the film to New Orleans for tax breaks, but the setting is imbued with great meaning by both Cage and Herzog. This is abundantly clear in the film's best moments-- a couple of scenes boldly shot in what I can only call "LizardCam," and an elegiac climactic sequence that features the most spiritual breakdancing I have ever seen.

4 / 5  BLOBS