Night Falls on Manhattan **** (1996, Andy García, Richard Dreyfuss, Lena Olin, Ian Holm, James Gandolfini, Ron Leibman) – Classic Movie Review 6042

Sidney Lumet is on fine form with the excellent 1996 crime thriller film Night Falls on Manhattan starring Andy Garcia as newly elected District Attorney Sean Casey, keen to eradicate police corruption.

Writer-director Sidney Lumet is on fine, first-rate form with this excellent, intelligent and gripping 1996 crime thriller starring Andy Garcia as newly elected District Attorney Sean Casey, keen to eradicate police corruption.

Casey soon finds himself in a police corruption investigation that may involve his New York City Police Department father Liam (Ian Holm) and his detective partner Joey Allegretto (James Gandolfini).

Richard Dreyfuss plays notorious drug dealer Jordan Washington (Shiek Mahmud-Bey)’s lawyer Sam Vigoda, a role is loosely based on the late celebrity attorney William Kunstler. Ron Leibman delivers a knockout performance in star support as the pretentious, inflated district attorney Morgenstern.

It also co-stars Lena Olin,  Colm Feore, Dominic Chianese, Paul Guilfoyle, Norman Matlock, Vincent Pastore, James Murtaugh, Bobby Cannavale and Frank Vincent as the Captain.

It is set and filmed on location in New York City. Lumet’s screenplay is based on Robert Daley’s novel Tainted Evidence. The script profitably again tackles some of Lumet’s usual favourite subjects of the criminal law, political corruption and the results of violence.

Night Falls on Manhattan runs 113 minutes, and 118 minutes in the director’s cut.

It is shot in widescreen by David Watkin and scored by Mark Isham. These distinguished contributions, Lumet’s work, and the actors’ outstanding performances were entirely ignored at awards time.

After all the first-rate work, reviews were grudging, and the film’s distribution and box office at $9,889,670 were disappointingly thin and sparse.

Frank Vincent died on 13 September 2017, aged 80.