Hickey and Boggs
Director: Robert Culp
Year: 1972
Rating: 7.0
The I Spy duo
pal up again in this tough gritty crime film that plays out in the broken
dreams of Los Angeles. The TV series had ended only a few years before and
engendered good feelings for both stars, Robert Culp and Bill Cosby. Time
has changed that and it took me years to get around to this film even with
the cool poster. It is so hard to match up the character Cosby is on screen
to what he was already up to in real life. But this film has a good reputation
and fits in nicely with the dark downbeat cynical mood of many 70's crime
films. This is likely due to scriptwriter Walter Hill. After bouncing around
for a few years in the business, Hill turned to writing scripts and this
was his first one produced. In the same year, his script for The Getaway
was also made into a film. He didn't get a chance to direct till three years
later. At Cosby's request, this is directed by Culp, who basically had no
experience as a director but does a solid job here though it could have been
more cleanly and coherently edited. Cosby had begun his moving into TV comedy
with the The Bill Cosby Show in 1969.
Cosby doesn't bring his comedy or charm
into this film and both actors play it straight. They are low rent end of
their rope private eyes who mainly do low level jobs. Their office is in
a non descript anonymous building and their personal lives are a mess. Hickey
(Cosby) is separated from his wife and depressed about it while Boggs (Culp)
is miserable and visits the file cabinet a few times a day to say hello to
a bottle of whiskey. They get hired to find a woman, but as these cases always
go in neo-noir films set in L.A., nothing is what it appears. They are given
a list of people who know her, but they have the habit of showing up recently
dead. Violently. As they go from lead to lead only to either find them dead
or missing or hired killers there, they realize they are over their heads.
But a reward and vengeance keeps them going.
Some good scenes at Dodger Stadium and a
shootout at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. A few other solid action scenes
as well. If only they could shoot straight, the film would have ended much
sooner. Culp said that about 50-minutes of film never made it into the movie.
Probably should have been about 70-minutes because at 2 hours it dawdles
over certain scenes. Amazing that this was made for 1 million dollars. It
feels much bigger. Small roles for James Woods, Michael Moriarty, Isabel
Sanford and Vincent Gardenia.
