#l.a. takedown

[omercifulheaves]

L.A. Takedown (1989) Art by Enzo Sciotti a.k.a. Heat: The Rough Draft

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | L.A. Takedown (Mann, 1989)

This is obviously nobody's favourite Michael Mann movie, but despite not being a hardcore Mann-head (nothing against the guy, I just haven't really dug in past a certain point), I did find this interesting to consider within the context of his career. This is obviously in the shadow of Heat, and you can see embryonic forms of the latter movie's iconic scenes rendered in a crisp, televisual style. But there's a fair bit of Miami Vice in this one's DNA, and I'm not just saying that because I've been obsessed with that show for the last few months. I mean, even the title plays like a response to that show. (If you must know, I just finished the entire series a few days ago. I suppose I should write something about the finale, but in any case, our long national nightmare of me bringing up the show at every opportunity is finally over... NOT!) 

You get a neon-tinged nighttime driving scene like the famous "In the Air Tonight" montage from the pilot episode "Brother's Keeper", although the music choice here, Billy Idol's cover of "L.A. Woman", is a lot more on the nose. (I do think this movie makes better use of it when it recycles it towards the end, accentuating the verve of the final showdown.) But the visual style, with the extra dark interior and nocturnal scenes and sunburnt daytime scenes, brings to mind the look of the not particularly beloved (but still worthwhile, in my opinion) fifth season. Apparently Mann shot this unusually quickly, and he's understandably unable to give L.A. the same curated sense of visual identity he achieved through the extensive location scouting in Vice, but there is an interesting squarish sense of geometry to the movie. Obviously some of that comes with the realities of architecture (buildings and their fixtures only come in certain shapes), but the rigid angles extend to the screen composition and even the action, which is often captured either perpendicularly or directly aligned to us. Despite the relatively bloodless confines of network television, the violence here has a real kick.

And with Vice's casting director Bonnie Timmermann involved, you unsurprisingly get a season's worth of great character actors packed into this. Best is Xander Berkeley as Waingro, playing his character like a more deranged Bruce Willis. Worst, surprisingly, are Scott Plank and Alex McArthur in the Al Pacino and Robert De Niro roles, respectively. Obviously when you're put up against two all time great actors, it's hard to measure up, but you can just look at the coffee scene here to see just how much they come up short. Plank is doing a lot of the shouting that I assumed was Pacino's contribution, and absolutely not pulling it off. Especially bad are the shouting matches he has with his wife, played by Ely Pouget from "Junk Love", who despite her valiant efforts, is given nothing by Plank to play off of. While I haven't seen Heat in some time, I remember the relationship stuff being the worst part, and that's definitely the case here. I should note that the copy I watched on YouTube dropped the audio for a few minutes late in the movie, but it was during these boring ass relationship drama scenes, so I probably didn't miss much. At least when Crockett or Tubbs had bad luck with women, Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas could pull off the material, and there were often wild and highly entertaining twists to boot, like in "Definitely Miami" and "Little Miss Dangerous". 

Apparently NBC offered to pick this up if Mann replaced Plank as the lead, which Mann refused to do, so it never went to series. I respect Mann's loyalty to his guy... but Plank sucks and NBC was right to want to replace him.

[power-chords]

Also from L.A. Takedown, here's Xander Berkeley as the OG Waingro. Berkeley has a bit part in Heat as Ralph ("Shut up, Ralph. SIT DOWN!!!"), Justine's effete, nerdy side piece. In his clothing is a prime example of Mann's thoroughly developed costuming language: abstract and/or geometric patterns to represent psychological instability (as a function of fragmentation, or permeability). You also see this in the almost Enid Marx-looking shirt Sadak wears in Blackhat, and Francis Dollarhyde's hideous splotchy button down in Manhunter. The brighter and louder or more fine-grained the print, the more trouble you're in.

[oldshowbiz]

A car chase speeds past a midcentury Pioneer Chicken in the film L.A. Takedown (1989)

[tendie-defender]

L.A. Takedown 1989. Heat. 1995

Michael Mann.

[brf-rumortrackinganon]

Timeline, Part 1 - An Update

I forgot the Daily Mail takedowns. Doh! (I kept that list separately and just totally forgot about it.) Tumblr is being weird when I try to update the other post so I'm putting the Daily Mail stuff here and I'll also add them to the main post.

First, some links that validate events on the main post:

Harry dating Sarah Macklin

Piers and Meghan have drinks

Doria papped after the relationship is outed

Meghan merches a H&M necklace and Harry is actually photographed (by Splash, of all people) outside Meghan's Toronto home immediately after his Caribbean tour ends.

Harry wants a bigger apartment and has his eyes set on the Gloucesters's home.

Meghan drops Reitmans

Harry talks about receiving therapy and help for his grief with Diana's death

4/30/2016: Kate revealed as the Vogue 100 (June 2016) cover star and story.

5/8/2016 - 5/14/2016: Harry is in Florida for the Orlando Invictus Games.

5/10/2016: Piers Morgan writes a "Good King Henry" article claiming Harry would be a better King than William.

6/12/2016: Daily Mail publishes a story about The Queen's tiara collection. (iykyk...)

6/28/2016: Harry appears with Coldplay at a Kensington Palace concert. This concert is often cited as proof that Harry is in London at the time they claim they were set up.

July 2016: (dates unknown)

Thomas Markle Jr. claims that Harry met Thomas during July 2016.

The Daily Mail claims Harry took Meghan to L.A. for a weekend of partying that sealed the deal and became officially boyfriend-girlfriend.

Meghan travels to Spain with Misha Nonoo. I think Markus Anderson is there too (there's a photo of a guy who looks like him with Meghan and Misha) but I can't tell.

9/8/2016: Harry is voted world's most hottest royal.

10/27/2016 - 11/4/2016: Harry is claimed to be in Toronto and a new version of how they met - in this version, they met at a charity event and Harry kept texting Meghan until she agreed to a date.

11/1/2016: Samatha Markle speaks out for the first time and a story about Meghan's fashion is published.

11/3/2016: Misha Nonoo revealed as the mutual friend that set Harry and Meghan up. Daily Mail publishes a "No one wants to marry Harry and he's desperate for love but Meghan isn't The One" editorial.

11/4/2016: Meghan pap walks and merches a hotel. Daily Mail publishes about Meghan's ancestry and that Meghan looks like Pippa.

11/5/2016: Meghan leaks that she wants to spend Christmas with Harry in the UK. Daily Mail publishes a "Diana wouldn't like Meghan" editorial.

11/6/2019: "Meghan, this is not how royals behave" editorlal published and Meghan leaks that she's very close with Princess Eugenie.

11/12/2016: "Harry, this is not how royals behave, stop calling us racists" editorial published.

11/14/2016: "Remember when Meghan had to choose between Prince William or Prince Harry" throwback article by the Daily Mail

11/15/2016: Meghan leaks that she will give up everything for Harry and the royal family.

11/16/2016: Meghan leaks that she wants private security from Harry and the royals.

11/19/2016: "Meghan the Kate lookalike" article published

11/21/2016: The royals don't like that stories and gossip about Meghan is taking over Harry's Caribbean tour and their work.

11/22/2016: Meghan's comment that she wants to "smash glass ceilings, don't wear glass slippers" is published. The subtext is that she won't be a cooperative associate of the royal family.

11/23/2016: An article about Harry making a tribute to Meghan while on the Caribbean tour is published. This is the very first "sweet nod" PR piece, though the phrase isn't actually used in the article.

11/25/2016: Daily Mail reports that William is not happy with Harry's love shield statement. This only fuels the rumors.

11/27/2016: Meghan and Priyanka's friendship is revealed.

12/9/2016: Yoga pap walk to merch Harry's bracelet

12/10/2016: Harry is hunting in Bavaria with friends and Meghan goes shopping in Toronto while the rest of the Suits cast attends Patrick Adams's wedding in California. Meghan claims she knew her attendance at the wedding would bring out the paparazzi and after discussing it with Patrick, decided to stay home to give them privacy. Rumors begin of a falling out between Meghan and the Suits cast over her behavior (e.g., entitlement and demands for special treatment) since dating Harry. Rumors that Meghan had an affair with one of her Suits castmates also resurface.

12/17/2016: The Markles sell photos of Meghan's childhood.

12/20/2016: Daily Mail writes about Meghan's topless photos and one of the first Kate hitjobs is published, an article that says Meghan has a better fashion style than Kate and that Kate should take inspiration from her.

12/21/2016: Daily Mail writes about Meghan's racy Suits scenes and an article claiming Meghan has been harassed and attacked by her half-sister is published, beginning Meghan's victim narrative. The Samantha article leads to speculation that Meghan dragged these issues up and into the public to bury her topless photos and sexy scenes. Later, it is also speculated that "Everyone Loves Classy" is meant to repair Meghan's reputation to make her royal appropriate.

12/27/2016: Yoga pap walk with Doria.

12/30/2016: A "Meghan is just like Diana" article is published, talking about Meghan's humanitarian work in and interest in Africa.

1/1/2017: The Daily Mail publishes more of Meghan's racy photos.

1/4/2017: Tom Markle Jr. confirms that Harry has met Thomas Markle "about six months ago" and that Thomas has known about the relationship since the very beginning.

1/6/2017: Another Kate hit job is published, stating that the Duchess will have to deal with being compared to Meghan, whose philanthropy is far more successful.

1/7/2017: Meghan leaks that she will be attending Skippy's wedding with Harry.

1/10/2017: The Daily Mail publishes photographs and stories about Meghan's first wedding to Trevor.

1/11/2017: Meghan spreads engagement rumors to E News! It's later confirmed that E News is one of Meghan's go-tos to leak info about the royals and her relationship so there's a solid confidence that she's trying to push Harry's hand.

1/14/2017: Meghan leaks to the Daily Mail that Harry plans to take her skiing in Verbier and her brother, Tom Markle Jr., has been arrested.

1/17/2017 - 1/18/2017: More information and details about Tom Jr.'s arrest are published.

1/20/2017: Kensington Palace announces that William and Kate are moving back to London in the fall when William's contract with EAAA ends in the summer.

1/22/2017: Meghan is papped at the airport in Mumbai, preparing to go home after 5 days in India for World Vision. There is some speculation that Meghan was a last-minute addition to the India program to get some good PR following her brother's drama but it's quickly debunked when a) veteran blogs point out that Meghan's strategy to bury bad news/criticism is a pap walk or a royal connection, not going off the radar and b) her November interview with Vancouver Star plugging the India trip is rediscovered.

1/27/2017: Meghan spreads rumors that they're really engaged now and Harry proposed over a glass of champagne.

1/28/2017: Kensington Palace announces that William and Harry have commissioned a statue of Diana for the KP gardens.

1/31/2017: Meghan tips off the Daily Mail about an article she wrote for The Tig about her dream bachelorette party. Rumors begin that this is Meghan announcing her availability to sponsors for merching opportunities in the UK when she marries Harry.

2/22/2017: A Cambridge hit job is published, pointing out that they don't hold hands and aren't affectionate in public.

2/25/2017: Meghan tries to convince us that she's firmly established in the UK with a group of society girls who've become close friends.

2/26/2017: Toronto pap walk to merch an elephant bracelet

2/28/2017: The Daily Mail publishes that Meghan has never met a freebie she didn't turn down.

3/5/2017: Meghan merches Cartier.

3/12/2017: Meghan leaks that Pippa doesn't want her at the wedding and has banned her with a "no ring, no bring" rule.

3/13/2017: The Daily Mail publishes a story and photographs of Meghan's very special episode of 90210. It's later that that Meghan leaked about William's dad dancing in Switzerland to bury this but more likely, it's Meghan's leaks that she will meet The Queen soon that are meant to bury the 90210 work.

3/20/2017: "Meghan is still the same girl I've always known, this fame isn't changing her" editorial by Lindsey Roth is published. This is in response to quiet-but-growing-louder speculation that Meghan has a new sense of entitlement, attitude, and rudeness.

4/3/2017: It's announced that Samantha Markle plans to write a book about Meghan. (Meghan gives her first brief against her sister the next day, on 4/4, largely in response to this news.)

4/8/2017: Meghan claps back against Pippa's "no ring, no bring" rule via an editorial.

4/9/2017: Meghan leaks that she loves Africa and Harry is taking her to visit again in October when Suits wraps.

4/20/2017: Meghan commissions a "Meghan is just like Kate" piece in the Daily Mail.

4/28/2017: Middleton hit job, accusing them of spending more time with the Cambridge children than their royal relatives. (Honestly, this reads more like a Charles hit job than Meghan's but it's part of a larger trend of Meghan sourcing stories that attack Kate.)

As always, corrections, additions, updates, and links are welcome!

Hopefully Tumblr stops acting up and I can incorporate these into the main post.

[franki-lew-yo]

Just finished rewatching all of Bojack Horseman cause it's so dang good like wow it's incredible.

There were a lot of bits I actually had avoided watching the first time around like "Escape from L.A." or really most of season 1 for whatever reason, but I gotta tell you the scene that breaks me the most and which I had to skip through is near the end of the show when Bojack's AA meeting literally all judge him and leave him behind.

Of course you understand why they do it but something about Bojack being so harshly rejected by those strangers hurts way more than him being rejected by his friends whom he did at some point genuinely hurt.

The bittersweet part of this whole show is how some justice or the performance of justice is never the same thing as true justice. Bojack's reputation and life will never be the same and the people who cut him out will continue to do so, but he's mostly okay with that and he still technically has Mr. Peanutbutter, Todd and Princess Carolyn even if they're at an arm's length. He has changed, but he sure as hell ain't really being punished. Meanwhile we never hear if Penny is actually going to be alright and cope with her trauma; Sarah Lynn's tragic demise is still being used for clout by her abusive parents who don't appear to be getting any real heat for their own mistreatment of her; the kid who found Bojack in the pool seems to be on the path to being exploited; Vance Wagner is not arrested-

Bojack may not be very subtle about it but it's one of the most poigent love-letter/takedowns/therapy sessions with Hollywood and the consumer media out there.

[maguireboyd]

L.A. Takedown (1989)

[loscerritoscommunitynews]

Show to Document the Murder of Deputy and Operation Takedown in Hawaiian Gardens

Officer Jerry Ortiz was shot and killed. November 2, 2023 By Brian Hews The killing of Jerry Ortiz, a 15-year veteran of the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department who worked on gang suppression, rocked the city of Hawaiian Gardens in 2005. After a massive door-to-door search, Jose Luis Orozco, a 27-year-old reputed gang member with devil horns tattooed on his head, was arrested in Hawaiian…

[academicelephant]

So, I watched Guardians of the Galaxy for the third time in the beginning of November 2022, had a huge crush on Rooker and in less than two months I watched all these movies of his (I haven’t yet finished watching the ones in italics and the ones in bold are my favorites):

Fantasy Island (2020)

Jumper (2008)

Love and Monsters (2020)

Fast and furious 9 (2021)

The Bone Collector (1999)

Mississippi Burning (1988)

The Hard Truth (1994)

Deceiver (1997)

JFK (1991)

The Eliminator (2004)

Brother’s keeper (2013)

Freeway killer (2010)

Afterburn (1992)

Renegade force (1998)

Corrective Measures (2022)

Vivo (2021)

L.A. Takedown (1989)

[buzzdixonwriter]

HEAT 2 by Michael Mann & Meg Gardiner [review]

Heat 2 is a prequel / sequel to Michael Mann’s classic 1995 crime drama, Heat, and a rousing / riveting /action packed entertaining read it is.

For those keeping score at home, Heat is about a team of bank robbers led by Vincent Hanna (Robert DeNiro) and Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer) being relentlessly tracked by police officer Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino).

Loosely based on the exploits of real life 1960s bank robber Neil McCauley and Chuck Adamson, the police officer who brought him down, Heat first began life as a spec screenplay in 1979.

Over the years it brushed close to production a couple of times with heavyweights like Walter Hill being considered as director.

In 1989 Mann retooled it as a pilot for a TV series to be called L.A. Takedown.  When the network passed on the pilot, Mann recut it as a standalone TV movie.  Many of the characters retained their original names but Mann changed McCauley’s name to Patrick McLaren for the pilot.

While good, L.A. Takedown didn’t prove exceptional and Mann sought a chance to do his story with the full complexity of character and motivation he originally envisioned.    Six years after the failed pilot, Mann released Heat to theaters, and it now enjoys classic status among crime film buffs.

The movie is an expertly made thriller, filled with compelling characters and spectacular action sequences, but it’s best known today for the diner scene, a low key yet crackling tension moment when lawman and outlaw simply sit down for a cup of coffee and compare notes on their lives, realizing how much they’re alike.

Neither Hanna nor McCauley operate from “pure” motives (pure here not in the moral or ethical sense, but in the straightforwardness of their intent). 

What attracts the two to their mutually antagonistic careers is not a quest for justice on Hanna’s part or a desire for money on McCauley’s but the thrill of the challenge that provides the real meaning and purpose to their otherwise lonely lives.

It’s a great scene, and ironically it renders the rest of the movie pretty much superfluous.  Anything Heat needs to say gets said in this short scene.

Now, almost 30 years after Heat first hit the screens, Michael Mann writing in conjunction with crime writer Meg Gardiner presents us with Heat 2, a prequel / sequel novel.

Like its cinematic predecessor, Heat 2 offers complex characterizations and a good level of existential philosophical musing. 

It’s a smartly written book in every sense of the word, and the style is extremely cinematic, vividly creating scenes and settings and moods with a minimum of words, an angry, urgent poetry all its own.

The prequel part is a lead up to the events of the film, the sequel in what happens to Chris Shiherlis after the movie, with Vincent Hanna linking the two in his pursuit of not only McCauley and Shiherlis but also a shew antagonist who enters the equation.

I like this novel very much and highly recommend it, but at the same time I get the feeling it may be the fusing of two previously unrelated Mann projects into a new form using the framework of one of his biggest hits.

The prequel portion feels like it could have been either a first draft of the original Heat screenplay or perhaps a proposed episode of the never-to-be L.A. Takedown series.

McCauley, Shiherlis, and the rest of their crew are presented as white hat bad guys; i.e., criminals who steal from other criminals.  They break into a Chicago bank vault and, among other items, find computer discs that reveal a literal drug cash flow from the United States into a cartel’s coffers in Mexico.

McCauley et al opt to take down the Mexican drug cartel’s money laundering operation and make off with literally tons of money.

However, the leader of a vicious home invasion robbery gang in Chicago learns of their plan and decides to rob the robbers, setting up a situation that continues past the events of the movie and into the sequel portion of the novel.

In and of itself, this portion works great and could easily make an exciting movie.  As a prequel to Heat, however, it presents too many of what Alfred Hitchcock would call “icebox moments.”

To Hitchcock, an icebox moment occurs after you’ve seen and enjoyed a movie in the theater, gone home, and as you prepare a late night snack before going to bed you start recalling the movie’s plot points and suddenly go, “Hey, wait a minute…”

The biggest problem with the prequel portion is found in the aforementioned diner scene.  McCauley’s personal mantra is "Don't let yourself get attached to anything you are not willing to walk out on in 30 seconds flat if you feel the heat around the corner."

The movie show how this otherwise ice cold sociopathic criminal is done in by his love for a woman, a love that brings him back to her and into the path of detective Hanna.

In Heat we absolutely believe this is the Achilles’ heel that brings McCauley down, the one fatal mistake me made rather than run the risk of living alone for the rest of his life.

But in Heat 2 we learn the movie’s Eady (Amy Brenneman) is merely the second great love of McCauley’s life, that he lost an earlier love to the prequel’s uber-baddie, Otis Lloyd Wardell.

Not only are Wardell and McCauley’s first great love never even hinted at in the movie (and by the book’s account, McCauley would have ample reason to perpetually keep his eyes open for Wardell), but the fact McCauley violates his own sacrosanct rule of survival twice diminishes him as the uber-cool mastermind of the movie.

This is not a fatal flaw in the book, but it does give one pause when reaching for the fried chicken in the refrigerator late at night.

Wardell is also problematic.  Part of what leads me to suspect the prequel portion may have been in whole or in part a proposed TV episode is the near cartoonishness of this character.  Like Hanna and McCauley he does what he does for unclear motives, not merely satisfied with robbing families but acting out weird psycho /sexual dominance fantasies in the process.

He’s the least plausible and most unrealistic character in the story.  He’s given a big buildup in the book, referred to merely as ��the boss” until Mann and Gardiner finally bring him forward, but there’s no real payoff. He’s not an established character with a secret life, he’s not someone who’s position would immediately imply added peril to the other characters, he’s just a garden variety vicious street hoodlum who blundered in on McCauley’s plan to hijack the drug money.

In short, he comes across as the sort of character Arnold Schwarzenegger would be chasing in a medium budget 1980s action movie.

He fills a similar function in the prequel to that of Waingro (Kevin gage) in the original movie, and while that’s fine for a standalone story, it makes the prequel suffer in comparison to the classic film.

The sequel portion of Heat 2 works better and ties in more directly to the movie. 

Chris Shiherlis, recovering from a near fatal gunshot, gets smuggled out of the country and down to Paraguay where, after healing, he joins the security detail for the Liu family in the triple border frontier town of Ciudad del Este, a freewheeling virtual lawless anarchy where Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay share common territory.

This flows more logically than the prequel portion since it picks up where the prequel and original movie left off.  Like McCauley, Shiherlis also loved a woman in Heat; unlike McCauley, he did leave her when the heat came down, albeit not voluntarily.

Shiherlis’s attempts to make sense of his new life in Ciudad del Este, where drug cartels and multinational corporations operate openly and without restraint, offers some of the best writing in the book, and his ambitions grow from that of a high scoring bank robber to someone wanting in on that dizzying world.

He becomes involved with the Liu family, in particular Ana Liu, the neglected brilliant daughter of scion Daniel Liu, overlooked by her father in favor of his Eric Trumpish son Felix.

Felix is jealous of his sister’s abilities and strives to undermine her efforts while at the same time he falls under the sway of Claudio Chen, leader of a rival criminal corporate family.

This spells near disaster for the Liu family but before that can be averted, Shiherlis must come to terms with his feelings for Ana vs his desire to reunite with his former girlfriend and their son, as well as his desire to wreak revenge on detective Vincent Hanna for killing his friend and mentor Neil McCauley.

This brings him to Los Angeles where implausibly Wardell has managed to reinvent himself yet stay out of sight from various law enforcement agencies around the country trying to track him down for a string of brutal crimes in Chicago and elsewhere.

One could be snarky and say the resolution of this part of the sequel is a mass of coincidences, or one could be generous and say it’s an example of fate working on a Greek tragedy scale.

I opt for the generous view.

Once the Wardell situation is resolved, the book almost too quickly ties off the Shiherlis / Ana portion of its story.

It’s briskly written and well staged but also somewhat abrupt.  Its icebox moment is the realization that in this sort of story, the mastermind never attacks the protagonist in his lair, but the protagonist must come after the mastermind. 

The sequel ends with a hint at Heat 3, but to be honest I think that might be a project best left to our imagination.

It is a well written book despite the couple of icebox moments cited above, one I highly recommend.

   © Buzz Dixon

[power-chords]

A still from Michael Mann's television film and Heat prototype L.A. Takedown, 1989, with Scott Plank (L) as Vincent Hanna, and Alex McArthur (R) as Patrick McClaren, who would six years later become Neil McCauley. You may recognize Plank from Melrose Place; he was also a Miami Vice cast alumnus. McArthur was in William Friedkin's Rampage as well as the music video for Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach."

[oldshowbiz]

The Penguin, a midcentury diner, as seen in L.A. Takedown aka Made in L.A. aka Corrupcion Los Angeles aka Showdown in L.A.

[jimenezpfacundo]

L.A TAKEDOWN / MIAMI VICE: THE HOME INVADERS

[launderground]

L.A. TAKEDOWN : WHEN IT'S OVER

[creme-de-synthe]