March 9, 2001 | It’s all too easy for a satirist to miss the mark — and shoot himself in the foot — while aiming at temptingly easy targets. Writer-director John Herzfeld (2 Days in the Valley) takes plenty of cheap shots at sitting ducks in 15 Minutes, an exuberantly undisciplined crazy-quilt of dark comedy, violent drama and savvy send-up. But he hits the bull’s-eye often enough for his snarling mongrel of a movie to demand attention and sustain interest.
Much like the sensationalistic tabloid TV shows that figure prominently in its plot, 15 Minutes is exaggerated, obvious and altogether shameless. Also like tabloid TV shows, however, it mines familiar territory for some provocatively unpleasant truths.
Focusing on the media-fueled cult of celebrity and the audience-grabbing allure of violence, Herzfeld introduces a protagonist with ties to both phenomena. Eddie Flemming (Robert De Niro) is a high-profile New York cop – and recent People magazine cover boy – who says he seeks the spotlight only because it’s easier to protect and serve when you’re famous all over town. Yeah, right. He’s such a selfless superstar, he allows the camera crew of a sleazy tabloid TV host (Kelsey Grammer) to accompany him during spectacular busts. Some cops are good for sound bites. Flemming is in a class by himself: He’s good for entire segments that will keep audiences waiting through commercial breaks.
Elsewhere in the Big Apple, other high crimes and misdemeanors are similarly recorded on tape. The big difference is, violent Czech thug Emil Slovak (Karel Roden) and goofy Russian lug Oleg Razgul (Oleg Taktarov) do double duty as actors and auteurs for their own cinema-verite drama.
The shooting starts shortly after the immigrants arrive in America, eager to finance their new lives in the land of opportunity by claiming Emil’s share of the loot from a long-ago robbery. Things go terribly wrong during a reunion with Emil’s former partners-in-crime, and the end result is a pair of fresh corpses. Oleg, a movie buff who likes to introduce himself as Frank Capra, impulsively captures the carnage on a stolen camcorder. Emil is somewhat more circumspect – he tries to cover up his bloody deeds by torching the scene of the crime.
The suspicious blaze cues the entry of Jordy Warsaw (Edward Burns), a young arson investigator who’s mildly disdainful of Flemming’s showboating style, yet extremely eager to work with the veteran cop. Flemming insists there is nothing wrong with generating your own publicity. Unfortunately, Oleg and Emil come around to thinking pretty much the same thing.
Much of 15 Minutes revolves around an ingenious variation of a familiar hypothetical question: “If extra-terrestrials visited Earth, what would they make of humankind if they saw (fill in the blank)?” In Herzfeld’s scenario, the aliens take a close look at television-specifically, tabloid newscasts and daytime talk shows-and assume they literally can get away with murder. “I love America,” Emil marvels, profoundly affected by the cavalcade of penitent adulterers, insanity-pleading killers and other products of dysfunctional families. “No one is responsible for what they do.”
The best defense, Emil and Oleg figure, will be videotapes of their vile acts. After all, only crazy people would capture their own crimes on camera, right? Better still, there’s bound to be someone out there – like, say, a tabloid TV host – who’ll pay them a fortune for exclusive rights to telecast their true-crime tapes.
There’s a major problem with consistency of tone throughout 15 Minutes. One moment, Herzfeld appears to be overstating his case in the sharply satirical style of Network or Wag the Dog. Every so often, though, there’s a strong dose of graphically realistic violence – the brutal murder of a prostitute is especially difficult to watch – or a sentimental interlude meant to reveal a kinder, gentler side of a dubious character. At one point, Flemming stands in front a mirror and practices his proposal to a TV news reporter (Melina Kanakaredes). It’s a disarmingly sweet moment, all the funnier if you see it as an in-jokey allusion to De Niro’s far more menacing monologue at the mirror in Taxi Driver. But it’s also part of a trite romantic subplot that adds nothing to the movie as a whole.
On the plus side, De Niro gives a nicely shaded and effortlessly authoritative performance. (Isn’t it ironic that, after three decades of being recognized as a great screen actor, he’s only recently become a full-fledged, 24-karat movie star?) Burns more than holds his own while working opposite this living legend. Grammer gets to be nastier than he’s ever allowed to be on TV’s Frasier. Roden and Taktarov are genuinely scary bad guys, because you’re never really sure what their characters will do next. There’s a terrifically kinetic chase-cum-shootout on a Manhattan street, and a truly shocking plot twist that will leave you thinking: “I can’t believe they did that!”
Things get completely out of hand in the final third of 15 Minutes, as narrative logic is sacrificed for narrative momentum, and characters behave in ways that are patently absurd, even as satirical exaggeration. Still, Herzfeld infuses the frenetic action with an urgent sense of purpose, and he raises some thoughtful points while taking us on a wild ride. Maybe this is his way of making amends for his own contribution to tabloid television, Casualties of Love: The Long Island Lolita Story, a 1993 TV-movie starring Alyssa Milano as Amy Fisher. Or maybe not.
