Angel Heart

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Horrorphile - August 2007

Angel Heart

August 27th 2007 01:00

A mystery thriller that looks like a 50s noir, but is wrapped in the macabre funk of the occult. Alan Parker’s Angel Heart (1987) is one of several exceptional films he directed (along with Midnight Express, Pink Floyd The Wall and Birdy) in a diverse career, and a personal favourite. It’s also my favourite performance of Mickey Rourke, an actor at the peak of his career (even if his guise as Marv in Sin City is a knockout).

The backstreets of 1950s Brooklyn, NYC

It’s New York City, 1955. Private Investigator Harry Angel (Mickey Rourke) prefers the easy jobs, ones where his cream-coloured, crumpled linen suit won’t get torn. Then he gets hired for a what seems like a fairly straight forward seek and ye shall find job, by a man who calls himself Louis Cyphre (Robert De Niro). Track down a popular young crooner called Johnny Favorite who vanished around the time the boys came home from the war.

Angel Heart Robert De Niro and Mickey Rourke

Robert De Niro as Louis Cyphre and Mickey Rourke as Harry Angel

Angel’s investigation takes an unexpected and sombre turn after he discovers the doctor who discharged Favourite from a hospital ends up with a bullet through the eye and his brains splattered over his morphine-tinged pillow. Angel digs deeper and finds himself becoming embroiled in the voodoo-cloaked atmosphere of New Orleans, especially after he meets the teenaged voodoo priestess Epiphany Proudfoot (Lisa Bonet), who happens to be Favourite’s daughter.

Lisa Bonet as Epiphany Proudfoot

Based on the novel Falling Angel by William Hjortsberg (who had penned the phantasmogorical fantasy Legend), Angel Heart spins a dark whirlpool of a yarn. I haven’t read the novel, but what makes the movie work so well is that the events and clues unfold at a pace where the audience is at one with Harry Angel, so when he begins to make certain correlations and the truly diabolical revelations come to bloodied hand, the audience gasps with him. Angel Heart is a powerful piece of horror cinema.

Into the dark heart of voodoo country

It’s aged very well, considering it’s been twenty years since it was first released. The cinematography by Parker’s long-serving cameraman Michael Serresin is superb; colour that verges on monochrome, and combined with Parker’s brilliant compositions and mise-en-scene, the movie is a dark beauty to watch. It helps when you’ve got a cast as charismatic as Rourke, De Niro, Bonet and Charlotte Rampling (as tarot reader Margaret Krusemark).

Charlotte Rampling as Margaret Krusemark

De Niro’s full bearded, long-haired and long finger-nailed turn as “Lucifer” was apparently De Niro impersonating Martin Scorsese (go figure!). He certainly commands every scene he is in. Rourke skillfully matches him. Although Parker originally offered the role of Angel to Al Pacino, Jack Nicolson and and even De Niro, Rourke fits the character like a glove. Director Parker subsequently found De Niro uncomfortably eerie in the role of Cyphre and let him direct himself!

I've got a thing about chickens

Parker’s attention to detail (he was once described by a critic as an aesthetic fascist), especially with the location shooting, art direction, use of music and the editing, lifts Angel Heart into a league of its own, a cult classic. The authenticity within the scenes; the pervading atmosphere, especially in some of the movie’s more intense scenes, such as the provocative, now legendary “Soul on Fire” rain/sex/blood scene, the village voodoo ritual, and the chase scenes. One image in particular of a frightened Harry Angel bolting out into a New Orleans’ street into the torrential rain, his flailing trench coat making him appear a ghostly apparition is pure cinematic brilliance.

Takes all kinds of critters to make a decent gumbo

“I’m an atheist,” states Angel to Cyphre while they sit together in a French Quarter church, the humidity and tension palpable. “Are you?” Cyphre replies a little surprised, “Yes I am. I’m from Brooklyn,” Angel says emphatically. The irony is rife. Cyphre twirls his ebony cane. “The future isn’t always what it used to be Mr. Angel,” he muses sardonically. Soon Harry Angel will know the truth. And it will scare him to his very soul. When he danced with the devil in the pale moonlight, he didn’t realise how terrible wisdom is when it brings no profit to the wise …

Here is Harry Angel with Louis Cyphre and that boiled egg:

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

11 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by Tracy

August 27th 2007 01:16

Movies and Life

Hi Bryn

I remember this film having a strong impact on me when I saw it for the first time and the second...it's one of those films....and you've written about it so well, bringing back lots of thoughts.

Tracy

Comment by Cibbuano

August 27th 2007 03:00

20/20 Filmsight
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Hunt Famous
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Fat Cult
Techbreak

sweet - I'll try and track this one down...!

Bonet - yeaow!

Comment by Damo

August 27th 2007 03:17

For the Sake of Argument
My Apologetics

I do like this film and it has stuck in my mind as being a very stylish multi level story.
Only after watching it do you realize what is actually going on.
It is a bit like a modern Oedopus Rex where the rentless search for the truth leads the character to his doom.

Everything offers a sense of a man who is outside of society to the point of almost being a ghost or a wandering soul that ready to be collected.

Comment by Bryn

August 27th 2007 03:24

Horrorphile

Tracy, it's aged like a fine French wine! (Pinot) Noir!! LOL

Cibby, what?! You're telling me you've never seen this?! Run like a madman to the nearest video store!! And yes, young Bonet, purrrrring indeed!!

Comment by Bryn

August 27th 2007 03:28

Horrorphile

Damo, clever thoughts there ... the line of De Niro's about wisdom offering no profit for the wise is from Sophocles' Oedipus The King.

Comment by Damo

August 27th 2007 03:46

For the Sake of Argument
My Apologetics

I should see this again.

Comment by Bryn

August 27th 2007 04:22

Horrorphile

You should see this again.

Comment by Bryn

August 27th 2007 04:24

Horrorphile

... for dark amusement's sake ... my review is 666 words long.

Comment by JohnDoe

August 27th 2007 09:53

Film & TV on DVD

Hi Bryn,
You already know of my unhealthy obsession with this film....I have a chicken and a knife, now where is my Bonet delight?

Comment by Nickoftime's Sanity Corner

August 27th 2007 20:25

Bryn,

this is one of those films that you have to see at least twice, because it grabbed you so hard by the throat the first time you couldn't breathe enough to watch it properly!

It's one of the few Rourke movies I actually "like" him in, cause personally, he creeps me out...

*Snicker*

Excellent revew of a fantastically dark disturbing but well made film!

Take care,

Nick

Comment by Bryn

August 28th 2007 06:17

Horrorphile

JD, of course, of course ...

Nick, indeed, in fact several viewings are demanded!

cheers guys!

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