THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE
From an article by Dr. Alan F. Philips, from the Project of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation:
On October 24, 1973, when the U.N. sponsored cease fire intended to end the Arab-Israeli war was in force, further fighting stared between Egyptian and Israeli troops in the Sinai desert. U.S. intelligence reports and other sources suggested that the U.S.S.R. was planning to intervene to protect the Egyptians. President Nixon was in the throes of Watergate episode and not available for a conference, so Kissinger and other U.S. officials ordered DEFCON 3 [Defense Readiness Condition (DEFCON 5 is the peacetime state; DEFCON 1 is a maximum war readiness).] . The consequent movements of aircraft and troops were of course observed by Soviet intelligence. The purpose of the alert was not to prepare for war, but to warn the U.S.S.R. not to intervene in the Sinai. However, if the following accident had not been promptly corrected then the Soviet command might have had a more dangerous interpretation. On October 25, while DEFCON 3 was in force, mechanics were repairing one of the Klaxons at Kinchole Air Force Base, Michigan, and accidentally activated the whole base alarm system. B-52 crews rushed to their aircraft and started the engines. The duty officer recognized the alarm was false and recalled the crews before any took off.
That paragraph neatly sums up the feeling of what things were like in 1973 far better than the Andrea Killen book 1973 Nervous Breakdown: Watergate, Warhol, and the Birth of Post-Sixties America, although the latter does have its value, despite the hyperbolic title. The United States, the Soviet Union, Israel, Egypt and Syria were all about to blow one another away, each for different reasons, while just a few months earlier, in June of that year, audiences across America were treated to a Bostonian version of the same thing, albeit, on a microcosmic scale.
Peter Yates directed The Friends of Eddie Coyle, a film in which Robert Mitchum as the title character could have represented, say Israel, while the gun dealing Jackie Brown might have been Syria, with Egypt played with masterful skill by the always dependable and disturbed Peter Boyle, and the role of the ATF cop, naturally, filled by the USA. The way the characters in this movie move Coyle around the table is excessively heartless, calculated and ultimately without purpose, just as in real life. Now I am not suggesting that Yates gave any thought whatsoever to the geopolitical symbolism I'm assigning to his film. After all, the novel upon which the movie was based was published in 1970 and the events described in the opening block quote had not happened at the time of this motion picture's release. What I am suggesting is that events do sometimes breathe together to create what I'll reluctantly call a zeitgeist, one which in both the instance of the film and the Middle East found everyone making deals with their enemies and using one another in the final analysis for no other practical purpose than to assure his destruction.
Eddie Coyle got popped for heisting a delivery truck for Dillon, the Boyle character. Facing the offer of a long prison term for which he has no use, Coyle decides to rat out a gun dealer--and easily the coolest guy in the film--in exchange for a complimentary phone call from the ATF guy. The deal goes down and so does the gun dealer, but the court wants Eddie to turn professional, full-time snitch. Eddie recognizes this is a death sentence, but he gives in anyway, turning over some friends who have been pulling some very clever bank robberies in the area (so clever that they were stolen for use in a subsequent film called Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry). It turns out the ATF guys don't need Eddie for this after all, but the robbers assume Eddie is the snitch and order Dillon to snuff him. Dillon, of course, is already working for the ATF guy and the mob, so we aren't sure what he'll do until he actually does it.
The truth is that the geopolitical implications, the personal betrayals and the long hard drop of the highly sympathetic Coyle would not merit holding this film in the public consciousness were it not for the acting skills of the participants, particularly Mitchum. Lesser talents, such as John Wayne and Sylvester Stallone owe most of their "trademark" moves from Mitchum and the latter in particular should admit the debt. I would even go so far as to say that I'd be willing to bet that the other actors in this movie learned something about understating their deliveries from Bob. In any other context, a line like, "April fool, motherfuckers," would sound ridiculous. Here, it makes you want to cry as you see how each layer of development is just one more layer of Eddie Coyle going down.
Eddie has played the cards he's been dealt. He hasn't played them as well as they could have been played, true, but he has played them as well as he knew how. We learned his story right away when he explains to the gun dealer that some bad guys smashed his hand in a drawer. "The worst part is you know he's gonna kick that drawer shut. You know it's gonna hurt and it hurts you before it even happens." And God damn Sam, the gun dealer actually thinks about this. He reacts with sudden sympathy. The feeling is quick and gets replaced with other emotions, but it's there and we see it.
These people are fascinating, the story holds your attention throughout, somebody even brought Mo Greene in from Vegas to rob the banks, and even the car wrecks are understated so that there isn't one gratuitous instant in the entire film. When you watch The Friends of Eddie Coyle, you may think of one nation or another, you may think of your old neighborhood, or you may simply imagine the tired horror of Eddie's life. The point is that you will be thinking and feeling at the same time. How many movies lately have had that going for them?
On October 24, 1973, when the U.N. sponsored cease fire intended to end the Arab-Israeli war was in force, further fighting stared between Egyptian and Israeli troops in the Sinai desert. U.S. intelligence reports and other sources suggested that the U.S.S.R. was planning to intervene to protect the Egyptians. President Nixon was in the throes of Watergate episode and not available for a conference, so Kissinger and other U.S. officials ordered DEFCON 3 [Defense Readiness Condition (DEFCON 5 is the peacetime state; DEFCON 1 is a maximum war readiness).] . The consequent movements of aircraft and troops were of course observed by Soviet intelligence. The purpose of the alert was not to prepare for war, but to warn the U.S.S.R. not to intervene in the Sinai. However, if the following accident had not been promptly corrected then the Soviet command might have had a more dangerous interpretation. On October 25, while DEFCON 3 was in force, mechanics were repairing one of the Klaxons at Kinchole Air Force Base, Michigan, and accidentally activated the whole base alarm system. B-52 crews rushed to their aircraft and started the engines. The duty officer recognized the alarm was false and recalled the crews before any took off.
That paragraph neatly sums up the feeling of what things were like in 1973 far better than the Andrea Killen book 1973 Nervous Breakdown: Watergate, Warhol, and the Birth of Post-Sixties America, although the latter does have its value, despite the hyperbolic title. The United States, the Soviet Union, Israel, Egypt and Syria were all about to blow one another away, each for different reasons, while just a few months earlier, in June of that year, audiences across America were treated to a Bostonian version of the same thing, albeit, on a microcosmic scale.
Peter Yates directed The Friends of Eddie Coyle, a film in which Robert Mitchum as the title character could have represented, say Israel, while the gun dealing Jackie Brown might have been Syria, with Egypt played with masterful skill by the always dependable and disturbed Peter Boyle, and the role of the ATF cop, naturally, filled by the USA. The way the characters in this movie move Coyle around the table is excessively heartless, calculated and ultimately without purpose, just as in real life. Now I am not suggesting that Yates gave any thought whatsoever to the geopolitical symbolism I'm assigning to his film. After all, the novel upon which the movie was based was published in 1970 and the events described in the opening block quote had not happened at the time of this motion picture's release. What I am suggesting is that events do sometimes breathe together to create what I'll reluctantly call a zeitgeist, one which in both the instance of the film and the Middle East found everyone making deals with their enemies and using one another in the final analysis for no other practical purpose than to assure his destruction.
Eddie Coyle got popped for heisting a delivery truck for Dillon, the Boyle character. Facing the offer of a long prison term for which he has no use, Coyle decides to rat out a gun dealer--and easily the coolest guy in the film--in exchange for a complimentary phone call from the ATF guy. The deal goes down and so does the gun dealer, but the court wants Eddie to turn professional, full-time snitch. Eddie recognizes this is a death sentence, but he gives in anyway, turning over some friends who have been pulling some very clever bank robberies in the area (so clever that they were stolen for use in a subsequent film called Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry). It turns out the ATF guys don't need Eddie for this after all, but the robbers assume Eddie is the snitch and order Dillon to snuff him. Dillon, of course, is already working for the ATF guy and the mob, so we aren't sure what he'll do until he actually does it.
The truth is that the geopolitical implications, the personal betrayals and the long hard drop of the highly sympathetic Coyle would not merit holding this film in the public consciousness were it not for the acting skills of the participants, particularly Mitchum. Lesser talents, such as John Wayne and Sylvester Stallone owe most of their "trademark" moves from Mitchum and the latter in particular should admit the debt. I would even go so far as to say that I'd be willing to bet that the other actors in this movie learned something about understating their deliveries from Bob. In any other context, a line like, "April fool, motherfuckers," would sound ridiculous. Here, it makes you want to cry as you see how each layer of development is just one more layer of Eddie Coyle going down.
Eddie has played the cards he's been dealt. He hasn't played them as well as they could have been played, true, but he has played them as well as he knew how. We learned his story right away when he explains to the gun dealer that some bad guys smashed his hand in a drawer. "The worst part is you know he's gonna kick that drawer shut. You know it's gonna hurt and it hurts you before it even happens." And God damn Sam, the gun dealer actually thinks about this. He reacts with sudden sympathy. The feeling is quick and gets replaced with other emotions, but it's there and we see it.
These people are fascinating, the story holds your attention throughout, somebody even brought Mo Greene in from Vegas to rob the banks, and even the car wrecks are understated so that there isn't one gratuitous instant in the entire film. When you watch The Friends of Eddie Coyle, you may think of one nation or another, you may think of your old neighborhood, or you may simply imagine the tired horror of Eddie's life. The point is that you will be thinking and feeling at the same time. How many movies lately have had that going for them?
