Prince of the City (1981)
Directed by Sidney Lumet
New York City detective Daniel Ciello agrees to help the United States Department of Justice eliminate corruption in the police department, as long as he will not have to turn in any close friends. In doing so, Ciello uncovers a conspiracy within the force to smuggle drugs to street informants.
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What critics compared Prince of the City to
Writer-director J.C. Chandor (Margin Call, All is Lost) offers a film stylistically reminiscent of Sidney Lumet, whose great Prince of the City was released in 1981.
It’s particularly reminiscent of Prince of the City and Q&A, two films he made on either end of the 1980s that dealt with crime and corruption in an increasingly grim Gotham — and films that were made in his uniquely invisible and un-showy style.
J.C. Chandor’s A Most Violent Year is a most curious movie, one with nearly all the elements of a classic crime-family saga and yet somehow lacking the moral complexity and emotional heft of the films to which it pays fastidious aesthetic homage: the New York–set urban thrillers of Sidney Lumet ( Serpico , Prince of the City ) and Coppola’s Godfather series.
The beautifully lensed ("Selma" DP Bradford Young), atmospheric period movie calls up such Sidney Lumet classics as "Prince of the City" and "Serpico."
It’s more like the ’70s-ish films that came after that era — pictures like Sidney Lumet’s “Prince of the City,” which felt generally gritty and grimy but oozed a cooler, less insistent realism.
Nearly every review of "A Most Violent Year" has mentioned the influence of Sidney Lumet, who captured this era in the Big Apple in films such as "Prince of the City" and "Serpico."
Shaft , The Godfather , The French Connection , Prince of the City , even Apocalypse Now — they come and go in this farrago like bits in an Oscar tribute montage.
Hardly the New York Police Department, portrayed as so totally corrupt that the cops are only too eager to keep the drugs flowing as a way to subsidize summer homes in Florida, which dovetails neatly with other period films like "Serpico" and "Prince of the City."
But in "Phone Booth," he's as spiritually overwrought as Treat Williams in "Prince of the City."
That respect for our intelligence alone makes it the best cop movie since "Cop Land" and renders it worthy of being spoken of in the same sentence as "The French Connection" or "Prince of the City."
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Set in a 1981 Gotham full of grimy, vertiginous shots invoking the epic gloom of the likes of Sidney Lumet’s Prince of the City , and starring Joaquin Phoenix – one of our most intense and talented screen stars – this origin story for the famed Batman villain is certainly straining for a flirtation with real-world despondency.
Cooper also fares well given his crooked cops storyline plays out like a skim-read of Serpico , Prince Of The City, Cop Land and more.