In the Hand of Dante, On Netflix

In Arturo Perez-Reverte’s The Club Dumas (but weirdly, not the inferior film adaptation, The Ninth Gate), a seedy bookseller searches for a rare early draft of The Three Musketeers. In this literary adaptation, the Macguffin is Dante Alighieri’s only surviving handwritten copy of The Divine Comedy. Originally, Johnny Depp also optioned Nick Tosches’ novel, featuring an unflatteringly fictionalized version of the author. The meta-Tosches will be spared demons and fallen angels, but the gangsters who hire him supply plenty of high stakes in Julian Schnabel’s In the Hand of Dante, which premieres today on Netflix.

We know from the prologue, Tosches once killed in self-defense as a pre-teen boy. Presumably, that means he can do it again. Also, this scene showcases Al Pacino, doing some of his most memorable work since Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Perhaps he should become king of the significant cameo.

Forty or so hard years later, Tosches boasts to gangster pal Lefty about how his long-in-the-works translation of Dante’s Comedy convinced him how he could edit it to make it better—after contemptuously dismissing his own editor. As it happens, Lefty’s boss Joe Black needs a Dante expert, to authenticate the rare handwritten manuscript. Technically, it is in the possession of the aging Don Lecco. That is why his chief enforcer, Louie Brunellesches will accompany Tosches to Italy.

Italy often brings out the déjà vu in Tosches. It should, since Oscar Isaac portrays both him and Dante Alighieri. In fact, it might not be simply a case of dramatic dual casting. Tosches might just have been Dante, like in Dead Again. Plus, Brunellesches would have been Pope Boniface VIII and Lefty was Italian nobleman Guido da Polenta. Apparently, Black wasn’t anybody famous—or John Malkovich wasn’t available for the scenes in Italy. However, Tosches’ new lover Giulietta might have been Dante’s neglected wife Gemma Donati. This time around, Tosches hopes to do better by her, because he truly loves her passionately.

Perhaps Tosches’ novel would better suit a full series adaptation, because even at two and a half hours, it is riddled with detours and sub-plots that simply dead-end and wither away. Ironically, the black-and-white contemporary Tosches timeline delivers all the really potent scenes, definitely starting with Pacino’s appearance as Uncle Carmine. Also, Gerard Butler will absolutely shock many viewers during his first scene as the thuggish, mean-spirited Brunellesches. Yet, it could honestly be the greatest performance of his career.

Copshop: Grillo vs. Butler

The drunk tank always looked like such a safe place when Otis crashed there on the Andy Griffith Show. Unfortunately, a rather unsavory character will avail himself of such hospitality at the Gun Creek police station. Nobody will be safe as long as he is there, but his competition is even worse in Joe Carnahan’s Copshop, which is now playing in New York.

Val Young is a cop who knows guns, but Teddy Murretto still manages to sucker punch her during a routine call. At least he apologized immediately after. The people who were chasing him are highly motivated, so his is happy to temporarily settle for the safety of a police cell and treatment for his minor gun-shot wound. Soon thereafter, Bob Viddick barrels into Murretto’s abandoned car, so the investigating troopers will book him into the station too. It was all part of his plan to get close to Murretto.

Viddick seems to operate according to some kind of hitman’s code, so Young might have been able to handle him. However, when Anthony Lamb, Viddick’s psychotic colleague also crashes the party, all bets are off.

Carnahan and co-screenwriter Kurt McLeod take the general situation of Rio Bravo, add the confined Die Hard-style action set-pieces and give them a Guy Ritchie-esque treatment—and frankly it all works like a well-oiled machine. The film eventually hinges on the question whether Young should trust an admitted killer like Viddick or an exploitative wheeler-dealer like Murretto, but the film and the audience both know she can only really rely on herself.

Frank Grillo is terrific oozing slime as Murretto. He should be a name-above-the-title star by now and maybe Copshop will bring him a step closer. Gerard Butler does usual tough guy thing as Viddick, but that is basically just what the doctor ordered. Grillo definitely brings more color and flamboyance, but they both more or less project an equal sense of danger. However, Alexis Louder out badasses everyone as Young, in what should turn out to be a star-making role.

In fact, the entire ensemble is quite distinctive, most definitely including Chad L. Coleman. He earns quite a bit of laughs as the overbearing Sgt. Duane Mitchell, but never at the expense of gritty cop cred. Toby Huss delivers a different sort outrageous gallows humor as Lamb, the off-the-rails assassin. It is quite a deep supporting cast, with memorable contributions also coming from Jose Cantillo, as Young’s buddy, Officer Pena and Ryan O’Nan, playing Huber, the mess-up on the Gun Creek PD.

The Vanishing: Scotland’s Lighthouse Mystery

Lighthouse keeping is a quiet, lonely business, but it is fraught with occupational risks. There is a voluminous history of mysterious and tragic events occurring in isolated lighthouses that have suddenly inspired a clump of films. Following Chris Crow’s The Lighthouse, based on the very real “Small’s Lighthouse Incident,” the mysterious disappearance of the Flannan Isles light-keepers gets a fictionalized explanation in Kristoffer Nyholm’s The Vanishing (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

James Ducat is the garrulous family man. Thomas Marshall is the bitter, guilt-wracked widower. Donald McArthur is the obnoxious apprentice. The three light-keepers ought to be able to survive six weeks on the Isle together, but all bets are off when an unknown sailor and a mystery chest wash up on at the bottom of a coastal ravine. Naturally, McArthur is sent down to investigate, but he is forced to kill in self-defense when the unnamed man turns out to be healthier (and meaner) than he looked.

Even though Marshall (rightly) fears the chest could be a proverbial Pandora’s box, they soon discover its contents: a sturdy pair of work boots and several bars of gold bullion. Obviously, it would be a terrible shame if those boots went to waste. As for the gold, the three co-workers decide to split it, like the bag of cash in A Simple Plan. They agree to wait a full year before cashing in, to avoid suspicion, but they are caught flat-footed when the dead man’s fellow crew members come looking for him and his “cargo.”

As a thriller, The Vanishing is nothing extraordinary, but it has its merits, starting with Gerard Butler, who does his best work since Ralph Fiennes’ Coriolanus as Ducat. He starts out as quite the hail-fellow chap, but becomes increasingly unhinged as their situation becomes dire. Peter Mullan is one of the best thesps in the business, but the salty old Marshall is so solidly in his wheelhouse, he hardly breaks an acting sweat. Connor Swindells is fittingly annoying as McArthur, while Danish character actor Søren Malling is all kinds of leathery and sinister looking as the suspicious skipper.

Nyholm’s workmanlike helming captures the claustrophobia of the lighthouse, but he allows the tension to flag from time to time. However, cinematographer Jørgen Johansson fully capitalizes on the lonely, picturesque vistas of the Outer Hebrides locale.

The one-two punch of The Vanishing and Crow’s Lighthouse should be sufficient to dissuade most recent grads from considering lighthouse keeping as a career. Maybe someone will make a film about the notorious Bustard Head lighthouse in Australia, to really drive home the point. Of course, it is easy to see the appeal of lighthouse movies to filmmakers: small cast, one set, and the evocative image of a windswept tower rising above the rocks. The Vanishing has all that, plus Butler as you have rarely seen him before. It is a completely respectable film, but viewers can safely wait until it hits subscription-based streaming services. For eager lighthouse buffs, it opens today (1/4) in New York, at the Cinema Village and releases day-and-date on iTunes.