The Big Heat, screenplay by Sydney Boehm, based on the serial by William McGivern, directed by Fritz Lang - 10 out of 10

The Big Heat, screenplay by Sydney Boehm, based on the serial by William McGivern, directed by Fritz Lang

10 out of 10

This is evidently one of the best options for the Armageddon that we may contemplate, seeing as it is one of the best motion pictures of all time, selected on The New York Times’ Best 1,000 Movies Ever Made list - http://realini.blogspot.com/2020/04/note-on-mad-max-2-road-warrior.html - and an inspirational film that could make us face the adversity of the pandemic with more courage, resilience, self-sacrifice, kindness, vitality, integrity, grit, hope, just like the hero of this impressive story, Sergeant Dave Bannion aka fantastic Glenn Ford, who takes on an all-powerful Evil, that we may see as the Virus or perhaps Trump in this age, the gangster- politician Mike Lagana.

We can easily assimilate, see the resemblance, if not the perfect replica with the Crook in charge of the free world represents for the Quintessential Vileness presented in this formidable movie, the corrupt individual that has climbed at the top – in the film it is just a town, but the real estate owner that has been through a series of bankruptcies and yet his idiotic fans see him as a ‘successful businessman has risen on top of the world, ‘stable genius’ as he is, pathological liar, spectacularly stupid and representative though for the depth and magnitude of the bright thinking of tens of millions of Americans and citizens of other nations, for there is no border for cave men and women and the likes of BolsoNero, Duterte, Putin and Xi are almost copies of the Orangutan…

The Big Heat starts with the suicide of a policemen and the call his widow, Bertha Duncan, makes to the…underworld, controlled by Mike Lagana and his cronies and hatchet men, the most prominent being, Vince Stone aka young and remarkable Lee Marvin, people that have the city under their control, because they have corrupt politicians, police commissioners on their payroll…which also strikes one as so similar with the present, in our land we have had until just a while ago such vicious and disgusting leaders, that their ‘party’ – in fact a Mafia organization meant to assure power and money – was known as the Red Plague – fortunately, Alhamdulillah, the disgusting thief that made laws for his own good is now in jail, though this is no reason for exaggerated exuberance, given that the other comrades share the same avarice, selfishness, stupidity and desire to steal and get rich at all costs.

Then we have the Lagana and Trump, representing the flaws of America, past and present respectively – a model to which I keep coming back, because it affects almost all of us and it is overwhelming and it seems to show the Decline, the Decadence, the Failure for us all, since that democracy used to be hailed – as the system in general – as the epitome of the successful running and development of a country as in The American Dream, all of which appears to have collapsed, in spite of the impeachment – voted down in terms of punishment in the Senate controlled by sycophants and smaller replicas of the Big Scoundrel - - and it pains so many, given that this used to be The Model to follow, the Shining City on the Hill, the Goal that we must look towards and hope that we will arrive there in the future…and now we look and see a post-apocalyptic society, where the Ultimate Pithecanthropus is in charge and not only that, but as he makes thousands of mistakes and tells tens of thousands of proven lies, 30 or 40% still love him and they are ready to use their guns – and they have a huge arsenal, bigger than most armies in the world – to keep him there…

To lighten the tone a little, we used to have jokes here and in the rest of Eastern Europe about America, such as ‘we offer 4 bedrooms penthouse, center of this or that capital, with all the amenities and exclusive facilities for a tent in Central Park…or another has the End of the World – just like now, with the Apocalyptic Virus – arrive and the American president says ‘do not worry, we have the space ships, we can leave the doomed planet’, while ours says ‘do not panic, we are anyway 50 years behind’ – that last figure varied, it was 100 at one time and now, in political terms we are ahead some decades, in the sense that our illuminated president is one million times better – with his inevitable flaws – than the monkey that they have placed in the White House…this trend could be reversed, but we surely hope not…Insha’Allah!

Dave Bannion is investigating the suicide, when he has a talk with Lucy Chapman, a woman that had had an affair with the late Duncan and who knows that there is something seriously wrong with the lies told by the widow, who has tried to justify a desperate act, claiming her late spouse had been very sick, when he was not and this makes the honest sergeant suspect there is more to find, especially when he would find that the poor ‘barfly’ – the demeaning term used then for those who had no possessions, flirted and had intimate affairs with various men, around bars – would be killed and worse, tortured, displaying cigarette burns on the dead body…

The hero knows, just like everybody else, that the gangster Mike Lagana is in charge and anything that happens in the streets has to have his marks, the approval and therefore he tries to push the bar tender, after he stays close to hear him connect the ‘higher echelons’, to tell him about the killer that ended the life of the poor woman who has tried to be a whistleblower – another connection with the present, when some patriot has tried to sound the alarm over the treasonous behavior of the president, Trump has pushed his monstrous behavior as far as to put the life of that noble man or woman in danger and in the days of the crisis, he has just sacked the Inspector General that had warned congress over the now infamous Ukraine scandal…

Dave Bannion walks up to the resident of the Godfather and confronts him, but the initial result is to have him scolded and warned by the lieutenant, who had had Big Heat coming from upstairs, where Commissioner Higgins and others are on the payroll of the gangster – indeed, in one scene of despicable violence, Vince Stone attacks his mistress, Debby Marsh aka Gloria Grahame, and pours hot coffee over her face, torturing and mutilating her for life and it is the commissioner who has to take her to the hospital, servant of the killers as he is, to prevent the otherwise inevitable report that would be made in such a case…

Tragedy strikes at the home of the Untouchable Sargent, when a bomb destined to silence him forever, blows someone else instead, but this will only serve to strengthen his anyway marvelous resolve to stand alone in front of the Evil Empire and fight to find the truth, revenge and make the loathsome creatures pay for their rottenness and abjection…