Mad City (film)
Encyclopedia
Mad City is a 1997 drama film and thriller film written by Tom Matthews and Eric Williams, directed by Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras
Costa-Gavras, is a Greek filmmaker, who lives and works in France, best known for films with overt political themes, most famously the fast-paced thriller, Z...

, and starring Dustin Hoffman
Dustin Hoffman
Dustin Lee Hoffman is an American actor with a career in film, television, and theatre since 1960. He has been known for his versatile portrayals of antiheroes and vulnerable characters....

, John Travolta
John Travolta
John Joseph Travolta is an American actor, dancer and singer. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after appearing on the television series Welcome Back, Kotter and starring in the box office successes Saturday Night Fever and Grease...

, Mia Kirshner
Mia Kirshner
Mia Kirshner is a Canadian actress and social activist who works in movies and television series. She is best known for her portrayal of Jenny Schecter on The L Word and for her role in the 2006 crime film The Black Dahlia as Elizabeth Short.- Early life :Kirshner was born in Toronto, Ontario,...

, Alan Alda
Alan Alda
Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo , better known as Alan Alda, is an American actor, director, screenwriter, and author. A six-time Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award winner, he is best known for his role as Hawkeye Pierce in the TV series M*A*S*H...

, Blythe Danner
Blythe Danner
Blythe Katherine Danner is an American actress. She is the mother of actress Gwyneth Paltrow and director Jake Paltrow.-Early life:...

, Ted Levine
Ted Levine
Frank Theodore "Ted" Levine is an American actor. He is known for his roles as Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs and Captain Leland Stottlemeyer in the television series Monk.-Early life and career:...

, Raymond J. Barry
Raymond J. Barry
Raymond John Barry is an American film, television and stage actor.-Personal life:Raymond John Barry was born in Hempstead, New York . His father, Raymond Barry, worked in sales. His mother, Barbara Barry , was also an actor, known professionally as B. Constance Barry...

, and Larry King
Larry King
Lawrence Harvey "Larry" King is an American television and radio host whose work has been recognized with awards including two Peabodys and ten Cable ACE Awards....

.

Plot

Sam Baily gets laid off from his job as a museum security guard. In desperation for not being able to provide for his wife and kids, he comes armed with weapons and explosives and takes his boss Mrs. Banks and a number of children (at the museum on a school field trip) as hostages.

Television journalist Max Brackett is in the museum using the restroom after an interview with the curator about financial difficulties. He becomes directly involved in the hostage situation, acting as Baily's intermediary to the outside world and the police.

Baily accidentally shoots a friend still working there as a security guard, sending him to the hospital, and later fires a gun again, frightening the children and becoming more and more unstable as he takes caffeine pills to stay awake. Along with a young intern, Laurie, Brackett reports the story exclusively on television, reviving his career. By being free to come and go, he negotiates with a national network and its star news anchorman, Kevin Hollander, with whom Brackett has an unhappy history.

Baily wants the police to let him return home to his wife and kids, and won't accept that he's going to jail. Brackett on the other hand makes a deal rather than let Hollander have the story, prompting Hollander to publicly accuse Brackett of prolonging the crisis and endangering the children. When Baily's ex-colleague dies from his injuries, Baily starts to realize he's lost everything.

Baily and Brackett allow the situation to worsen until the police finally have had enough, issuing a five minute ultimatum to Baily for release of the hostages. Baily lets the children as well as Brackett go, but rather than face prison -- and his wife -- he ultimately sets off his explosives, committing suicide. As reporters swamp Brackett and ask about Baily, all he can say is, "We killed him," referring to how the media handled the situation.

Cast

  • Dustin Hoffman
    Dustin Hoffman
    Dustin Lee Hoffman is an American actor with a career in film, television, and theatre since 1960. He has been known for his versatile portrayals of antiheroes and vulnerable characters....

     as Max Brackett
  • John Travolta
    John Travolta
    John Joseph Travolta is an American actor, dancer and singer. Travolta first became known in the 1970s, after appearing on the television series Welcome Back, Kotter and starring in the box office successes Saturday Night Fever and Grease...

     as Sam Baily
  • Mia Kirshner
    Mia Kirshner
    Mia Kirshner is a Canadian actress and social activist who works in movies and television series. She is best known for her portrayal of Jenny Schecter on The L Word and for her role in the 2006 crime film The Black Dahlia as Elizabeth Short.- Early life :Kirshner was born in Toronto, Ontario,...

     as Laurie Callahan
  • Alan Alda
    Alan Alda
    Alphonso Joseph D'Abruzzo , better known as Alan Alda, is an American actor, director, screenwriter, and author. A six-time Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award winner, he is best known for his role as Hawkeye Pierce in the TV series M*A*S*H...

     as Kevin Hollander
  • Blythe Danner
    Blythe Danner
    Blythe Katherine Danner is an American actress. She is the mother of actress Gwyneth Paltrow and director Jake Paltrow.-Early life:...

     as Mrs. Banks
  • Robert Prosky
    Robert Prosky
    Robert Prosky was an American stage, film, and television actor.-Life and career:Prosky, a Polish American, was born Robert Joseph Porzuczek in the Manayunk neighborhood of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Helen and Joseph Porzuczek. His father was a grocer and butcher...

     as Lou Pottts
  • Ted Levine
    Ted Levine
    Frank Theodore "Ted" Levine is an American actor. He is known for his roles as Buffalo Bill in The Silence of the Lambs and Captain Leland Stottlemeyer in the television series Monk.-Early life and career:...

     as Chief Lemke
  • Kyla Pratt
    Kyla Pratt
    Kyla Alissa Pratt is an American actress and singer.-Early life:Pratt was born in Los Angeles, the oldest of five children of Kecia Pratt-McCullar, a schoolteacher, and Johnny McCullar, a semi-professional basketball player....

     as Kid

Reception

As of August 2007, the film had a score of 36% on Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...

, based on 28 reviews; on Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...

, the film had a score of 45 out of 100 (mixed or average) based on 23 reviews. Film critic Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...

 noted Mad City is inspired by the film Ace in the Hole and gave the movie two stars (out of four), writing: "The movie knows what it wants to do, but lacks the velocity for lift-off."

In the United States, the film opened at #6 at the box office with an opening weekend gross of $4.6 million. It went on to gross $10,5 million.
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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