L.A. Confidential is a very good film. Set in 1953 Los Angeles it tells the story of deep police corruption and murder. Guy Pearce plays Ed Exley, a Lieutenant who is not well liked within the force for snitching out his fellow officers when they beat a bunch of prisoners who were accused of beating a cop. Exley, however, is a very smart and incorruptible cop who is good at his job. Russell Crowe plays Bud White, also a good cop but in much different ways than Exley. White is a hot head that will beat the truth out of a witness and has a penchant for violence. When there is a murder at a local coffee shop in which White's former partner is killed the mystery begins. The case gets solved but something doesn't smell right. White does his own behind the scenes investigation, while Exley works with Sergeant Jack Vincennes, a narcotics officer who does a lot of behind the scenes dealings with tabloids, to try and figure out exactly what is going on. White and Exley hate each other for various reasons, but when all this stuff goes down they are forced to work as a team. L.A. Confidential is a great homage to the 1940's film noirs, and has fantastic performances from Crowe, Pearce, Spacey, Basinger, et al. Definitely a film that everyone will enjoy, succeeds at everything that De Palma tried to do with The Black Dahlia and failed. Overall 3.5/4 Stars Grade = B+
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