The Cotton Club (1984)

Francis Ford Coppola's The Cotton Club is every bit as dazzling, chaotic and decadent as one might imagine the roaring twenties would have been. it's set in and revolves around the titular jazz club, conducting a boisterous, kaleidoscope study of the various dames, dapper gents, hoodlums, harlots and musicians who called it home. Among them are would be gangster Dixie Dwyer (a slick Richard Gere), Sandman Williams (Gregory Hines), a young Bumpy Johnson (Laurence Fishburne) and renowned psychopathic mobster Dutch Schultz (a ferocious James Remar). Coppola wisely ducks a routine plot line in favor of a helter skelter, raucous cascade of delirious partying, violence and steamy romance, a stylistic choice almost reminiscent of Robert Altman. Characters come and go, fight and feud, drink and dance and generally keep up the kind of manic energy and pizazz that only the 20's could sustain. The cast is positively stacked, so watch for appearances from Nicolas Case, Bob Hoskins, Diane Lane, John P. Ryan, James Russo, Fred Gwynne, Allen Garfield, Ed O Ross, Diane Venora, Woody Strode, Giancarlo Esposito, Bill Cobbs, Sofia Coppola and singer Tom Waits as Irving Stark, the club's owner. It's a messily woven tapestry of crime and excess held together by brief encounters, hot blooded conflict and that ever present jazz music which fuels the characters along with the perpetual haze of booze and cigarette smoke. Good times.

It's 1928 Harlem. At Bamville Club, cornet player Dixie Dwyer (Richard Gere) saves gangster Dutch Schultz (James Remar)'s live. It becomes widely known and his brother Vincent Dwyer (Nicolas Cage) is excited to join his gang. He falls for Vera Cicero (Diane Lane) but she becomes Dutch's girl. Dutch kills a rival bootlegger in front of mobsters Owney Madden (Bob Hoskins) and Frenchy Demange (Fred Gwynne). Owney who owns The Cotton Club tells Dutch to lay low. Sandman Williams (Gregory Hines) and his brother are new hires at the legendary Cotton Club where performers are black and only whites are allowed in the audience. Sandman falls for star performer Lila Rose Oliver (Lonette McKee).This is an extravagant costume drama. It's overly indulgent. There are too many stories. The narrative is too scattered. If the movie could just follow only Richard Gere, it would be a much more compelling watch. None of the characters are compelling. It is a good looking movie from director Francis Ford Coppola but it's not a good watch.

Francis Ford Coppola is quoted as saying, "I have genius but no talent." Honestly, I think he has both. But with his December 1984 release The Cotton Club, he unfortunately loses a little of this talent by failing to format a somewhat cohesive storyline. If you ignore that sort of minor flaw, you still get a splashy mob flick that is highly stylized, highly energized, and done with mounds of real panache.Taking place in 1930's Harlem (ah the good old days) and projecting itself as a movie that tries to cram in 2-3 stories in a 2 hr. period, "Club" tells the tale (or tales) of musician Dixie Dwyer, (played by Richard Gere who has amazing screen presence here) his uncontrollable resistance to move up the mob chain, and the resorting-to-murder brother he has to look out for (played with gusto by Nicolas Cage). The film also examines the life of a racially discriminated tap dancer (Gregory Hines) who struts his stuff at where else, The Cotton Club.Projecting itself as a sped up version of Coppola's masterpiece The Godfather (there's a sequence toward the end that pays complete homage to the baptism murder scene in said movie), this torrid vehicle has a fantastic look (very accurate for the time period and not too overdone), brilliant acting by Richard Gere ( Dwyer) and Nicolas Cage ( Dwyer's brother Vincent), and well choreographed, exhilarating tap dance sequences.Coppola, who is in total command of the camera (and his craft) wants to make sure the viewer is worn out by the time the credits roll. He is accurate, doesn't give an inch (he's a perfectionist. All you gotta do is watch the Heart of Darkness documentary), but seems too busy filling the screen with an overload of indelible images. I guess he insists on doing this instead of keeping the viewer focused on exactly what's going on with this talented cast (boy do they give it their all). Try as I might though, I can't fault him. Entertaining and never boring, The Cotton Club excels at making the audience feel unsafe (just like the actual characters in the movie) and it's at least in my mind, a moderate success. This veritable gangster movie is the equivalent of a sugar rush ( in a good way of course). It's one "club" you might want to check out.

Everyone knows Francis Ford Coppola is a master filmmaker. His 1984 film, "The Cotton Club," centers on events at the famous Harlem nightclub during the late 20s and early 30s. The club was a "whites only" establishment but ironically utilized mostly black entertainers.PLOT: As musician Dixie Dwyer (Richard Gere) starts chumming around with mobsters in order to advance his career, he slowly gets involved with the young moll (Diane Lane) of a snarling gangster (James Remar) and eventually becomes a Hollywood actor with the help of the club's owner (Bob Hoshkins). Meanwhile a black entertainer at the club, Sandman Williams (Gregory Hines), gets involved with a half-black singer (Lonette McKee), who sometimes passes herself off as white for convenience and career. Also on hand are Nicholas Cage as Dwyer's brother, who gets mixed up with the mob and becomes a public enemy, and the hulking Fred Gwynne as the club owner's right-hand man.To be expected, there's quite a bit of mob nastiness, but it's nicely balanced out by the music & entertainment. While I'm not a big fan of the music of that period, there are a couple of numbers that really impressed me, including one by McKee's character. The gangster shenanigans are also balanced out by quite a few other aspects, particularly the fact that the film has heart. In short, despite being mainly a mobster movie with a huge side of song & dance, there's some warmth here and there. Also, it's nice to see Fred Gwynne play someone other than Herman Munster.FINAL WORD: I was mainly interested in "The Cotton Club" because of Coppola's genius and the film's infamous production. In addition, the movie's a great way to sort of go back in time to the Prohibition-era and get a taste of what it was like, Hollywoodized and overdone though it may be.The film was shot in New York City and runs 2 hours 7 minutes.GRADE: B