It's the men who 'matter'
Mad Dog and Glory
Directed by John McNaughton
Starring Robert De Niro, Uma Thurman and Bill Murray
At the Valhalla Cinema, Melbourne
Reviewed by Vannessa Hearman
Directed by John McNaughton of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer, this film incorporates several genres. It is a cop thriller, as well as a romance and male buddy film.
Robert De Niro plays Wayne (Mad Dog), a single police photographer who works night shifts. He happens to save the life of a gangster during a hold-up he unwittingly interrupts. The gangster, Frank (Bill Murray) tries to repay him by giving him a "friend" for a week, his bartender Glory (Uma Thurman), whose brother is indebted to Frank for large sums of money and cannot repay him.
Initially, Wayne is discomfited by the idea and does not know what to do with Glory. However, they fall in love after a few attempts at intimacy. The end of the week looms, when Frank will reclaim her.
This is an interesting film, with De Niro and Murray both playing unusual roles, unlike their macho and bumbling characters in the past. Murray plays a maladjusted gangster with a knife edge of malice under layers of insecurity. The viewer is taken by a few surprises.
However, the film leaves little scope for female characters. Glory is a pawn in the hands of Wayne and Frank, bought and sold like an object. Meanwhile Wayne's lonely neighbour is the victim of her lover's violence, behind closed doors. The characters who "matter" are predominantly male, as shown by the fight scene in which Wayne and Frank are cheered on by each other's mainly male groupies. The ending, too, leaves little room for imagination.