L.A. Confidential is one of my favorite movies and possibly the best movie of the 90s. I've viewed it several times, most recently last month, and it holds up well.
I've just finished reading the novel the movie is based on, L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy, one of a series of noir novels by the author set in Los Angeles during the 40s, 50s, and 60s. The 500 page book makes for intense and compelling reading, I couldn't put it down. It is also completely bonkers, an insane fever dream, and quite different from the movie, with many more characters, much more plot, taking place over most of the decade of the 50s instead of within the compressed time frame of the movie.
Reading the book, I was filled with admiration for the film's screenplay authors, Brian Helgeland and Curtis Hanson (who also directed the movie), for their skill in extracting a brilliant and filmable story from the sprawling novel. In the process they jettisoned subplots while eliminating or minimizing some key characters in the book, and significantly changing the entire flow of the narrative and ending. They did so by maintaining a laser like focus on the three main characters - Bud White, Ed Exley, and Jack Vincennes. The result, a memorable and great looking film that introduced Russell Crowe and Guy Pearce to American audiences.
One thing did remain constant between the book and movie - reading the dialogue in every scene in the novel in which Sid Hudgens, publisher of Hush-Hush magazine appears, I heard Danny DeVito's voice in my head!
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