G. Pelecanos, writes:
Joel and Ethan broke with the tradition begun by Hammett [in
Red Harvest]
and carried on by Kurosawa and Leone, and gave
their
> protagonist a name (Tom Reagan), but the source
material, once again,
> remained uncredited.
Greetings to DC's Finest (missed you at the door), but having
said that I have to express my usual scepticism on the
Kurosawa borrowing idea. We argued this at length once upon a
time, and I'm just old enough to have forgotten all the
excellent points I undoubtedly made (?)...but I don't
remember that anyone came up with a hard link; the evidence
was circumstantial. As someone mentioned recently, Kurosawa
doesn't acknowledge the debt.
Probably we need someone who knows all those Jacobean blood
revenge plays (with bodies galore) to find the real origins
of the plot in question.
I agree that Miller's Crossing feels like Red Harvest, more
than Kurosawa's or Leone's films do. Feels like it in the
great scenes, urban setting, within a plot that is episodic,
a series of actions that start and stop, sometimes a bit
separated at the seams. On the other hand, both Kurosawa and
Leone have a fairly unified plot, rising to an expected,
ultimate face-off.
Bill Hagen
billha@ionet.net
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