The Guilt Flows Throughout
After writing over twenty reviews for The Bayley Film Club, a person starts noticing certain qualities a film needs in order to be good. Some of these are: a good beginning, a good middle, and a good end. Even better if all three parts correspond with each other smoothly.
The beginning of Mystic River ties the action together and plants everything we will need for future reference. We are introduced to Jimmy, Sean and Dave — three young boys living in the same neighbourhood in Boston. It is a regular day in 1975 when Dave is abducted by two men, one pretending to be a police officer and the other a priest. The boy manages to escape after four days of sexual abuse.
Then comes the reintroduction — twenty-five years later. Sean (Kevin Bacon) is a homicide detective, Jimmy (Sean Penn) an ex-con who runs a neighbourhood store, and Dave (Tim Robbins) a blue-collar worker haunted by his past. Tragedy strikes when Jimmy's nineteen-year-old daughter is found dead in a nearby park, shot twice and covered in bruises. The investigation led by Sean and his partner Whitey Powers (Laurence Fishburne) has to compete with Jimmy and the Savage brothers' own quest to find the killer — and take revenge.
The beginning and the main part of the film are brilliant. They gradually provide just enough facts for the viewer to speculate on their own. Then everything is revealed, all the loose ends are tied and explained. All is clear.
It would be a great film if it had ended on the street where Jimmy and Sean have their final conversation. But it doesn't — and that spoils the whole effect for me.
The scenes that follow feel unnecessary and add little to the narrative. I just wish Clint Eastwood had shouted the final "CUT!" one scene earlier.
Overall, I enjoyed Mystic River a lot. It is a fine and simple story about a crime, parental love, revenge, and the psychological scars of the past. One thing is certain — the guilt flows throughout the Mystic River.