Miller's Crossing (1990)

Rating: 100

Review written by me and first published on May 13, 1999, bearing the title "Makes Me Cry". A minor correction was made for republication here.

This is such a wonderful film I recover my faith in the human race just to remember it. But I also lose my faith in my own perceptiveness, since I didn't notice its greatness until watching it for the second time. I clearly see it at two different levels. First, as a straightforward gangster story, and it works perfectly well as such, with countless brilliant scenes and the cutest dialogue you could imagine. Secondly, in a deeper, more philosophical level, it is a reflection on such themes as personal ethics, chance, destiny, and one's command over one's own life. There is a clue to this in the final dialogue between Byrne's and Finney's characters. A truly complex and superior movie.