Motherless Brooklyn (2019): Intelligent Noir

How can you not like Edward Norton? He’s smart, well spoken, a keen student of cinema, and a terrific actor [American History X (1998); Fight Club (1999); 25^th Hour (2002); The Illusionist (2006).] Now, it turns out, he’s a talented screenwriter and director as well. His new movie, Motherless Brooklyn, is a passion project for Norton, years in the making, in which he stars as the protagonist Lionel Essrog. Norton also wrote the screenplay, adapted from the wonderful 1999 Jonathan Lethem novel of the same name (winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award) and directed the film.

Motherless Brooklyn is a moody, intelligent character study and a neo-noir mystery, set in late 1950s New York City. It’s also a barely disguised commentary on current themes of gentrification and institutional racism, and a not too subtle indictment of the visionary, so-called “master builder” of mid-century New York, Robert Moses – represented in the story by an imposing character named Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin).  Norton’s adaptation of the Lethem’s novel smartly moves the era of the story from the 1990s back to the late Fifties, which allows the development of his twinned themes of Moses - and his unprecedented (unelected, thus undemocratic) use of power to obliterate neighborhoods while transforming the city -  and the racist, corrupt, crooked schemes that underpinned his idealistic urban vision.  

The way he weaves these elements into a personal story of a gumshoe’s investigation of a murder reminds me of one of my favorite all-time movies, the great Roman Polanski classic Chinatown (1974) – even though Polansky’s picture is set in sun-drenched 1930s Los Angeles while Norton’s is in the urban jungle of New York.  The corruption, the bigger than life personalities, the flawed detective, the developing relationship between said detective and a beautiful mystery woman, the enigmatic history of said woman, and more align in the two films.  Of course, few films can match the near-perfection of Chinatown, which rates an A+ in my book.  Motherless Brooklyn is not quite at that level, but it’s awfully good. (You’ll find my grade below.)

The story is intricate, atmospheric and dark with a peculiar, yet oddly effective protagonist in Lionel Essrog. Essrog works for Frank Minna (Bruce Willis), a shady private detective with, it would seem, a heart of gold - having plucked Lionel and his three colleagues Tony (Bobby Cannavale), Gilbert (Ethan Suplee) and Danny (Dallas Roberts) from a bleak orphanage when they were still teens. Now they’re known as Minna Men.  Lionel, whom Minna calls “Brooklyn”, is the sharpest, if not the most ambitious. When, during a stake-out, their mentor Minna is mysteriously killed, Tony aims to take over the agency, while Lionel feels compelled to go out and find out who done it and why.

As it turns out, Lionel has a couple of advantages. First, he’s a fellow with an almost supernatural memory for details – visual, verbal and otherwise. No need for this guy to take notes. What’s more noticeable is that Lionel suffers from Tourette’s syndrome – a disorder that involves repetitive movements (like twitching his head or repeatedly touching one’s shoulder) and unwanted bursts of unwanted words. In the book, Lionel describes it like this: 

“Context is everything. Dress me up and see. I am a carnival worker, and auctioneer, a downtown performance artist, a speaker in tongues …. My mouth won’t quit, so mostly I whisper and subvocalize like I am reading aloud, my Adam’s apple bobbing, jaw muscle beating like a miniature heart under my cheek, the noise suppressed, the words escaping silently, mere ghost of themselves, husks emptied of breath and tone. … they mean no harm. They placate, interpret, massage. Everywhere they’re smoothing down imperfections, putting hairs in place, putting ducks in a row, replacing divots. [But sometimes, things feel too neat.] That’s when it comes, the urge to shout in the church, the nursery, the crowded movie house. It’s an itch at first. Inconsequential. But that itch is soon a torrent behind a straining dam. Noah’s flood. That itch is my whole life. Here it comes now. Cover your ears.

‘Eat me!’ I scream.”

How is this an advantage? Lionel is obviously pretty odd. Sometimes this is pretty funny, mostly it just sets him apart. (Another nickname Minna gave him – affectionately - is “Freakshow”.) The thing is, though, people underestimate him.  Meanwhile he works the case, following seemingly nowhere clues; but with his native intelligence, unassuming manner and phenomenal memory, he starts to piece things together.  This gets him into strange and dangerous territory. A matchbox found in Minna’s pocket leads to a Harlem nightclub (“The King Rooster”) and a young African American woman, Laura Rose - played by Gugu Mbatha-Raw [Belle (2013). She works with community organizer/neighborhood preservationist/shit-disturber Gabby Horowitz (two-time Tony Award winner, Cherry Jones) - likely based on the real urban activist Jane Jacobs. For the first time,  listening to Gabby, naïve Lionel becomes aware of the Machiavellian world of Moses Randolph and the seemingly corrupt, profit-oriented world of NYC politics. Seems there’s something rotten in the Big Apple, which may have a connection to Minna’s death. But what?

While on the long side for a noir picture at just under two-and-a-half hours, seeing Motherless Brooklyn is time well spent – thanks to strong performances by all the actors in his ensemble, which also includes a nice performance by Willem Dafoe as Moses’ struggling, disaffected brother and Michael Kenneth Williams (“Omar” in The Wire) as a jazz trumpeter; and to the lovely aesthetic of Norton and his team. Working with veteran DP Dick Pope, Norton gives us appropriately noirish, darkly lit interiors and many shadowy scenes in streets and alleys, creating a mood of alienation and mystery.  And the movie really captures the look, feel and sound of the late 1950s city. The clothes, the cars, the rhythms, the smokes, all sorts of details. Phone booths. Taxis and busses. brownstone neighborhoods. The neighborhood jazz joint.

Laura Rose’s dad runs such a club and it features a quintet made up of solid jazz players (Joe Farnsworth on drums, Jerry Weldon on sax, Russell hall on bass, Isaiah J Thompson on piano) along with thesound of Wynton Marsalis on trumpet -  the trumpet man played believably by Michael Kenneth Williams. One tune they are playing is a new song by Radiohead’s Thom Yorke called Daily Battles,  arranged to sound just like a 1959 Miles Davis number and, together with the ambience of the bar itself,  it puts us solidly in a late Fifties mood. (Thom Yorke's own version also features on the lovely soundtrack.)  

Norton the actor as Lionel is just perfect.  We get introduced to his Tourette’s tics and idiosyncrasies early on and while they never disappear, they do abate as the film goes on so as to remain interesting, rather than off-putting. There’s a pretty cool scene at the King Rooster where Lionel starts grooving to the jazz and blurts Tourettes induced, syncopated, scat-like sounds that catch the admiration of trumpeter Williams. And there's a cute, classic bit where Lionel attempts to suavely light an attractive lady’s cigarette, only to compulsively blow out his own match each time.  More to the point, his mild-mannered yet intense commitment to solving the case holds our attention throughout. We can’t help but like this lonely, afflicted guy.

I loved the novel Motherless Brooklyn. Twenty years on, I still remember my initial impression of Lionel Essrog – such a cool, unusual character.  Edward Norton the writer/director has modified the plot of the story considerably but has still made a quite intriguing film. The thing that hasn’t changed is the character of Lionel Essrog. Norton the actor captures him perfectly.

2 hours 24 minutes.                            Rated R

Grade: A-

In general release.