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Falling Down Movie Review

Falling Down is a 1993 crime drama film directed by Joel Schumacher and starring Michael Douglas and Robert Duvall. It’s a highly underrated picture.

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“You have a choice. I can kill you.

Or you can kill me,

and my daughter will get the insurance“

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William ‘D-Fens’ Foster is an unemployed and divorced engineer whose increasing frustration levels lead him to act out violently and commit several crimes. When this film was released, it received mixed reviews. Nowadays, it still continues to be deservedly criticized for its supposed racism. Both the far-left and the far-right found the movie racist, but in actuality the movie is just realistic in its honest depiction of the problems that all races face in America.

Its depiction of L.A. as this hopeless place ravaged by poverty and crime was certainly uniquely dark and brave in its honesty. This movie holds no punches in its portrayal of the many issues facing American society from the grounds up, which is why most critics did not take kindly to it as they were personally offended and threatened by the film’s brutal realism.

Michael Douglas has rarely been better than he was as the unhinged protagonist of Falling Down. He was always amazing playing these frustrated and nervous men going through stressful situations, which is why this role was perfect for him. It was over-the-top, but also inherently tragic and believable. Others also impressed in smaller roles. Barbara Hershey was excellent as his troubled wife while Robert Duvall was marvelous in the policeman role. The final confrontation between the two men was so heartfelt.

Falling Down’s issues are twofold. One is its over-the-top execution in terms of humor and action. Some of it was funny for sure, but most of the movie was tonally incoherent and overly aggressive in its themes that needed to have been dealt with in a more nuanced manner. The other issue is the overly convenient nature of its many plot scenarios. The movie piled misfortune upon misfortune on its protagonist to the point that it risked becoming overly repetitive.

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Still though, the directing from Schumacher has never been better and the movie was also deftly edited and well paced. The categorization of the film into the action genre was just false as it is more of a crime drama with some action and comedy elements that were more there to make the movie more populist in its appeal. But in its themes, it remains a serious social drama that was way ahead of its time and is still wrongly maligned by many critics.