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The Usual Suspects DVD cover
The fifth installment of "The movies we crave" is Bryan Singer's first and certainly greatest film, The Usual Suspects (1995).
**Spoilers**
Driven by Christopher McQuarrie's ridiculously well written script, The Usual Suspects (#21 in IMDb.com's Top 250 Movies of All Time) contains arguably the best plot twist of the past 20 years. These days, the plot twist is a tactic used to artlessly market films, ultimately trivializing the remainder of the film as the audience focuses on out-smarting the movie instead of appreciating all it has to offer. A plot twist is only effective when no one sees it coming and when this film came out in 1995, no one suspected a thing.
When five relatively small time criminals (and one who claims to be reformed) meet in a police lineup, they decide to work together through various money earning schemes, particularly hijacking. Told from the perspective of the good old untrustworthy narrator (Kevin Spacey as Verbal Kint, in his best work to date), the rest of the plot is a composition of deception--after multiple views, it still isn't clear what exactly happened and what exactly is contrived.
The beautifully entangled script is modern and slick, but the film's execution has the air of an old Hollywood noir, with Detective Kujan (Chazz Palminteri) as the truth-seeking Humphrey Bogart, outmatched by his opponent in ways he can't possibly suspect. Laced with hints throughout, the film's seemingly minor details are more trustworthy than anything that comes from the characters' mouths.
After the five men unknowingly steal from notorious crime boss Keyser Soze, the primary mystery of the film is determining his identity. Kint explains, "He becoes a myth, a spook story that criminals tell their kids at night. 'Rat on your pop, and Keyser Soze will get you.' And no one ever really believes." Included as best villain and best character in numerous movie-centric lists, Soze's ominous influence in the plot's driving force.
Dean Keaton's (Gabriel Byrne) precise role and motivations in the film are purposefully left murky, even for Byrne himself. In fact, when asked at a film festival who Keyser Soze was, Byrne responded "During shooting and until watching the film tonight, I thought I was!" His moral ambiguity convinces the audience he could be behind all of it.
With the part of Verbal Kint written specifically for him, Spacey is at his finest, back when he had something to prove. Many of the confused reactions to Fenster's (Benicio Del Toro) dialogue were genuine, as a few of the actors had difficulty understanding his garbled English. Despite this, or perhaps because of it, Del Toro's performance stands out in this fairly minor role. Stephen Baldwin is surprisingly bearable, Kevin Pollack is his typical loudmouth self, and Peter Greene is the creep he always plays (effectively, mind you).
The Usual Suspects is one of those movies that when it ends, you can't help but finally exhale and utter a singular "wow."
And like that, he's gone.
The movies we crave, part one
The movies we crave, part two
The movies we crave, part three
The movies we crave, part four
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