The 25 best L.A. films about Los Angeles of the last 25 years
Los Angeles Times
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- DirectorCurtis HansonStarsKevin SpaceyRussell CroweGuy PearceAs corruption grows in 1950s Los Angeles, three policemen - one strait-laced, one brutal, and one sleazy - investigate a series of murders with their own brand of justice.She is as fitting a metaphor for the city as anything ever hatched by Hollywood: Kim Basinger‘s high-class call girl Lynn Bracken in the neo-noir potboiler “L.A. Confidential.”
- DirectorAntoine FuquaStarsDenzel WashingtonEthan HawkeScott GlennA rookie cop spends his first day as a Los Angeles narcotics officer with a rogue detective who isn't what he appears to be.Written by David Ayer, who grew up near the rough streets depicted in the film, and directed by Antoine Fuqua, “Training Day” presents a worst-case-scenario vision of law enforcement in Los Angeles, a nightmare phantasmagoria of a police procedural sprawled out on the hood of a car.
- DirectorPaul Thomas AndersonStarsMark WahlbergJulianne MooreBurt ReynoldsBack when sex was safe, pleasure was a business and business was booming, an idealistic porn producer aspires to elevate his craft to an art when he discovers a hot young talent.Even though it follows the rise, fall and survival of a boy from the Valley who discovers that his “one special thing” is the enormous bulge in his pants, “Boogie Nights” is not about porn. It is about the people who make porn.
- DirectorQuentin TarantinoStarsPam GrierSamuel L. JacksonRobert ForsterA flight attendant with a criminal past gets nabbed by the ATF for smuggling. Under pressure to become an informant against the illegal arms dealer she works for, she must find a way to secure her future without getting killed.Go ahead, start drafting your angry e-mail. This is the spot where you expected to see Quentin Tarantino‘s adrenaline-to-the heart masterpiece “Pulp Fiction,” or maybe his bloodied caper film “Reservoir Dogs.” No, after plenty of debate (and by split vote), we’re going in a different direction.
- DirectorJohn SingletonStarsCuba Gooding Jr.Laurence FishburneHudhail Al-AmirFollows the lives of three young males living in the Crenshaw ghetto of Los Angeles, dissecting questions of race, relationships, violence, and future prospects.Arriving with a shotgun blast in the same year as the Rodney King beating, “Boyz N the Hood” captures a uniquely Angeleno experience that no mainstream movie before it dared touch -- the first all-African American feature about South-Central L.A.'s urban strife to be bankrolled by a major studio.
- DirectorMartin BrestStarsEddie MurphyJudge ReinholdJohn AshtonA freewheeling Detroit cop pursuing a murder investigation finds himself dealing with the very different culture of Beverly Hills.Who can forget Eddie Murphy tooling down Beverly Drive in his “crappy blue Chevy Nova,” flirting with a girl in a tan convertible? Or discussing art with a marbled-mouth gallerist (Bronson Pinchot)?
- DirectorRobert AltmanStarsTim RobbinsGreta ScacchiFred WardA Hollywood studio executive is being sent death threats by a writer whose script he rejected, but which one?The eight-minute opening tracking shot pays homage to Orson Welles‘ “Touch of Evil,” though now instead of focusing on a car carrying a bomb across the Mexican border, director Robert Altman highlights the banality of evil on an unnamed studio lot, as writers pitch witless ideas (including “The Graduate II”) to bored studio executives.
- DirectorAmy HeckerlingStarsAlicia SilverstoneStacey DashBrittany MurphyShallow, rich and socially successful Cher is at the top of her Beverly Hills high school's pecking scale. Seeing herself as a matchmaker, Cher first coaxes two teachers into dating each other.Filmmaker Amy Heckerling (“Fast Times at Ridgemont High”) spent several years studying the genus -- rich L.A. teen -- to get all the slang and clothes right (or at least memorable) in this retelling of Jane Austen‘s “Emma,” set in Beverly Hills, which she wrote and directed.
- DirectorAlex CoxStarsHarry Dean StantonEmilio EstevezTracey WalterA young punk, recruited by a car repo agency, finds himself in pursuit of a Chevrolet Malibu with a huge, $20,000 bounty--and something otherworldly stashed in its trunk.Los Angeles has symbolized the end of civilization in a long list of films but rarely as memorably as in this sci-fi-inflected portrait of punk-era dead-enders.
- DirectorMichael MannStarsTom CruiseJamie FoxxJada Pinkett SmithA cab driver finds himself the hostage of an engaging contract killer as he makes his rounds from hit to hit during one night in Los Angeles.Michael Mann‘s cameras, and the director’s famously sleek shooting style, could probably make any city look good. . Here he transforms Los Angeles into a beautiful and otherworldly place, shot mostly at night in a color treatment very close to black and white, which includes both the sophisticated and the rustic -- the shimmering skin of Disney Hall as well as a sphinx-like coyote crossing the street.
- DirectorJoel CoenEthan CoenStarsJeff BridgesJohn GoodmanJulianne MooreJeff "The Dude" Lebowski, mistaken for a millionaire of the same name, seeks restitution for his ruined rug and enlists his bowling buddies to help get it.According to Coen brothers lore, the writer-directors’ rationale for setting their surrealistic comedy “The Big Lebowski” in Los Angeles was disappointingly simple: real-life friends who inspired its most vivid characters -- the White Russian-swigging slacker protagonist “the Dude” ( Jeff Bridges) and his Vietnam veteran bowling buddy Walter ( John Goodman) -- lived in the city at the time; it was reason enough for the understated filmmakers to shoot what has been called “the first cult film of the Internet age” here.
- DirectorDavid LynchStarsNaomi WattsLaura HarringJustin TherouxAfter a car wreck on Mulholland Drive renders a woman amnesiac, she and a Hollywood-hopeful search for clues and answers across Los Angeles in a twisting venture beyond dreams and reality.Named for the street that runs the ridgeline of the Santa Monica Mountains and Hollywood Hills, “Mulholland Drive” could just as easily be called “Boulevard of Broken Dreams.”
- DirectorRobert ZemeckisStarsBob HoskinsChristopher LloydJoanna CassidyWhen a cartoon rabbit is accused of murder, he enlists the help of a burnt out private investigator to prove his innocence.This wacky homage to L.A. hard-boiled detective fiction, set in 1947 Los Angeles, blended live action and animation to tell the story of a washed-up Det. Valiant, trying to exonerate cartoon film star Roger Rabbit for a murder he did not commit, and in the process save Toontown, the neighborhood where the animated stars live.
- DirectorDoug LimanStarsVince VaughnHeather GrahamJon FavreauA wannabe actor has a hard time moving on from a break-up, but he is lucky to have supportive friends.For the 6.2% of actors in the Screen Actors Guild who earn more than $50,000 a year, there’s “Entourage.” For the other 93.8%, there’s “Swingers,” Doug Liman’s hip, indie comedy about the lives and loves of struggling actors written by a struggling actor, Jon Favreau (now the director of “Iron Man”) for his struggling actor buddies.
- DirectorCarl FranklinStarsDenzel WashingtonTom SizemoreJennifer BealsA Black war hero is hired to find a mysterious woman, and gets mixed up in a murderous political scandal in 1948 Los Angeles.It says something about the nature of things that the time and place of this superb crime drama -- the circa 1948 streets surrounding Los Angeles’ vibrant Central Avenue -- are as remote as Burkina Faso for mainstream movie audiences.
- DirectorF. Gary GrayStarsIce CubeChris TuckerNia LongIt's Friday, and Craig and Smokey must come up with $200 they owe a local bully or there won't be a Saturday.Although rapper-actor Ice Cube and South-Central L.A. factor inextricably into both movies, don’t mistake “Friday” for “Boyz N the Hood Redux.”
- DirectorJan de BontStarsKeanu ReevesDennis HopperSandra BullockA young police officer must prevent a bomb exploding aboard a city bus by keeping its speed above 50 mph.A race against time? No, far worse, it’s a race against traffic. One out of every 31 Americans lives in Los Angeles County and, right now, somewhere in town, there’s a freeway that looks like a parking lot.
- DirectorMartha CoolidgeStarsNicolas CageDeborah ForemanElizabeth DailyJulie, a girl from the valley, meets Randy, a punk from the city. They are from different worlds and find love. Somehow they need to stay together in spite of her trendy, shallow friends.The era of the Valley girl has passed. The Sherman Oaks Galleria, ground zero for all things “tubular” and “gnarly,” has been razed and rebuilt. But the heart of “Valley Girl” -- a time capsule of teenage dating rituals and Reagan-era L.A. night life -- still beats true on DVD.
- DirectorWilliam FriedkinStarsWilliam PetersenWillem DafoeJane LeevesA fearless Secret Service agent will stop at nothing to bring down the counterfeiter who killed his partner.Fourteen years after “The French Connection,” director William Friedkin came back with another street tale about a criminal mastermind being stalked by violent and morally compromised cops.
- DirectorMick JacksonStarsSteve MartinVictoria TennantRichard E. GrantWith the help of a talking freeway billboard, a wacky weatherman tries to win the heart of an English newspaper reporter, who is struggling to make sense of the strange world of early 1990s Los Angeles.Steve Martin‘s love letter to his adopted hometown reveals the side of Los Angeles usually seen only by longtime residents and NPR supporters -- the cultural side.
- DirectorCharles BurnettStarsDanny GloverPaul ButlerDeVaughn NixonA charismatic old acquaintance drifts into town, stirring up trouble for a mild-mannered family.Now that his classic “Killer of Sheep” has been handsomely reissued, this is perhaps the Charles Burnett theatrical feature most deserving of rediscovery.
- DirectorMarek KanievskaStarsAndrew McCarthyJami GertzRobert Downey Jr.A college freshman returns to L.A. for the holidays at his ex-girlfriend's request, but discovers that his former best friend has an out-of-control drug habit.With its neon-bathed shots of Melrose Avenue, decadent nightclub set-pieces and scenes plotted around the turquoise brilliance of swimming pools at night, “Less Than Zero” viscerally evokes the Big Empty -- the hedonism, superficiality and laissez-faire nihilism -- of ‘80s L.A.
- DirectorMichael RitchieStarsChevy ChaseJoe Don BakerDana Wheeler-NicholsonWhile working undercover wisecracking newspaper reporter Irwin "Fletch" Fletcher is offered a large sum by a millionaire with a terminal disease to kill him. Intrigued, Fletch decides to unearth the full story behind the offer.“I’m Chevy Chase and you’re not.” Well, these days he’s not really Chevy Chase either, but he was when he made this 1985 farce.
- DirectorAllison AndersStarsAngel AvilesSeidy LopezJacob VargasMousie and Sad Girl are childhood best friends in a contemporary Los Angeles poor Hispanic neighborhood. But when Sad Girl becomes pregnant by Mousie's boyfriend, a drug dealer named Ernesto, the two become bitter enemies. While their dispute escalates towards violence, the violence of the world around them soon also impacts their lives.Rather than the overheated drama one might expect of a story revolving around gang kids and drug dealers in Echo Park, writer-director Allison Anders‘ “Mi Vida Loca” is a surprisingly sweet romance, cannily pitched somewhere between rose-tinted melodrama and wide-eyed realism.
- DirectorPaul HaggisStarsDon CheadleSandra BullockThandiwe NewtonLos Angeles citizens with vastly separate lives collide in interweaving stories of race, loss and redemption.Opening with a monologue that declares Los Angeles unlike a “real city” because people spend too much time behind the “metal and glass” of their cars, “Crash” announces itself right from the start as a Big Statement about L.A., which it views as a roiling caldron of racial mistrust and enmity.