Motherless Brooklyn (2020) - Movie Review

A prominent actor decides to write, produce and direct a noir-soaked story as their personal passion project… I’m getting an unwelcome feeling of déjà vu. To go one further, say what you will about Ben Affleck, he at least proved his salt as a filmmaker years before trying this gambit; only other directing credit Edward Norton has is for Keeping The Faith back in 2000, and outside of some uncredited punch-up work, this is Norton’s first attempt at writing a screenplay on his own. The end result isn’t nearly as dire as that lead-up may suggest, but it’s not exactly smelling of roses either.

As is usually the case around here, there won’t be any comparisons made to the source material here, although the decision to adapt it on its own raises an eyebrow just reading Norton describe it. I don’t know why he thought transferring a story based in the 90’s to the 50’s instead was going to make the hard-boiled dialogue come across better, but its main impact is feeling like just another detective yarn. The dialect, however toyed around with it gets through Norton’s character, feels about as generic as it did in Live By Night. Also like Live By Night, it’s that same blandness that takes some of the bite out the material.

Between Alec Baldwin’s casting as the main villain, a city commissioner involved shady urban renewal projects in Brooklyn, and one of the impetuses for Norton to finally finish this project being the 2016 US election results… yeah, there’s quite a bit of timeliness to read in this material. Hearing Baldwin’s Moses Randolph talk at length about power and how it makes him feel is incredibly unsettling, easily the best he’s ever been in this Trumpian mode, and with the way that Norton’s Lionel is characterised, the story is basically set up as the struggle of apathy vs. empathy. A man who wants to lord his not-elected position over everyone else, versus a man who wants to look out for those who did the same for him.

And on that note, Norton playing a private detective with Tourette’s sounds like fishing for Oscar dap on paper, but it turns out a lot better than I would’ve expected. For a start, it isn’t treated like the verbal tics are the only thing that make him tick, aided by his photographic memory to basically show a compulsive mind in all its positive and negative workings. It being used to show solidarity with a local black-owned jazz club was also a pretty cool touch.

For another, he thankfully doesn’t go the easy route and just make his own dialogue a swear-fest (coprolalia is the most commonly-depicted form of Tourette’s, despite being the most extreme and rare example of which), and as someone with a few verbal and physical tics of his own, it didn’t come across like a pity party; just that it’s one of many facets to his character. And for a third, the way he describes it, like an anarchist joyriding in his brain, is the kind of writing flourish I relish hearing in stuff like this.

There’s quite a bit to like about this feature. The casting and acting are quite good, the writing is solid (if quite removed from the source material, according to reports), Daniel Pemberton’s smoke-filled speakeasy jazz soundtrack is killer, and there’s some really damn good moments to be found here. But not enough to justify the running time at about 140 minutes and change. If the pacing was tightened up, allowing the genuinely engaging aspects hold their own rather than having to hold up the duller moments, this could’ve been a solid effort. But as it is, again much like Live By Night, it feels like this passion project would’ve succeeded better if someone else had been able to trim the fat.