Bad Lieutenant (1992) ****

There's a ton of police dramas that use the line "He's a cop on the edge", mainly when lead cop in said movie is going to kill a ton of bad guys at the behest of some dead partner or blood relative. Our "cop on the edge" goes on an orgy of violence that ultimately ends with him being congratulated for shooting all the bad guys and being an all around nice guy, even though he's an asshole to everybody.

Bad Lieutenant isn't about a "cop on the edge". It's about a cop that jumped off the edge feet first into whatever private hell he had created for himself. The film stars Harvey Keitel as the bad lieutenant, an investigator with the NYPD whose job isn't even second in his life. First is betting (badly) on baseball. Second is getting high. Third is getting off. Throughout the film crime is something he is more apt to be committing than fighting. Even though the lieutenant is working a case involving a nun who is literally raped on the alter of her church it all is secondary in the story of a man who has hit total rock bottom.

Harvey Keitel delivers one of the greatest performances of his career in this film. Bar none and you have to remember that this guy's worked with Scorsese. He pours his soul into a character that is at one minute pathetic, generating apathy from the audience, to heinous. Keitel fears nothing in performing in this film. His drunken and drug induced binges that cause him to forget about "to serve and protect" show a man that is broken. He's done. There are no scruples for the lieutenant. One particularly disturbing scene involves the main character asking a pair of young girls out for a joy ride to show him how they would perform fellatio or he'll call their dad. The lieutenant then proceeds to fiddle with himself as they mimic as ordered. Rock bottom.

This is a film that goes beyond the idea of gritty. A dark tale from all angles. Bad Lieutenant is basically a redemption tale with our main character trying to claw his way to civilization again from the deepest, darkest hole imagined. It's a film that pulls no punches and is really a disturbing look at how life can turn out for you. A pure morality tale that doesn't feel preachy, yet gets it's point across beautifully.