The film opened to widespread critical acclaim. It was nominated for six Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, and Best Supporting Actress. Sean Penn won Best Actor and Tim Robbins won Best Supporting Actor.
Plot Summary
The film opens with three boys, Sean Devine, Jimmy Markum, and Dave Boyle, playing hockey in the street. While playing, the boys find a section of sidewalk concrete that is still drying. Jimmy impulsively writes his name in the cement and Sean follows. Dave begins to write his name in the cement, but a car pulls up and a man who pretends to be a plainclothes police officer gets out, scolds the three boys, and tells Dave to get in the car. As the car moves away, Dave looks out the back window to see Jimmy and Sean staring back at him. Hearing that Dave was taken away by a police officer, the parents of Jimmy and Sean agree that something is wrong and begin to look for him.
The film then cuts to Dave in the basement of the two pedophiles who took him and then to Dave running away from the house through a forest.
Twenty-five years later, the boys are now grown and still living in Boston. Jimmy (Sean Penn) is an ex-con running a neighborhood store, while Dave (Tim Robbins) is a blue-collar worker, still haunted by his abduction. The two men are still neighbors and related by marriage. Jimmy's 19 year old daughter Katie (Emmy Rossum) is secretly dating Brendan Harris (Thomas Guiry), a boy Jimmy despises. She and Brendan are planning on eloping to marry in Las Vegas.
Katie goes out for the night with her girl friends and is seen by Dave at a local bar. That night, Katie is murdered, and Dave comes home with an injured hand and blood on his clothes, which his wife Celeste (Marcia Gay Harden) helps him clean up. Dave claims that he fought off a mugger and possibly killed him. Sean (Kevin Bacon), who is now a detective with the Massachusetts State Police, investigates Katie's murder with his partner, Whitey Powers (Laurence Fishburne). In a subplot, Sean's wife Lauren (Tori Davis) has left him, and subsequently telephones him without speaking. She is pregnant when she makes this call, but won't even tell Sean the baby's sex.
Over the course of the film, Sean and his partner track down leads while Jimmy uses his neighborhood connections to conduct his own investigation. Sean discovers that the gun used to kill Katie was used in a liquor store robbery during the 1980s by "Just Ray" Harris, the father of Brendan Harris, causing him to suspect Brendan. Ray Harris has been missing for some time, but Sean believes that his gun was still in the house.
Brendan claims that Ray has been sending $500 a month since he disappeared. Sean also learns that Jimmy is listed as a known criminal associate of Ray Harris. Powers suspects Dave, as he was one of the last people to see Katie alive and has a wounded hand (Dave tells them that he injured it on the garbage disposal). Dave continues to act strangely, and his wife eventually tells Jimmy about Dave's behavior and the bloody clothing. She tells Jimmy that she thinks Dave killed Katie.
The climax of the film occurs when Jimmy and his friends get Dave drunk. When Dave leaves the bar to vomit, and the men follow him out. Jimmy tells Dave that he shot "Just Ray" Harris at that same location for ratting him out and sending him to jail. This caused Jimmy to be absent while his first wife was battling cancer and ultimately dying while he was in prison. Jimmy tells Dave that he will let him live if he confesses to killing his daughter; if he does not he will kill him right then and there. Dave repeatedly tells Jimmy that he did kill someone but it was not Katie: he killed a pedophile, after finding him with a child prostitute in a car. Dave is so nervous he vomits once again. When Dave finally admits to killing Katie in an attempt to escape with his life, Jimmy stabs him in the stomach and shoots him in the head. They dispose of his body in the adjacent Mystic River.
While Dave's murder is occurring, Brendan (having found out about his father's gun from Sean during questioning) confronts his younger brother and his brother's friend about Katie's murder. He savagely beats the two boys, but is almost shot by one of them when Sean arrives just in time to stop it.
The next morning, Sean tells Jimmy that the police have Katie's murderers – who have confessed. She was killed by Brendan's brother and his friend in a violent prank gone wrong over the fact that Brendan and Katie were going to move away and get married. Sean asks Jimmy if he has seen Dave, because he is wanted for questioning in another case, the murder of a known pedophile. A distraught Jimmy thanks Sean for finding his daughter's killers, but says "if only you had been a little faster". Sean asks Jimmy if he is going to send Celeste Boyle $500 a month too, as he had been doing for the widow of "Just Ray" Harris. This is why Brendan believed his father was sending his mother the money every month, even though it was clear he was dead. Jimmy's wife, Annabeth (Laura Linney), comforts him over Dave's murder, telling him that he did what he had to do because he loves his daughter. Some time later, at a parade, Celeste frantically tries to get the attention of her despondent son Michael (Cayden Boyd). Sean spots Jimmy in the crowd and makes a gun with his hand, 'shooting' it at Jimmy. Jimmy shrugs and puts on his sunglasses.
Cast
- Sean Penn as Jimmy Markum
- Tim Robbins as Dave Boyle
- Kevin Bacon as Sean Devine
- Laurence Fishburne as Sgt. Whitey Powers
- Marcia Gay Harden as Celeste Boyle
- Laura Linney as Annabeth Markum
- Emmy Rossum as Katie Markum
- Thomas Guiry as Brendan Harris
- Cayden Boyd as Michael Boyle
- Ari Graynor as Eve Pigeon
- Eli Wallach as Mr. Loonie
- Jonathan Togo as Pete
Awards and nominations
Awards
- 76th Academy Awards:
- Best Actor in a Leading Role (Sean Penn)
- Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Tim Robbins)
- Art Directors Guild: Feature Film - Contemporary Film (Henry Bumstead [production designer] and Jack G. Taylor Jr. [art director])
- Blue Ribbon Awards: Best Foreign Language Film
- 24th Boston Society of Film Critics Awards: Best Picture, Best Ensemble Cast
- 9th BFCA Critics' Choice Awards: Best Actor (Sean Penn), Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins)
- Cannes Film Festival: Golden Coach (Clint Eastwood)
- Casting Society of America: Best Casting for Feature Film - Drama
- Central Ohio Film Critics: Best Actor (Sean Penn), Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins), Best Supporting Actress (Marcia Gay Harden)
- Chicago Film Critics Association: Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins)
- César Awards (France): Best Foreign Language Film
- Dallas-Fort Worth Film Critics Association: Best Actor (Sean Penn)
- Florida Film Critics Circle: Best Actor (Sean Penn), Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins)
- Fotogramas de Plata (Spain): Best Foreign Language Film
- 61st Golden Globe Awards:
- Best Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama (Sean Penn)
- Best Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture (Tim Robbins)
- Kansas City Film Critics Circle: Best Actor (Sean Penn)
- Kinema Junpo Awards (Japan): Best Foreign Language Film
- Las Vegas Film Critics Society: Best Actor (Sean Penn)
- London Film Critics Circle: Actor of the Year (Sean Penn), Director of the Year (Clint Eastwood)
- Mainichi Film Concours (Japan): Best Foreign Language Film
- National Board of Review: Best Picture, Best Actor (Sean Penn)
- National Society of Film Critics: Best Director (Clint Eastwood)
- PEN Center USA West Literary Awards: Best Screenplay (Brian Helgelan)
- Sant Jordi Awards (Spain): Best Foreign Language Film
- Satellite Awards: Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture - Drama (Sean Penn), Best Screenplay - Adapted (Brian Helgeland)
- Screen Actors Guild: Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Supporting Role (Tim Robbins)
- Seattle Film Critics: Best Supporting Actress (Marcia Gay Harden)
- Southeastern Film Critics Association: Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins), Best Screenplay - Adapted (Brian Helgeland)
- USC Scripter Award: Brian Helgeland (screenwriter) and Dennis Lehane (author)
- Uruguayan Film Critics Association (Uruguay): Best Film
- Vancouver Film Critics Circle: Best Actor (Sean Penn)
Nominations
- 76th Academy Awards:
- Best Picture
- Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Marcia Gay Harden)
- Best Director (Clint Eastwood)
- Best Screenplay - Adapted (Brian Helgeland)
- American Cinema Editors: Best Edited Feature Film - Dramatic (Joel Cox)
- American Screenwriters Association: Discover Screenwriting Award (Brian Helgeland)
- Argentine Film Critics Association: Best Foreign Film (Clint Eastwood)
- Australian Film Institute: Best Foreign Film
- Awards of the Japanese Academy: Best Foreign Film
- 57th BAFTA Film Awards:
- Best Actor in a Leading Role (Sean Penn)
- Best Actor in a Supporting Role (Tim Robbins)
- Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Laura Linney)
- Best Screenplay - Adapted (Brian Helgeland)
- Broadcast Film Critics Association: Best Acting Ensemble, Best Supporting Actress (Mary Gay Harden), Best Director (Clint Eastwood), Best Writer (Brian Helgeland), Best Composer (Clint Eastwood)
- Cannes Film Festival: Golden Palm (Clint Eastwood)
- Cinema Writers Circle (Spain): Best Foreign Film
- European Film Awards: Screen International Award (Clint Eastwood)
- 61st Golden Globe Awards:
- Best Motion Picture - Drama
- Best Director - Motion Picture (Clint Eastwood)
- Best Screenplay - Motion Picture (Brian Helgeland)
- IFTA Awards: Best International Film, Best International Actor (Sean Penn)
- International Horror Guild: Best Movie
- Motion Picture Sound Editors: Best Sound Editing in Domestic Features - Dialogue & ADR
- Online Film Critics Society: Best Picture, Best Actor (Sean Penn), Best Supporting Actor (Tim Robbins), Best Director (Clint Eastwood), Best Screenplay - Adapted (Brian Helgeland)
- PGA Golden Laurel Awards: Motion Picture Producer of the Year Award
- Robert Festival (Denmark): Best American Film
- Satellite Awards: Best Motion Picture - Drama, Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role - Drama (Marcia Gay Harden), Best Director (Clint Eastwood), Best Cinematography, Best Film Editing (Joel Cox), Best Sound (Alan Robert Murray, Bub Asman, Michael Semanick, Christopher Boyes and Gary Summers)
- Screen Actors Guild: Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture (Kevin Bacon, Laurence Fishburne, Marcia Gay Harden, Laura Linney, Sean Penn and Tim Robbins)
- Writers Guild of America: Best Adapted Screenplay (Brian Helgeland)
DVD releases
The DVD was released on June 8, 2004 and 3 editions have been released:
- Full Screen Edition
- Widescreen Edition
- 3-Disc Deluxe Edition
Tidak ada komentar:
Posting Komentar