Falling Down

Joel Schumacher, USA, 1992, 112 minutes

Michael Douglas plays a middle-aged, middle-class white male. One very hot morning, while trapped in a seemingly endless LA jam, he decides to desert his car and "go home" to his wife (Barbara Hershey) and child in Venice Beach. En route, he encounters frustration after frustration, being driven to violence by the inherent irritations of everyday life. Victims of his anger include a Korean shopkeeper, a burger bar counter assistant and an elderly gentleman enjoying a leisurely game of golf. It is not very long before the police are alerted to Douglas's violent escapades and throughout the film we follow veteran detective Robert Duvall's determined efforts to track down the menace who has become known as "D-FENS". His search culminates in a tense exciting climax.

Falling Down is a challenging, refreshingly thought-provoking piece of work which offers a head-on engagement with the dubious assumptions of political correctness. The film has several questions, but gives no firm answers. The viewer is left to decide whether or not the lead character actually is "the bad guy".

Reminiscent of a whole host of pictures including The Swimmer, Lonely are the Brave (starring Douglas's father, Kirk) and The Blue Knight, this film certainly has flaws (e.g. secondary characters are remarkably under-written) but, at the end of the day, it works as a highly enjoyable thriller which raises some prescient issues. The acting of Douglas and Duvall is exemplary, to say the least.

Review by Stephen Townsend
Taken from EUFS Programme 1993-94