The Rookie (1990) Warner Bros./Action RT: 121 minutes Rated R (violence, brief sexual content, language, drugs) Director: Clint Eastwood Screenplay: Scott Spiegel and Boaz Yakin Music: Lennie Niehaus Cinematography: Jack N. Green Release date: December 7, 1990 (US) Cast: Clint Eastwood, Charlie Sheen, Raul Julia, Sonia Braga, Tom Skerritt, Lara Flynn Boyle, Pepe Serna, Marco Rodriguez, Pete Randall, Donna Mitchell, Xander Berkeley, Tony Plana, Paul Ben-Victor, David Sherrill, Hal Williams. Box Office: $21.6M (US)
Rating: ***
The Rookie is an example of a pretty good Clint Eastwood movie. It’s not a great one like Dirty Harry (1971), High Plains Drifter (1973) or Unforgiven (1992). It’s good like The Enforcer (1976), Absolute Power (1997) and Blood Work (2002). It’s a solid albeit formulaic actioner starring Clint as an L.A. cop on the vengeance trail after his partner is murdered by German criminal Strom (Julia, Kiss of the Spider Woman), the leader of an international car theft ring.
Sgt. Nick Pulovski wants to get his man in the worst way. He’s not about to let a little thing like a new inexperienced partner hamper his efforts. David Ackerman (Sheen, No Man’s Land), the rookie of the title, has just been promoted to detective. Nick tells him nothing at first leaving David with no choice but to try and keep up with him. He’s a rather passive sort who can’t believe how flagrantly the senior detective violates procedure. He’s also trying to deal with the guilt stemming from a childhood tragedy.
Nick causes Strom so much grief that he’s forced to fold up his operations in L.A. and relocate. He takes Nick hostage after a foiled robbery attempt, demanding $2 million for his safe return. He’s aided in his endeavors by his female companion Liesl (Braga, Kiss of the Spider Woman).
Naturally, the city isn’t willing to pay. David’s CO Lt. Garcia (Serna, Scarface) benches him, telling him he doesn’t want to see his face for two weeks. Instead, the rookie cop goes on the warpath looking for Nick. He’s been a rather passive sort up until this point. It was his hesitation to pull the trigger that resulted in his partner’s current predicament. Now, he’s truly pissed off! He’s determined to find out where Nick is being held and he’s not asking nicely.
This is where The Rookie really starts to cook. David shifts into total kick-ass mode. Riding a vintage motorcycle he borrows from Nick, he shows up at a rough bar frequented by assorted Hispanic lowlifes seeking information. He ends up burning the joint down. This is one of Sheen’s better performances. He’s actually believable as a rich kid getting back at his parents for ignoring his suffering as a child by being a cop. He manages to find his inner bad ass when it counts the most. He also manages to hold his own against Clint. Everybody knows that’s not easy.
Overall, The Rookie is a decent action flick. Directed by Eastwood, it’s a bit overlong at a shade over two hours. Some of it, like the opening sequence, is too dark. By that, I mean it’s hard to see what’s going on. What I find odd about it is the casting of Julia and Braga as Germans. He’s Puerto Rican; she’s Brazilian. He manages a passable German accent; she doesn’t have a lot of dialogue. They don’t give bad performances. It just seems to me Clint could have hired German actors for the roles. Why didn’t he? It’s just weird. That being said, you have to love the scene between Braga and Clint while his character is tied to a chair. You know the one I’m talking about.
The rest of the cast is right on. Lara Flynn Boyle (Twin Peaks) is good as David’s girlfriend who keeps urging him to finish law school. The character is somewhat underwritten, but Boyle makes the best of it. Marco Rodriguez, the psycho supermarket killer from Cobra, shows up as one of Strom’s top guys. He’s great! He always makes a convincingly slimy scumbag. Tom Skerritt (Alien) is also good as David’s father who, at one point, tries to pay Nick to keep his son out of harm’s way. That goes down pretty much how you’d expect.
The jazzy score by Lennie Niehaus is great; it fits the movie perfectly. The action scenes, the airport finale in particular, are well executed. The bit where he drives a car out a second-story window to escape an explosion is pure 80s/90s hokum. I love it! The screenplay by Scott Spiegel and Boaz Yakin offers up a good story with little in the way of surprises. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was watching the pilot episode for a new TV series. The Rookie is not, by any means, a bad movie. It’s just one we’ve seen before. The only difference is it bears Clint’s signature style.
Clint does his usual good job as both lead actor and director. Sure, The Rookie is one of his lesser efforts. The thing is one of Clint’s lesser efforts is still better than most of the bombastic efforts blowing out speakers in multiplexes these days. Plus, it’s always fun to see him in action. We get to see him make a Dirty Harry face, you know the one, the angry look with the throbbing vein in his forehead. At 60, he was still the epitome of cool.
In short, The Rookie is a good movie. It has plenty of action and an engaging if too familiar storyline. Plus, it has Clint Eastwood. I don’t know about you, but I’ll never pass up a Clint Eastwood movie. I was raised better than that.
