Motherless Brooklyn and Richard Jewel: Contrasting ideologies in films

I recently watched “Motherless Brooklyn” and “Richard Jewell” which are both hot off the red box and they are a stark reminder of the way two films can hint at the ideologies of their makers and my evolution in reading them.

“Motherless Brooklyn” stands out primarily as a great film and showcase for Edward Norton who co-adapted the book and directed in addition to playing a starring role. Stylistically, the film takes its cues from film noir with a detective falling deeper and deeper into a well of obsession and that’s not an easy genre to re-capture, let alone put a spin on. On top of that, it’s a little “Chinatown” meets “Rain Man” as Norton’s character has tourette’s syndrome which takes guts: Imagine the potential this has to be disastrous both to film noir and the disabled community if handled sloppily.

Like one of the great neo-noirs, “Chinatown”, (the vast majority of noirs came out in the 40s and 50s and “Chinatown” was in the 70s, “Motherless Brooklyn” seeks to make infrastructure sexy. “Chinatown” explores how the city of Los Angeles was built through irrigation systems. “Motherless Brooklyn” derives from the story of Robert Moses who cut through a tremendous amount of red tape and created a series of bridges and highways that some say modernized New York and allowed connectivity between…