Film Contemplation| The Panic in Needle Park (1971)| Film Review
‘I was gonna marry you’
Films centered on addicts are as pervading as use of technicolor. There’s no denying the fact that junkies appear to ignite an unrivaled imagination in screenwriters. How they decide to tackle the same topic varies; some pictures appear to glorify them albeit intentionally or unintentionally, some try to use the fodder to present an anti-smack picture, while some just try to ride on the genre’s coattails with the aim of gathering some steam for their feature films. The Panic in Needle Park (1971) is however, an organic, gritty and surprisingly simplistic picture that is just interested in presenting the material as it is.
The film, adapted from James Mills’ 1966 eponymous novel, centers on a bunch of Manhattan residents who hang out around Sherman Square also known as ‘Needle Park’. Their lives revolve around drugs. They are drug peddlers and use the money to purchase some more for their own consumption. Some of them are burglars, some are streetwalkers, others do similar jobs for a living. Most of them, if not all, have done prison time that too, multiple times and yet they do not have a hint of remorse. They have just one aim in their life; to get their hands on the next round of dope. When it is easily accessible, they have no care about the rest of the world. But when panic or scarcity strikes there is just no escape for them. The harshness is not dwindled in the fact that they turn on each other, selling each other out to survive. These are ordinary looking people living a elementary lifestyle. They sport none of the flashy stuff usually characterized with heroin addicts. When they walk amidst the crowd it is be possible to lose them. They could be anyone you see around you.
Two of these are Bobby (Al Pacino) and Helen (Kitty Winn). The former is a carefree, charismatic guy while the latter is a burdened, broken soul. It doesn’t take long for fireworks to spark between them. What starts as a natural romance soon hits the road bump of money. Since neither has a stable source of income, they soon realize that surviving solely on love is difficult. They take up the above mentioned jobs with varying consequences. What follows is hovering questions about ratting on your friends, prison time, jealously, adultery, more misdeeds, more doubts, tiffs, forgiveness, compassion and the same cycle going on again.
Credit should go the actors for making this platonic relationship work. Al Pacino gives a monstrous performance as the unambitious boy stuck in the sewers by ill fate. He is affable while depicting care for his girl and equally menacing during their arguments. The reason the audience members are going to exit the theaters empathizing bobby is down to him. He carries the film on his shoulders and it’s quite surprising that this performance is not as talked about as his succeeding wonderful ones. Theater regular Kitty Winn plays the other half of the film’s central characters and is a revelation. While her character appears grief stricken from the first frame, Winn ensures that it doesn’t become pitiful or cringe worthy. Her character arcs from a helpless drifter to a person who makes her own decisions. The leading pair has a beautiful chemistry and their romantic angle is one of the most endearing ones you’ll watch in a picture. Richard Bright also proves his mettle as the complicated thief, Hank. With the benefit of hindsight, it is hilarious to watch him bossing over Pacino here knowing fully how the roles will be reversed in The Godfather franchise (Bright plays right hand man Al Neri to Pacino’s Michael in that picture).
Director Jerry Schatzberg has a monomaniacal focus on his subject. Another director might have presented the change in seasons to premeditate a change in the group’s fortunes. Spring promising new dynamics in their relationships, the warmth of summer with the professional and personal boom in their lives, the beginning of fall with the drastic change in their relationship for worse, the harsh winter mirroring the meltdown in their association and once again, spring with its false promises. Schatzberg has no intentions of diverting the audience with such stuff. There are no contemplative shots of empty roads or other such props to depict the varying moods or conditions of the characters. Surprisingly, even without focusing on many people he manages to capture the atmosphere of Manhattan quite succinctly. Rather he goes on with the screenplay with no other subplot. Such a gamble pays off here as his astute direction does not let the viewers attention waver even for a single scene.
The Panic in Needle Park is a criminally overlooked film. It’s characters are stuck in a loop with no end in sight. Every attempt to get out and make a better life is met with a greater pull inwards with a false opportunity/ new problem. It’s a vicious cycle where the dynamics between friends and loved ones change with requirements. Every positive turn in the lead pair’s relationship is outweighed by a greater negative. Every forgiveness is met with a new misstep. The picture is gem that heralds the arrival of Schatzberg and more importantly Pacino. It should most certainly be not missed.
