Empire State DVD+Blu-ray, 1986

There is a growing cult interest in this intelligent, flawed, colourful and over-ambitious 1987 effort (shot through with a distinct homoerotic strain) from director R... more >

There is a growing cult interest in this intelligent, flawed, colourful and over-ambitious 1987 effort (shot through with a distinct homoerotic strain) from director Ron Peck. The film is an attempt to synthesise elements of The Long Good Friday (notably the latter's scabrous political commentary on the voracious acquisitiveness of Thatcherism) and Mona Lisa in a stylised and vivid eighties clubland thriller which is finally compromised by its stretched resources; Ron Peck (who made an impact with the gay-themed Nighthawks in 1978) simply doesn't have the cadre of acting talent to meet his narrative ambitions; pros such as Martin Landau (at his most oleaginous) and Ray McAnally hold their own, but throw into stark relief the struggling, lesser-known principals who simply lack the acting chops for the demands Peck makes on them. The film utilised the resources of a British Screen Film Finance/Film Four production budget, and sets its gangster action and bare-knuckle fighting in the sexually-charged camp of the eighties East End club scene (as represented by the Empire State nightclub, which despite its elaborate trappings, has, in the film, a distinctly pop-up nightclub air). Peck is at his most trenchant on the complaisance of dockland entrepreneurs, focused on sweeping away the seediness of the run-down East End that is clogging up potentially remunerative real estate - even though there is little nuance in his picture of yuppie venality (the speculators - to a man and a woman - are an unappetising bunch).

London's then-to-be-developed Docklands are the focus for the strip-mining of Britain's colliding social strata, in as setting where disparate lives uneasily intersect. The Thameside area has possibilities for both social groups (playground of the rich, and an escape from poverty and squalor for the impoverished working class inhabitants, but it's the latter who are shown getting screwed) This is also the battleground for a primeval conflict between the hard men who have ruled the East End for decades, and - set against them - the ruthless new breed of racketeers. The interaction between these groups and the moneyed incomers is encapsulated in the smooth, viperous Chuck, an American with £3 billion to spend (and a taste for rough stuff with cockney rent boys). Chuck manipulates his eager business colleagues with promises of potential investments, while the young, blond, heavily-accented and none-too-bright Pete from the regions comes to find a friend in London (anywhere beyond the Watford Gap is seen here as hinterlands to be fled from as quickly as possible) to find a friend, who has disappeared in the glossy corridors of the Empire State. Chuck and Pete, though, are only two of the film's large ensemble cast, none of whom are concentrated on at the expense of others. The film's problem is encapsulated in the performances here: Martin Landau, supremely understated and persuasive as the American money man, while the non-acting Jason Hoganson is totally unable to create any kind of character for the bottle-blond young visitor from the sticks. Hoganson is cast for his looks - though, strangely, despite the clearly gay-oriented agenda of the director, the erotic effect of the film is negligible. Peck is at least equal opportunity in his erotic gaze - although there are close-ups of the hairy crotches of male strippers, the director's use of nudity incorporates buxom female breasts and buttocks which are shown being enthusiastically soaped in showers.

There is also the problem of the presentation of the nightclub itself, which, while being accoutred by the production designer with the perfectly plausible trappings of a trendy nightclub, never really convinces as the real thing. But the key preoccupations of Peck and his co-writer Mark Ayres are the challenges thrown up by the redevelopment of the Docklands area (an astringent metaphor for eighties Britain), with the director remarkably even-handed in his criticism of the various groups squabbling over the spoils: the corrupt East End gangsters (with their bloody bare knuckle bouts - another of the film's metaphors) and the soigné property developers - a judicious mix of races and sexes, but all presented as venal and superficial. Ironically, given the director's sympathies, it is interesting that the Martin Landau character is encapsulated in his unpleasant treatment of a spivvy East End male prostitute; homosexuality in this film might be said to have the same connotation of moral corruption as it did in such films as Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train - except that Peck casts plagues on every house in this film, whatever the sexual predilections of the characters. < less

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