The discussion of the power of Artificial Intelligence is becoming a hot topic. News that several AI companies have lost control of several rogue AI agents is disturbing indeed. Gemini, OpenAI and Anthropic have have reported incidents in which sequestered AI agents broke out of their controlled environments and accessed real-world systems without authorization. These revelations are changing the discussion on AI and making many rethink the risk/reward analysis.

This is a serious. Potentially as serious as the specter of nuclear war that has hung over mankind for the past 80 years.

All this had me thinking of the dystopian AI future that The Matrix foretells. I watched it again this week and it’s our recommendation for this edition of Weekend Buff.

The Matrix was written and directed by the Wachowski siblings (V for Vendetta, Speed Racer), and was way ahead of its time, both in its story and special effects. Artificial intelligence had been theorized and rudimentarily used since the 1950’s, but was more science fiction than fact when the movie was made. The movie’s special effects influenced an entire generation of Hollywood films and still hold up remarkably well today.

For those who don’t know the story, Thomas Anderson, a.k.a “Neo” is a computer hacker investigating The Matrix. What he doesn’t know is how long that string he is pulling on truly is. It’s beyond his wildest imagination. He is found by “Trinity” and “Morpheus” who invite him into a frightening reality. Morpheus gives him two options, the red pill, which will show him the terrifying truth, or the blue pill, which will revert him back to his relatively mundane life of ignorance. Neo takes the red pill.

What he encounters is unimaginable. His world is not real. The year is not 1999, it is 2199. AI was released upon the world and has taken over. People were subjugated by the machines and now are being used to power the massive systems. People live their entire lives asleep in womb-like pods while the computers sap their energy to power themselves. AI uploads a false reality into their unconscious victim’s brains to keep them functioning.

What Neo thought was reality was The Matrix, a world created by computers to mimic the past. Nothing is real.

Those that live outside their pods are hunted by computers. Morpheus and his crew fight the machines in an attempt to destroy The Matrix and bring back humanity from is comatose slavery.

In The Matrix, everything is an illusion, even law enforcement. Cops and federal agents exist in The Matrix believing that they are enforcing the law. In reality they are the unwitting bad guys, repressing reality and keeping the computers in control. In their false reality, Morpheus and his crew are the criminals who need to be eliminated. It is a tough “pill” to swallow as a cop, and blurs the lines between law enforcement and oppression.

The Matrix has a fantastic cast. Keanu Reeves cemented his reputation as an A-list actor here, and nails the role of Neo. Carrie-Anne Moss makes a name for herself as Trinity, and Laurence Fishburne continues his distinguished career as Morpheus. Hugo Weaving is the sentient “Agent Smith” program in The Matrix and provides some fantastic deadpan acting and one-liners. Supporting cast includes Gloria Foster, Joe Pantoliano, and Marcus Chong.

This is a deep film, despite its non-stop action. Plenty of themes and questions to consider as you watch, and its worth seeing a few times.

The movie runs over two hours, but as evidenced by the multiple sequels, it has you wanting more. It can be rented on a streaming service for $4, but you can also probably check it out your local library. Enjoy this look at a dystopian future that seems quite a bit more feasible today.

ChatGPT says it’s not possible, but whose side are they on?

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After the 25^th Anniversary of the September 11^th attacks, it seemed like a good idea to go in a more relaxing direction for this installment of Weekend Buff.

In the aftermath of the attacks in 2001, the country was united, there were flags flying, and America, despite taking a punch, was clearly not down. This was the good “old fashioned” patriotic idea of America that we hadn’t seen since before Vietnam.

Well, that didn’t last long. Now America is divided on issues of race, politics, and income disparity, with one side of the isle doing most of the work fomenting those feelings. We have been through that before, and hopefully America will weather the storm.

I wanted to go back to those post-9/11 days, when America was patriotic, united, and had a mission.

What better vehicle to capture that feeling than a John Wayne movie. The Duke seemed to encapsulate all that was good about America for decades. He was a patriot and an advocate for the idea of traditional America, or at least his conception of it. As the winds of societal change began blowing in the late 60’s, Wayne stuck to his guns with films like The Green Berets, and Big Jake.

But I digress. The recommendation for this installment of Weekend Buff is Rooster Cogburn (1975). This is Wayne’s penultimate film, as cancer was already killing him. Here he reprises his role as Marshall Reuben “Rooster” Cogburn first introduced in True Grit.

Cogburn, like Wayne himself is a little worse for wear. Rooster’s jacket doesn’t fit across his girth, his patience is non-existent, he is drinking too much, and he is doing less asking questions and more shooting.

As the film begins, Marshall Cogburn is tracking down a dangerous group of wanted men, and as so often happens, he is forced to let a few rounds go, killing the wanted men.

Judge Parker has had enough. He views Cogburn an anachronism of days past and a believes he is breaking the law by killing so many of the outlaws he tracks down. When a judge thinks you are committing crimes, it might be time to retire. Parker says, “The West is changing, and you haven’t changed with it. I want your badge.” Cogburn turns it in and settles into a relatively depressing and lonely retirement.

How many old timers in the police department have felt that sentiment? Crime goes down, standards of professionalism and use of force get stricter, and somehow the way you always did things is no longer mentioned in polite society. But every now and then, things get crazy in the streets and bosses are glad you are there to handle things.

Cogburn is in the same boat. Shortly after removing Cogburn’s badge, Judge Parker is at his door, hat in hand, asking him to take up the gun and shield again.

Bank Robbers, led by Hawk, have killed a platoon of soldiers and stolen a shipment of nitroglycerine they intend to use to break into banks. They are outlaws on a rampage, killing indiscriminately as they make off with their stolen explosives. Perhaps times have not changed as much as Judge Parker thought!

They murder Reverand George Goodnight and terrorize his daughter Eula and thier congregation. Cogburn becomes an unwilling partner of the outspoken and upright Eula Goodnight, and together they go after the outlaws.

What follows is relatively straightforward from a cops and robbers’ perspective. The dynamic here is the relationship between Wayne’s Cogburn and Aubrey Hepburn’s Eula Goodnight. The two couldn’t be more different in every way but one, they both speak their mind. The conflicts, compromises, and camaraderie between the two make the movie.

Rooster Cogburn runs about an hour and 45 minutes. There is some action, but Wayne was 68 when the movie was released – and it shows. But it is still a classic, good guys vs bad guys, American Western and well worth the watch. I couldn’t find it for free, so you will have to rent it from a streaming service.

This weekend, enjoy a last look at The Duke, before we lost him to eternity. The movie is a reminder to all those who think that we are too civilized these days to ever need someone like Rooster Cogburn again - Society may change, but man’s nature stays the same.

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My September 11th, 2001 was easier than for many cops. I returned to work after recently finishing my midnight shift and was assigned to help evacuate people from the piers near the Intrepid. I didn’t make it down to the Trade Center until the next night. I can’t imagine the impact that this anniversary has on those who were present at Ground Zero, or that had loved ones in the towers.

For almost 3,000 Americans, it was the last day of their lives. For thousands more, it was the worst day of their lives. Today we pray for them and and their families.

There are many movies, documentaries, and books about that day; some reflective, some historical, and most heartbreaking. I decided to make a recommendation in a different direction for this edition of Weekend Buff.

Former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy’s podcast, The McCarthy Report, is one I never miss. His legal and political insight on a variety of topics is unmatched in its fairness and expertise. He generally presents an unbiased view that is fact-based and informative.

McCarthy is likely the foremost legal expert on issues surrounding the Jihadi’s mission of “death to America”. He was a Chief Assistant US Attorney in SDNY on September 11th, but his story goes back much further than that. He prosecuted the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 against the Blind Sheikh, Abdel Rahman, and his followers. He knows the ins-and outs, the backstories, and the challenges of the many terrorism cases prosecuted in the Southern District of NY; and has a deep understanding of their implications.

That is why his episodes on counterterrorism issues are so important. His analysis comes from personal experience and expertise - and it’s downright frightening. He warns of the danger of the radical mindset that brought death to the streets of New York, and explains why that danger cannot be ignored.

This week’s episode explores the legal and policy decisions surrounding the war against America that many did not realize we were fighting until that fateful day.

The episode, released yesterday, serves two purposes. First, it relates the historic and legal events leading up to and encompassing September 11, 2001. It then explains policy mistakes that the United States made, and continue to make, in its approach to Jihadi terrorism. McCarthy needs no script to make his points. He lived these events and decisions, and recalls them with remarkable clarity.

In his opinion, this threat is far from over, and argues the reasons why with the skill that comes from years of brilliant work at a prosecutor.

McCarthy explains the absurd reliance on the legal system to keep America safe. He points to mistakes made by several presidential administrations, and the absurdity of the scheduled trials of captured terrorists like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

He is unequivocal with his statement that, “A war is not a crime, and you do not bring your enemies to a courthouse”. The federal justice system is not designed for this task.

His analysis of impossibility of trying to change the mindset of people who are trying to destroy our culture is spot on.

In short, he is all in on the fight against terrorism. That makes this week’s episode particularly compelling.

You can find The McCarthy Report on the Apple Podcast application or on the National Review website. Each episode runs about an hour, and covers a variety of topics. McCarthy took a two-month hiatus over the summer, but hopefully is back to his regular weekly schedule. Enjoy, and God Bless America!

Unfortunately, the criminal justice system does not do a great job handling these crimes, despite the best efforts of cops like my friend. Many of these perps are a menace who are given sentences that neither rehabilitate nor reform them. Whenever I hear of a judge giving a light sentence to one of these convicted criminals, it makes me wonder what they are doing when no one is watching.

Lorenzo Carcaterra wrote his book about child sex abuse, Sleepers, in 1995. Most people remember the movie, starring Brad Pitt and Jason Patric, but the book is great, and it’s our recommendation for this installment of Weekend Buff.

I read Sleepers shortly after Paul and I were assigned to the Midtown North Precinct out of the Academy. Midtown North covered much of Hells Kitchen, where most of the story takes place. The book highlights the neighborhood and was an interesting read on that front, but the abuse that it detailed was much more moving and eye-opening for a rookie cop.

Sleepers relates the tale of four friends growing up in the 1960’s on the west side of Manhattan. They are inseparable, and it seems to them like the fun and games will last forever. The boys, Shakes, Michael, John, and Tommy, engage in the typical mischievous behaviors of teenage boys. Not criminals, but frequently in trouble.

One event changes their lives forever. The group, looking to get a free lunch and create some excitement, take a hot dog cart from a street vendor. They are not looking to keep it, just have some fun and fill their bellies. During the chaos that ensues, the cart rolls down a subway entrance, striking and nearly killing a man.

That’s where the book changes from a feel-good, coming of age story to something much darker.

The boys are sentenced to a term upstate to the Wilkinson Home for Boys, a seemingly-bucolic juvenile detention facility. But what goes on inside the “home” is terrifying. The boys suffer horrific physical and sexual abuse at the hands of several of the guards. Carcaterra details the torture that the boys endured.

The book then flashes to the present. The boys are adults and have grown apart, taking different paths in life, but seriously affected by their time in Wilkinson. Tommy and John live a life of crime and addiction. Shakes is a journalist. Michael is a Manhattan Assistant District Attorney.

When Tommy and John see one of their former tormentors, they immediately and unthinkingly take revenge, killing the man in front of numerous witnesses.

Michael finds himself in a position to help them, but it means violating his oath as an attorney.

The book is told as a retrospective in the first person. This gives it an impact that pulls at the reader’s emotions. Carcaterra, spins a masterful story, describing in detail their childhood, their neighborhood, and later the terrible abuse and the toll it took on them.

Carcaterra describes the book as loosely autobiographical. It is likely more of an, “inspired by a true story” novel. The Manhattan DA put out a statement shortly after its release denying the role his office played in the story, calling it false.

Wherever the truth lies, Carcaterra’s writing talent makes the story feel authentic. He does a fantastic job relating the dark details, and it certainly reads like an autobiography.

There is a long line of books advertised as being “better than the movie”. That description is certainly true with Sleepers. The characters are given more depth. The crimes hit home. The emotions seem real. It is a book well worth reading, even if the movie holds mostly true to the book.

Sleepers runs a little more than 400 pages depending on what version you get. You can look for it in your local library, or buy it on Amazon for less than $10. It is an engaging and easy read that you can get through in a few days. This weekend check out this well-written coming of age-turned nightmare story, where the terrible impact of child abuse confronts the reader at every turn of the page.

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There were reasons for that. First of all, one important lesson of investigations is that even the most ludicrous stories you get told are sometimes true, so you have to keep an open mind. Second, IAB had civilian oversight and a mandate to fully investigate most allegations. There were hard rules and you had to do your due diligence on all of them. Bosses would often kick back cases simply based on the size of the case folder - “You have more to do”.

That was frustrating; investigating cases you knew were going nowhere for months.

However, every once in a while, your team would get assigned a case that seemed more legit. The cop may have had similar allegations in the past, have a bad history both on the job and occasionally prior to getting hired, hung out with perps (a violation of department policy), or the story was simply plausible. I didn’t mind investigating those; it was a real case, and I have no use for dirty cops that would make our job harder.

In the beginning of the movie Internal Affairs, LAPD Sergeant Raymond Avilla, played by Andy Garcia, is experiencing his first tour assigned to Internal Affairs. I can tell you from personal experience, that is a tough day. You are on the other side, and no one wants to talk to you. On day one, you are an outcast. You don’t feel like a cop anymore. That’s tough for someone who loves police work.

Avilla meets his new partner, Sergeant Amy Wallace, played by Laurie Metcalf (Roseanne, Lady Bird). Wallace is an outcast already, she is used to it. She puts Avilla right to work on an investigation into his old academy classmate, the strung out Officer Van Stretch, played by Billy Baldwin. Stretch looks like a corrupt cop - and he is. Battling addiction, beating his wife, and beating and flaking suspects.

His partner is Officer Dennis Peck, played by Richard Gere at the height of his fame. On the outside Peck seems like the perfect cop. Always working, always meticulously uniformed, and well liked by the brass. He was a networker and a schmoozer; someone who knew all the angles - and incredibly corrupt. That may seem like a surprise, but my experience told another story.

One thing that surprised me about working in Internal Affairs is that the cops I thought would be beyond reproach were sometimes among the very few NYPD cops that were engaged in serious corruption. Hard workers with great arrest numbers made up about half of the five or six cases of legitimate corruption that my team investigated.

That was the case in the film. Gere’s character was not a do-nothing, or a “hairbag” in NYPD parlance. He was good at police work. Gathering intelligence, making good arrests, and working hard. He was also stealing, planting weapons, blackmailing, and committing homicides. He was a one-man crime wave.

When Officer Van Stretch agrees to cooperate with Internal Affairs, Peck is the first to know. He has to get rid of Stretch to stay out of jail. That’s when things start to unravel for Peck and the drama begins to unfold..

Peck is a master manipulator and Avilla is a relentless pursuer. It is clear that the two are headed for an epic showdown.

Director and score writer Mike Figgis does a good job with the movie. He assembles a talented cast and spins an entertaining, though fantastical story.

But Richard Gere steals the show. His Officer Dennis Peck is an enigma that he largely created on his own. His character is criminal mastermind that didn’t really exist, but Hollywood likes its bad guys larger than life, and Gere nails the role. The Peck character was not based on a real cop and the movie is not “inspired by a true story”, but it makes for good cinema.

Internal Affairs is a psychological thriller that runs about two hours. It is a good mix of drama and action as the protagonist and antagonist square off in a battle of wills. I couldn’t find it for free, but you can rent it for the usual $4. This weekend take a look at Hollywood’s take on the dark side of policing. It’s over the top, but entertaining nonetheless.

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Preserve the evidence, follow the facts, and refuse to let outside pressure steer the investigation, and the truth often reveals itself.

That’s why Netflix’s The Bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 is worth your time.

The series dramatizes the December 21, 1988 bombing that killed 270 people when Pan Am Flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland. Among the 259 aboard were 190 Americans, including 35 Syracuse University students. Eleven more people died on the ground.

But underneath, this is the story of investigators refusing to quit.

Hollywood generally portrays detectives solving crimes through flashes of brilliance. But real investigations succeed because investigators obsess over details everyone else overlooks.

And Lockerbie wasn’t one crime scene—it was thousands.

The aircraft exploded at 31,000 feet, scattering evidence across miles of Scottish countryside. Every piece of metal, suitcase fragment, and shred of clothing had to be located, cataloged, and preserved.

That’s not glamorous television. That’s disciplined police work.

The series deserves enormous credit for respecting that process. Scottish police and prosecutors worked alongside the FBI, FAA, CIA, MI5 and MI6. Thousands of investigators, forensic specialists, analysts, and prosecutors spent years reconstructing what happened—one fragment at a time.

The show understands that cases are about evidence—not “gut feelings” or “detective instinct.”

It also shows how terrorism investigations become geopolitical. Detectives find themselves sharing the stage with intelligence agencies, diplomats, prosecutors, and politicians. Suddenly, the search for truth competes with the interests of governments.

The series doesn’t pretend every question surrounding Lockerbie has been answered. The conviction that was achieved remains controversial, with questions about witness testimony, forensic evidence, and whether investigators identified the right state sponsor. But it wisely avoids turning legitimate questions into conspiracy theories.

The series also reminds us that terrorism devastates families long after the headlines disappear. Every homicide detective understands that. Cases don’t end when the cameras leave.

There’s another lesson relevant today. Politicians promise we’ll prevent every terrorist attack. That’s fantasy. Intelligence and law enforcement make decisions with incomplete information. Sometimes they miss something. Sometimes agencies fail to communicate or protect information they should share. In a global west that values civil liberties, stopping every attack before it happens is virtually impossible. Yet the media often leads the public to expect perfection.

My one criticism is that the series occasionally pulls its punches on institutional failures. It hints at intelligence shortcomings and geopolitical pressures without digging deeply enough. The public deserves to know not only who committed an attack, but whether opportunities existed to stop it. These could’ve been explored more.

Still, that’s a minor criticism.

What makes The Bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 stand out is its recognition that justice isn’t always fast, clean, or satisfying. Sometimes it takes decades. Sometimes investigators do everything right and questions remain unanswered.

It makes this not only a deep-dive into a terrorism investigation… it’s also a fascinating whodunit. One that highlights the work of the people who spent years putting together a puzzle someone else tried very hard to scatter to the wind.

It’s available on Netflix now. We recommend it.

Rating: 4½ out of 5 stars.

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The Courier (2020) another movie I missed when it came out. Perhaps the fact that it was initially shown at the end of January of 2020 as COVID was making its way through the United States had something to do with it. The full release was delayed until October of 2020 as we waited for some degree of normalcy to return. Needless to say, it was not a box office hit.

The movie is an intelligence and espionage drama set in the early 1960s as the Cold War raged and the Cuban Missile Crisis approached.

The film is based on the true story of Oleg Penkovsky and Greville Wynne.

Penkovsky was a Soviet GRU (military intelligence) officer who worked on the State Committee for Science and Technology. This gave him access to nuclear and missile technology information.

He became concerned that the boisterous Nikita Khrushchev was driving the world into a nuclear war and decided to give information about the Soviet arsenal to the United States. At that time, the Soviets has fewer bombs then they claimed and no ICBM capability. You may remember that Kennedy ran his 1960 campaign on the missile gap, a scare tactic created to get more votes. Penkovsky wanted the truth to get out so Khrushchev’s bluster was not taken seriously by the west.

Greville Wynne was a British businessman. He was seemingly unremarkable, other than having a gift of gab, a tippling way, and plenty of business interests behind the Iron Curtain. He was recruited by MI6 and the CIA to act as a courier for Penkovsky’s information. He boldly traveled to Moscow on several occasions to bring critical intelligence back to the west.

The Courier was directed by Dominic Cooke, who although known mostly for theatre work, does a good job here. He had previously worked with award winning actor Benedict Cumberbatch, and was able to recruit him for the role of Greville Wynne. Cumberbatch is, as usual, excellent in the film. Merab Ninidze (Conclave, Homeland) plays Oleg Penkovsky. Ninidze was born in Soviet Georgia, and began his career there, but immigrated after the USSR dissolved. He brings his life experience to the role and nails the part.

Rachel Brosnahan plays the aggressive but loyal CIA agent Emily Donovan. Angus Wright is the more practical and cautious MI6 handler, Dickie Franks (who would later rise to the lead the agency). It’s a solid cast, but, as you would expect, Cumberbatch steals the show.

The film is filled with all the fittings of an old fashioned spy thriller. Secret messages, micro cameras, dead drops, and clandestine meetings all bring some excitement to the story. But mostly this is a drama about the people who risked their lives for a cause. Courage, dedication, and loyalty are the major themes here.

The Greville Wynne and Oleg Penkovsky characters put their lives on the line for peace and the greater good. The Cuban Missile Crisis was the closest that the world came to nuclear annihilation, and these two men were willing to die trying to prevent a global cataclysm. Both men were loyal not only to their cause, but to each other. Wynne in particular returned to the Soviet Union, even though he believed that his operation may have been compromised. He was willing to risk everything to save Penkovsky and his family.

And it was compromised.

In headlines this week, the supposedly great intellects at Cambridge University were shown to have been willfully duped by the bald faced and obvious lies of Jason Arday. They were willing to hire this fraudster as a professor in the blind pursuit of diversity. This was not the first time that individuals from Cambridge were willingly duped into believing lies. In the 1930’s a group of Cambridge University students bought into the lies of communism and became spies for the Soviet Union.

This group, known as the Cambridge 5, worked their way into the British intelligence service and compromised numerous western intelligence and technology operations. The damage done by this group was incalculable. They likely compromised this operation as well, as George Blake, an associate of Cambridge 5 spies Kim Philby and Donald McLean, gave up British spy Janet Chisholm. Chisholm was a contact for Oleg Penkovsky, and the Soviets likely learned of his activities by following her.

The Courier runs a little less than two hours. The film is a drama with several moments of suspense, but if you are looking for chases and shootouts, you will have to look elsewhere. Dominic Cooke, however, does a good job of relating the story in a compelling and entertaining way. You can catch the film for free on YouTube.

This is an important movie for today’s audience, as the horrors of the communist Soviet regime seem to have been forgotten by today’s youth. The film shows that many of the problems of communism were solved with a bullet to the head. The death toll of international communism should never be forgotten as Americans are now going to the polls and pulling the lever in support of an ideology that caused untold death, destruction, and misery. In 1991, the world felt that communism was on the way to the dustbin of history. We must work to ensure in arrives there eventually.

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I thought the movie fit our weekend buff criteria because of the criminal angle and due to the fact that the story is timely for our current political environment. It revolves around the military industrial complex and political corruption, two of the biggest issues confronting America today.

I had never seen State of Play before this week, and didn’t recall its existence, but nevertheless found the story compelling. I don’t know how I missed it.

State of Play is set in Washington DC, a.k.a The Swamp, a wretched hive of scum and villainy. A mysterious figure shoots two people on a dark street; a woman is seemingly pushed (or perhaps jumps) in front of a train. Neither the connection between the two events, nor the motives are immediately clear, but Detective Donald Bell of the Metro Police is working the crime scene and starting his investigation. Washington Globe reporter Cal McAffrey arrives and immediately starts asking questions, much to the indignation of Bell.

Any cop can tell you the groans that arise at an active crime scene when the press shows up - everything just got harder. Another thing to deal with. That’s not to say that media attention can’t help, it often leads to tips critical to solving a case - but not right now, we have work to do! Detective Bureau bosses would call DCPI (the Deputy Commissioner of Public Information) to let them know and hope some patrol cop doesn’t give out any information (or misinformation) that we don’t want out there. An hour later, Chiefs you rarely heard from would be calling for every detail and asking if the case was solved yet. But if the media attention helps solve the case, it’s well worth the headaches.

But I digress - McAffrey learns that the victims are linked to his friend, army veteran and newly minted Congressman Stephen Collins. McAffrey starting pulling strings and finds that PointCorp, a powerful and secretive defense contractor, has it out for Congressman Collins, as Collins is spearheading an investigation into their fraud, political corruption, and push for endless wars (sound familiar?).

McAffrey and his fellow reporter, Della Frey, work their story, hiding information from the police and their editor, hoping to find the facts that would sink PointCorp.

Naturally, the cops and the reporters are at odds. Detective Bell wants to solve his murders. The journalists want their big story, which is quickly morphing into a Quixotic quest to change Washington.

Deadlines, dollars and cents, journalistic competition, political corruption, and big-money influence are stymieing their efforts.

The film is based on the successful British television show, State of Play. Director Kevin Macdonald (The Last King of Scotland, Marley) assembles an all star cast for this political thriller. Russell Crowe is great as Cal McAffrey, a man on a mission who is not afraid to use guile and intimidation to get his story. Rachel McAdams is a bit bland as his fellow reporter, Della Frey, but the role requires a lower tone. Ben Affleck is solid as Congressman Collins, a seemingly idealistic crusader. Supporting actors include Harry Lennix as Detective Donald Bell, Jason Bateman, who is great as sleazy PR man and fixer Dominic Foy, Jeff Daniels as corrupt Congressman George Fergus, Helen Mirren as editor Cameron Lynne, and Robin Wright as Anne Collins.

The movie’s plot is relevant to our current social and political environment, essentially detailing the investigation into a conspiracy theory around the military industrial complex and DC corruption. With wild conspiracy theories (too many of which are likely true) dominating our discourse, this movie is right on target 17 years later.

Unfortunately, today’s deep state and political corruption investigations just remain conspiracy theories. Never proven or disproven, they hang in limbo with America never learning the truth. Like Fauci’s 5th Amendment scam, the Russian Collusion plot, or Joe Biden’s autopen presidency, we never get the whole story and no one is held accountable.

But this is Hollywood! This conspiracy must be taken down before the credits roll. The bad guys go to jail and America is once again the home of the free and land of the brave. Right? You’ll have to watch to find out.

This film is a good combination of suspense, action, and drama, while not taking sides on Republican vs Democrat. No doubt the Hollywood of today would ironically politicize this political thriller, carefully outlining the political leanings of the bad guys while sprinkling in some woke morality.

State of Play runs a little more than two hours. You can catch the movie for free on YouTube. You’ll have to put the phone down and pay attention while watching, there are a lot of twists and subtle lines critical to understanding the plot. I feel that Kevin Macdonald meticulously fashioned an underrated masterpiece here, and hope you enjoy it.

Thanks for reading The Ops Desk. Stay Safe!

There are plenty of television shows about criminals. Few understand crime. Ozark does.

At first glance, it’s a money-laundering story. Financial adviser Marty Byrde relocates his family to the Missouri Ozarks after a deal with a Mexican drug cartel goes catastrophically wrong. But that’s merely the setup. The real story is how ordinary people convince themselves they can control extraordinary evil—and how quickly they instead become part of it.

From a law enforcement perspective, Ozark gets one thing exactly right: organized crime is not so much transactional as relational. Every favor creates another debt. Every compromise becomes the starting point for the next. Marty and Wendy Byrde aren’t just laundering money; they’re slowly surrendering every moral boundary they once believed was immovable.

The series also understands something investigators see repeatedly: intelligence is no substitute for judgment. Marty may be the smartest man in almost every room he enters, but intellect can’t outmaneuver the fundamental reality that cartels enforce through fear and violence — not negotiation. Every clever solution merely postpones a reckoning while making the next crisis even more dangerous.

Julia Garner’s Ruth Langmore is the show’s breakout character because she embodies the tragedy of generational crime. She possesses remarkable instincts and resilience, yet she’s trapped by an environment where criminality isn’t an aberration—it’s an inheritance. Police officers encounter versions of that story far too often.

Another major character is the Ozark region itself. Beautiful, ugly, stark, forbidding, bucolic… the lakes and woods of the Ozarks serve as a reminder that violent, organized crime can exist anywhere.

No television drama perfectly mirrors reality, and plot-wise Ozark occasionally asks viewers to accept coincidences and operational successes that would be extraordinarily difficult to sustain in the real world. Still, its portrayal of the corrosive effects of money laundering, corruption, intimidation, and narco violence feels authentic.

Perhaps the show’s greatest achievement is refusing to romanticize criminal life. There are no real winners in Ozark. Wealth becomes meaningless. Family becomes collateral damage. Trust disappears. Survival replaces living.

That’s the lesson every veteran investigator eventually learns. Crime may promise power, freedom, or prosperity. In the end, it almost always delivers fear, isolation, and destruction. Ozark understands that truth—and that’s what makes it one of the most compelling crime dramas of the last decade.

Still streaming now, on Netflix. And we’ll see you over the weekend for our weekly Ops Drop and another Nightwatch episode!

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Coogan had formed an alliance with the Gambino Crime Family, and used their muscle to take over the Westies, ultimately killing Mickey Spillane and his lieutenants. Coogan bit off a bit more than he could chew in his association with the powerful Italian mob, and eventually the partnership became more of a subservient relationship. But Coogan and his associate Mickey Featherstone were a legendary force in Hell’s Kitchen, and everyone feared them.

The newest portrayal of the Irish Mob is the series, The Westies (2026) from creators Chris Brancato (Narcos) and Michael Panes (Godfather of Harlem). The show takes place in the early 1980’s as the Jacob Javits Convention Center is being built and the Irish and Italian mob are muscling in on the union jobs and contracts that are creating a gangster’s gold mine on the west side.

The show focuses on the tenuous relationship between the Irish and Italian crews, with the Italians looking for Irish connections to the Javits Center, and the Irish just trying to get a piece of the pie and stay alive.

In this series, the names of the Irish hoodlums who ran the Westies have been mostly changed. Gang leader Eamon Sweeney and his lieutenant Jimmy Roarke are composites of Mickey Spillane and Jimmy Coogan, and Mickey Flanagan is a stand in for the unhinged enforcer, Mickey Featherstone. On the Italian side, the names have not been changed, with Paul Castelano and John Gotti running the Gambino’s and ruling over their Irish counterparts.

J.K. Simmons (Whiplash, Juno) is surprisingly good as Eamon Sweeny. It takes a minute to forget his role as the Farmers Insurance spokesman, but he sells the character well. Jimmy Roarke is played by Tom Brittany, who gives the best performance in the series. Mickey Flanagan is played by Stanley Morgan. Titus Welliver plays Police Officer Glenn Keenan, a corrupt cop who has close ties to the Westies. Jessica Frances Dukes plays an FBI Agent heading the investigation into the Westies and has recruited Keenan.

The show tries to bring the audience back to 1980’s Manhattan but fails in this regard. The series was filmed in Toronto, as Hell’s Kitchen has changed so much over the past few decades as to be unrecognizable to the gritty Irish ghetto of the 80’s. The dirty tenements and dilapidated elevated West Side Highway are long gone, replaced by luxury skyscrapers and the new park-lined West Side Drive.

But the series gets most of the rest of the story right. Solid character development, the history of the Gambino’s and Westies, and the rampant corruption surrounding the Javits Center construction are on target.

The show does a great job of portraying the business of organized crime. The Westies were never powerful enough to dominate New York; they were just trying to hold on to their west side outpost. They survived by making themselves useful to La Costa Nostra. This constant balancing act between independence and subservience creates a fascinating strategic chess match. The Irish crew must show enough brutality to command respect but can’t step on the toes of their Italian masters. The Italians know this and often insult the Irish. Sweeney fights to keep his men and their famous Irish tempers in line to keep his alliance alive.

The Westies is three episodes into its run as a series. There is a total of eight episodes in the first season, but whether the show will be renewed for a second season is still up in the air.

Each episode runs about 50 minutes. It is a drama interspersed with scenes of action and violence. The Westies is a political drama set in New York organized crime. You can catch the first episode for free on Amazon Prime and additional episodes can be purchased or watched for free with a subscription to MGM+. Enjoy this look back on the wild west side of Manhattan where bodies were dropping, and the Irish mob ruled the streets.

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The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973) is not a movie that most people have seen - it has been largely forgotten, but it is a fantastic portrayal of the Boston organized crime scene and a vivid narrative about the dirty world of police informants.

Eddie Coyle is one of those informants. A small-time hard drinking gun runner, Coyle is past his prime. Ironically, his friends are all gone, busted or dead – he has no one to rely on. And he has a problem. He got busted in New Hampshire a few years ago on a deal set up by Dillon, a local barman and low-level gangster. Found guilty, his sentencing date is coming up, and he is looking at some serious federal time. His family is struggling and will have to go on welfare – the Boston Irish mob is not going to take care of them.

He is looking for a way out, and acting as an informant for the ATF seems like his best bet. He meets with ATF agent, Dave Foley, and tries to give up information in exchange for a more lenient sentence. It is clear from the beginning that Foley is more worried about Foley, and isn’t going to be much help, but Coyle is desperate.

He manages to set up a gun purchase and gather enough information to dime out another gun runner to Agent Foley. But Foley wants more before he will “help” Coyle. Coyle has one big bit of information. He knows about people in his own organization who are robbing banks in a deadly and well-organized pattern. Will he give them up too? Is he that desperate?

The Friends of Eddie Coyle has a solid cast. Robert Mitchum, who is one of my favorite actors, plays the down on his luck Eddie Coyle. He is perfect for the role. Mitchum captures the sad, hopeless Coyle in both appearance and affect. Richard Jordan is ATF Agent Dave Foley. I think Jordan really captured the interaction between handler and confidential informant. It’s an acting role at the end of the day, with both parties telling their own lies. It’s a relationship built on mutual mistrust. Director Peter Yates (Bullitt, Breaking Away), Mitchum, and Jordan really hit the nail right on the head in this regard.

Peter Boyle plays Dillon, the seemingly innocuous barman who is more than meets the eye. The supporting cast is not remarkable, but Alex Rocco, who played Moe Greene in the Godfather, is in the movie.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle is a sad movie. The title is ironic. Eddie Coyle has no friends. He has no future. He has no hope.

Mitchum’s Coyle reminded me of Willy Loman from Death of a Salesman. The characters have a similar down and out, too old and worn out, vibe. The stories mirror each other in many ways despite the different settings. Both characters think that they will be rewarded for their loyalty…. And both are wrong.

The film is loosely based on Boston’s Winter Hill Gang. The characters in many ways mirror the lives of Winter Hill members Whitey Bulger and Billy O’Brien. Mitchum allegedly wanted to meet the infamous Bulger as a character study before filming began but was talked out of any interaction with the mercurial gangster.

Boston is the backdrop for the movie. It’s old Boston, before the real estate boom, where neighborhoods now gone to modernization are seen in their past iteration. Some cool old Boston spots and old cars set the stage.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle runs a bit longer than the usual hour and a half. It is a drama, and can be slow at times, but the characters are the key here. The movie captures them well, and the few action scenes give the movie some pep. You can rent The Friends of Eddie Coyle on Amazon Prime or YouTube for $5. While not a big hit at the box office, this film is moving and well-acted. It is worth a watch. Enjoy!

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Now spyware and miniature digital devices can record conversations at the push of a button. Yes, expertise is needed, but it is not the art form that it was in the analog era. The Conversation (1974) captures the surveillance intricacies of this era and incorporates them into a thrilling and disturbing film.

The Conversation is a film about a surveillance operation that wreaks havoc in the mind of one of the nation’s best electronic monitoring professionals. Harry Caul is renowned as the nation’s leading private surveillance operative. His ability to plant bugs, record conversations, and infiltrate any location leaves his peers in awe, wondering how he gets his jobs done.

Caul is tormented by a particular past assignment. He recorded a conversation for a client that resulted in three murders. Ever the professional, he kept his client’s confidence and tries to convince himself that he is not culpable for the deaths. A job is a job, and what the client does with his tapes is not his concern. But he can’t shake the guilt. It torments his dreams, makes him irritable, and is affecting his work and personal relationships.

Caul has a new assignment from a mysterious client known to him only as The Director. He is hired to spy on The Director’s wife, Ann, and her suspected lover, Mark. Setting up an elaborate rolling audio surveillance Caul and his team are able to capture a full conversation between the two lovers as they walk through busy Union Square, San Francisco. During the captured conversation, Ann says, “He’d kill us if he got the chance”.

This remark leads Caul to an existential crisis. Will his work lead to another series of murders?

When The Director’s assistant, Mr. Stett asks for the tapes, Caul demurs, refusing to hand them over. Stett already has Caul under surveillance and is working to steal the recordings. Caul is duped and loses the tapes to Stett.

Now he is in a panic and crosses all lines of professionalism to try to uncover more about the case. Half mad with guilt, the line, “He’d kill us if he got the chance” plays over and over in his head driving him to more extreme actions.

The Conversation was directed by Francis Ford Coppola. As you might expect, Coppola, coming off the success of The Godfather, is able to assemble a cast of some of the greatest actors of all time.

Gene Hackman is Harry Caul. He is excellent in a difficult role outside his usual comfort zone. The mysterious and ominous Director is played by Robert Duval. Harrison Ford is his assistant, Martin Stett. John Cazale is Caul’s bumbling and unprofessional assistant. Cindy Williams (Laverne and Shirley) is The Director’s wife Ann, and Frederic Forrest (Apocalypse Now, Falling Down) is her lover, Mark. The supporting cast includes Terri Garr, Allen Garfield, and Elizabeth MacRae.

Although ancillary to the plot, Caul’s display of technical savvy is something to behold. The character is a legend in the surveillance world, and Coppola gets into his techniques and 70’s era technology. Caul builds out his own wires, bugs, and transmitters to spy on his targets with impunity.

Coppola hired legendary private eye Hal Lipset as the technical advisor for the film. Whatever he was paid was money well spent. Lipset was a legend in private electronic surveillance, earning the moniker “The Private Ear” for his foresight and expertise in the emerging field of electronic surveillance. He was able to impart his knowledge to the actors and filmmakers to make the movie realistic and accurate.

The Conversation runs about two hours. It can be slow at times, but as a neo-noir, psychological thriller, this movie has few equals. It is downright haunting.

I was able to find it for free with an Amazon Prime subscription or it can be rented on other streaming services for the usual $4.

This weekend, get in the head of a tormented master spy with The Conversation, one of Francis Ford Coppola’s less famous, but nonetheless fantastic films.

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Men In Black was a big success when it hit theaters in July 1997 (that feels like yesterday). The movie grossed almost $6 million and broke box office records. The film depicts a secret government agency, called MIB, that investigates and monitors alien activity on earth.

The agency is impressed by NYPD detective James Darrell Edwards, who chased down an alien who was known to be particularly hard to catch. Detective Edwards is recruited by the agency, forgoes his lucrative tier 2 pension, and agrees to sign up. He thought he had the best seat to the circus as an NYPD cop, but he finds himself on another level of incredulity that makes the streets of NYC seem tame.

Detective Edwards is designated Agent J, and is teamed up with Agent K, an unflappable agent with plenty of time on the job. Agent K has seen it all, and nothing seems to get his adrenaline going at this point. Most cops arrive at that feeling at some point.

Together they are assigned to track down a particularly nasty alien, known as a “Bug”, who has recently arrived on Earth. The Bug is bent on stealing a powerful energy source so it can destroy an alien civilization. Agent J and K must find the energy source and stop the Bug.

The film is set in 1997, New York City, and that is part of its charm. Major NYC sites such as the Guggenheim Museum and Flushing Meadows Park are the scene of several battles with alien life.

The MIB Agency is a microcosm of police forces around the nation. Inadequate training, too much paperwork, and byzantine procedures hamper the efforts of the agents, but they succeed in spite of all of it. Nothing about police work could be more accurate.

Agent K is played by Tommy Lee Jones. Director Stephen Spielburg was hoping for Clint Eastwood to take the role, but fortunately, he declined. Jones is fantastic as the deadpan Agent K. Will Smith, at the height of his fame, takes the role as the charismatic and energetic Agent J. Both are born for their roles and make the film a success.

The relationship between Agent J and Agent K mirrors that of partners in any police department. Two wildly different personalities working together to solve problems. The two aren’t always on the same page but grow to appreciate what their other half brings to the job. Smith and Jones (they probably could have kept those names for their characters) develop an on-screen chemistry that makes the film a comedic and dramatic hit.

They are supported by the sultry Linda Fiorentino as a medical examiner Dr. Laurel Weaver, who has discovered alien life forms in her morgue. Rip Torn is fantastic as MIB head Chief Zed. He takes the entire circus in stride, confident that his agents will get the job done. Vincent D’Onofrio is the dangerous alien “Bug”, bent on destroying life as we know it. That’s ironic as the ultra-liberal TDS sufferer D’Onofrio may have the same goal in real life. Tony Shaloub, SNL alum Siobhan Fallon Hogan, and World War 2 vet Mike Nussbaum round out the supporting cast.

Men In Black runs a little more than the typical hour and half. The film is full of comedic one liners, fantastic special effects that still hold up, and solid character development for the CGI aliens. It’s a rare special effects-rich film that stands the test of time and technologic advancement.

I couldn’t find it for free anywhere, but it is available for rent for the usual $4 on most streaming services. Enjoy this decades-old summer blockbuster in a time when wo ke Hollywood seems to have forgotten how to make them. And don’t forget to neurolyze yourself after the final credits roll. You don’t want the government to disappear you!

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Life on Mars was a successful British cop show. It portrayed a modern-day Manchester police detective who, after being hit by a car, wakes up in 1973. Life on Mars was remade for the US in 2008 to try to mimic the Brit version’s ratings success. For whatever reason, the show didn’t take off here across the pond, but it was a pretty good show with a great cast and worth a watch.

Life on Mars is one of the most unique police dramas ever made. Mixing detective work, science fiction, and a healthy dose of nostalgia, the show follows modern-day NYPD Detective Sam Tyler, who wakes up in 1973 after being struck by a car. Whether he is dead, dreaming, in a coma, or somehow traveling through time is the central mystery, but that’s almost secondary. The real attraction is watching a modern cop collide with old-school detective work.

Sam suddenly finds himself assigned to the fictional 125th Precinct in Manhattan, where the rules are dramatically different. There are no computers, no cell phones, no DNA evidence, no surveillance cameras on every corner, and certainly no body-worn cameras. Detectives solve crimes the old-fashioned way, with interviews, informants, and instincts.

If you’ve ever worked investigations before technology became king, you’ll appreciate just how much this show gets right.

Tyler is trying to find out how he wound up in 1973 while still handling a detective’s case load. One mystery after another rolls in for Tyler to solve: murders, robberies, and kidnappings. Meanwhile, his personal mystery is getting weirder and weirder – hearing voices, seeing images from the future, and getting strange instructions. It’s like Tyler is living an out of body experience while juggling a really hard job.

The biggest reason to watch Life on Mars is the cast.

Keitel plays Lieutenant Gene Hunt, and he absolutely owns every scene he’s in. Hunt is loud, intimidating, politically incorrect, impatient, and fearless. He believes good cops catch bad guys first and worry about paperwork later. Every modern policy that frustrates Sam Tyler is something Gene Hunt dismisses with a sarcastic grin. Today, Gene Hunt would probably spend as much time answering questions from Internal Affairs as he would supervising detectives. In 1973, he was exactly the kind of commander that got the job done. Keitel nails the role.

Jason O’Mara does an excellent job as Detective Sam Tyler. Every episode forces him to reconcile everything he learned as a modern detective with the reality of policing in the 1970’s. He essentially has to relearn his job, deprived of the tools of modern investigations, all the while trying to figure out how to get back to his old life.

The supporting cast is equally strong.

Michael Imperioli plays Detective Ray Carling with the swagger of an old-school detective who believes he’s already seen everything. Gretchen Mol’s Annie Norris is one of the first female detectives trying to prove herself in an overwhelmingly male profession. Jonathan Murphy and Lisa Bonet round out the cast of characters in the detective squad.

Where the show really shines is its recreation of 1970s New York City.

Even though NYC is not the Disney Times Square of a few years ago, New York today has got nothing on the 1970’s. It’s grimy, dangerous, covered in graffiti, and filled with abandoned buildings, pornography theaters, corruption, and rising violent crime. The city itself almost becomes another character. Anyone who remembers New York before the renaissance of the 1990s will recognize the atmosphere immediately. The show adds in some great 70’s rock and roll to the soundtrack and a few classic muscle cars to make the show a bit more appealing.

The biggest mystery of the series is how Sam Tyler is going to get back to his old life. And that winds up being the most controversial things about Life on Mars. The last episode is a plot twist so far out of left field that it divided watchers of the show. Some liked it and some hated it. Was this a stroke of cinematic genius, or a quick fix to a show that was getting cancelled? You can decide for yourself.

For cops, Life on Mars is worth watching because it asks an interesting question: Has technology created better detectives, or has it masked the loss of some-time tested investigative skills? There are arguments on both sides, but a good detective must embrace both technology and old investigative techniques.

Life on Mars only lasted 17 episodes before they pulled the plug. The dynamic of time travel could only be strung out for so long, but if they had created the show with the same cast as a 70’s police drama, I think it could have done really well. I found a few episodes on YouTube, but to get the full experience, you will have to buy the series on a streaming service for about $15. This weekend enjoy the eclectic mix of 70’s police work and modern sci-fi with Life on Mars.

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The Terminal List on Amazon Prime is not your typical slick Hollywood action series. It’s darker, angrier, and far more honest about what violence does—to the men who carry it out, and to the institutions that too often betray them.

At its core, Chris Pratt plays James Reece like a man held together by discipline, training, and rage barely kept under control. From a cop’s perspective, that performance rings true. Real operators—whether they wear a military uniform or a detective shield—often aren’t loud men. They’re quiet, methodical, and dangerous when cornered. Pratt understands that.

What makes the series work is its realism in one key area: betrayal cuts deeper than bullets. Every investigator knows that criminals are easy to understand—they’re criminals. What destroys morale is corruption from inside the walls: political players, compromised executives, and transactional power brokers who see honorable men as expendable pieces on a chessboard. That’s where The Terminal List hits its target.

The tactical scenes are excellent—not cartoonish, not overdone. Movement, weapons handling, surveillance, countersurveillance—all feel grounded. There’s weight to it. When violence comes, it’s sudden, brutal, and ugly—the way real violence is.

But beneath the gunfights, this is really a story about grief, loyalty, and moral injury. The show asks a hard question cops and soldiers know well: What happens when the system meant to protect justice becomes the thing protecting injustice?

That’s where James Reece becomes compelling—not as a superhero, but as a man operating on a code when every institution around him has abandoned theirs.

Some critics dismissed the show because it doesn’t wink at the audience or apologize for its masculine themes of duty, brotherhood, and vengeance. That misses the point. This series understands something modern entertainment often forgets: men who stand post in dangerous places carry burdens most people will never understand.

From a law enforcement lens, The Terminal List feels less like escapism and more like a warning—about corruption, institutional cowardice, and what can happen when good men are treated as expendable. Blue city mayors defunding the police everywhere would be wise to take heed. Put simply: we need men like James Reece.

Verdict: Tough, tense… and totally unapologetic. Refreshingly so. If you’re in the move for some true grit, this one’s for you.

And a reminder: We had The Terminal List book author, former Naval Seal Jack Carr, on the podcast a few weeks ago. If you haven’t checked it out already it is a must watch. Jack has a new book coming out called The Fourth Option, which he has dedicated to “all the local, state and federal law enforcement officers who hold the line each and every day.”

We like this guy.

Check it out below!

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One of the better Philip Marlowe films is the simply titled, Marlowe (1969). In this adaption of Chandler’s novel, The Little Sister, actor James Garner gets the nod as the enigmatic detective. It is a quality film and is our recommendation for this installment of Weekend Buff.

In this movie, director Paul Bogart (All in the Family and Oh God! You Devil) and Screenwriter Stirling Silliphant (In the Heat of the Night) update Marlowe from 1940’s Los Angeles to the then-modern day late 1960’s LA.

Here Marlowe is hired by Orfamay Quest, a young lady from Kansas to locate her missing brother. The investigation soon turns to murder and a blackmail plot against famous actress Mavis Wald. Wald has shacked up with Los Angeles, nee Brooklyn, mobster Sonny Steelgrave. Wald and her studio bosses are desperate to hide the affair for fear of bad publicity, but photos of the tryst are out there somewhere.

As the bodies pile up, Marlowe has a caper on his hands. The police are also investigating, but true-to-form, Marlowe’s investigative powers are leaving the cops in the dust.

The film has a great cast, with James Garner as a solid, yet slightly atypical Philip Marlowe. The beautiful Gayle Hunnicutt stars as actress Mavis Wald. Hunnicutt exudes Hollywood glam right down to the big 60’s hair and sweet 69’ Jaguar roadster convertible that her character drives. Sharon Farrell is the manipulative client, Orfamay Quest. Both give good performances. Carroll O’Connor is excellent as the insecure LAPD Lieutenant Christy French, supported by Kenneth Tobey as Sgt Fred Beifus. Tobey is a career actor, but he plays such a great cop that I had to look him up to see if he was retired from The Job.

Bad guys include H.M. Wynant as mob boss Sonny Steelgrave, who does a nice job, but is horribly miscast into a poor character, as it seems like the studio didn’t want the stereotypical La Cosa Nostra types as the bad guys. The film was released just around the same time Joseph Coloumbo started the Italian American Civil Rights League, so perhaps they didn’t want to offend Italian Americans – or the mafia.

Steelgrave’s henchman is Winslow Wong, who is played by Bruce Lee. Wong is a great character in this film but drops off too early. Bruce Lee naturally puts on a wild martial arts display that is itself worth the cost of admission.

The film is not Oscar worthy and did not win any awards but is a solid and entertaining depiction of the legendary private eye. It is advertised as neo-noir, but the director and cinematographer could have done a better job of capturing that noir vibe.

What they do get right is the updated Marlowe feel for swinging 60’s Los Angeles. This iteration of Philip Marlowe is a little more realistic and nose to the grindstone than the literary version, and that makes the plot a little more true-to-life. Marlowe is catching clues that the cops miss and putting the puzzle together with facts rather than Sherlock Holmes-like deduction.

Phillip Marlowe gets beaten up, threatened, manipulated, and occasionally outsmarted. He survives mostly because he keeps asking questions when everybody else wants him to stop. He is a dog with a bone and refuses to let go.

Marlowe is the standard hour and thirty minutes, and the film fits the time perfectly. Nothing wasted and nothing extra. You can catch it on YouTube right now for free, but a Marlowe mystery is not something to watch on your phone. You have to pay attention to the angles, the motives, the clues, and the subtleties. This weekend, enjoy James Garner’s modern take on one of America’s greatest characters.

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An absolute classic show. Barney Miller is the gold standard for police comedies, one with many imitators but no duplicators. This was the first police show that I remember watching as a kid as my grandparents tuned in regularly.

Barney Miller relates the investigations, problems, and hijinks of the fictional 12^th Precinct Detective Squad in Greenwich Village New York City. It is a sitcom in the real sense of the word – almost the entire show takes place in the 12^th Precinct Squad room.

Led by Captain Barney Miller, the 12^th Squad is not the ideal of an efficient team of investigators, but they get the job done, just like real NYPD detective squads. The show relies on humor to handle investigations from the ridiculous to the deadly serious. I can tell you from my experience in several NYPD detective squads, that is more like the real thing than most people would guess. Working in a precinct detective squad was my favorite, and funniest, assignment. Humor makes the show and humor eases the tension for real detectives. It is a comedy that hits true to reality.

And that’s why, decades after it went off the air, it remains one of the most authentic police shows ever made. It’s not authentic in the sense of tactics, investigative techniques, or cinematic gunplay. It is authentic in the way detectives recognize immediately. They see themselves in the show. The squad room, the characters, the problems, they just feel right. The exhaustion feels right. The weirdness feels right. The job feels right.

Captain Barney Miller was played by Hal Linden, a Bronx native who is still alive and kicking at 95. Linden won numerous Golden Globes and Emmies for his portrayal of the tired and sarcastic Captain Miller. Linden’s Barney Miller is a subtly funny and competent manager who seems perennially exhausted from long days corralling cats. That’s what being a squad commander feels like. Just managing the chaos.

Linden is supported by a phenomenal cast of characters and actors that portray them. You will find carbon copies of these characters in any detective squad across the country.

Max Gail plays the dedicated but quirky Detective Stanley “Wojo” Wojciehowicz. As other detectives get tired of the routine, Wojo shows up to work ready to conquer the world.

1^st Grade Detective Ronald Harris is played by Ron Glass. He exudes the typical 1^st Grader (perhaps the hardest rank in the NYPD to achieve) vibe – well dressed, professional, and intelligent. He handles his cases with ease and is always looking for his next gig as a writer or actor to get ahead.

The ageless Abe Vigoda portrays Detective Phillip Fish. Vigoda was only 54 when the show started, but he looked like he had aged out of police work years before. And that was the role. Detective Fish was exhausted.

Jack Soo plays Sergeant Nick Yemana, who is hysterical. Yemana is the master of the deadpan one liner. He is competent, has seen it all, but is not bitter. He seems mildly amused by everything going on around him – but don’t drink his coffee, that stuff will kill you.

Other characters include Detective Chano Amengual portrayed by Gregory Sierra, Detective Arthur Dietrich played by Steve Landesberg, Deputy Inspector Frank Luger played by James Gregory, and Liz Miller, Barney’s wife, portrayed by Barbara Barrie.

The actors in this show had a bond that mirrors the bond amongst cops. The cast was close-knit and maintained relationships long after the show ended. Taping was largely drama free and friendly. The first few seasons were filmed in front of a live studio audience and then involved long hours of edits and overwrites. Filming would often last well into the wee hours of the morning. The cast was brought together in tragedy when Jack Soo died of cancer in 1979 while the show was still in production.

Decades after the show ended it is still a favorite of cops across the country. Ask any detective and 90% of them will claim this as their favorite cop show. Not every case is a homicide. Most detectives are catching a mountain of mundane misdemeanors. It gets you bone weary after a while. Barney Miller is a show detectives feel a bond with.

Barney Miller lasted 8 seasons and 171 episodes. Season 3 is probably the best, as the show found its groove. Each episode runs about 25 minutes. You can catch many of them on YouTube for free. Enjoy this timeless classic that rings true and will leave you laughing. Most of the time, this is what police work looks like.

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One of the biggest drivers for corruption is the feeling of futility that many cops suffer from, particularly when they are not supported by politicians and the justice system. Keep disparaging cops and discrediting the work that they do and some turn to misconduct to fight the system that has maligned them.

The movie Training Day (2001) is Hollywood’s outsized take on LAPD corruption as the Rampart Scandal broke. The film was certainly over the top but was inspired by the LAPD’s Rampart Division CRASH Unit misconduct.

The Rampart Scandal story broke in 1998 when Officer Rafael Perez of the CRASH unit began cooperating with Internal Affairs and prosecutors to turn in corrupt members of the LAPD Rampart Division’s CRASH unit. Unlike cops like Frank Serpico, Perez was no ideologue intent on righting wrongs within the LAPD. He was caught stealing cocaine from a LAPD evidence room and agreed to cooperate in exchange for a reduced sentence.

Perez’s allegations tore through the LAPD, leading to allegations of misconduct against 70 LAPD cops and ended the career of Chief Bernard Parks. At the end of the investigation only 8 cops were arrested, and 58 faced internal charges. William Bratton was brought on as Chief of the LAPD to clean up the mess in the wake of the scandal.

The corruption that plagued LAPD CRASH Units was allowed to fester as crime in the City of Angels grew out of control in the early 90’s with homicides passing 1,000 a year. The crack-fueled crime wave seemed uncontrollable and LAPD brass put anti-corruption safeguards on the back burner in exchange for the results being obtained by CRASH cops. That is always a recipe for disaster.

The Training Day version portrays fictitious Detective Alonzo Harris, an insanely corrupt LAPD narcotics investigator. He is charged with evaluating Officer Jake Hoyt who is a candidate for the narcotics team. Hoyt is desperate to fit into the narco unit and follows Harris’s lead. A bad decision, as Harris immediately begins leading Hoyt down the road to ruin. The day starts with Harris forcing Hoyt to smoke PCP-laced marijuana and gets worse from there. Blatant theft, fake search warrants, home invasions, drug deals, and even murder follow in an eye-opening day for the wide-eyed rookie.

The actions of Harris and his fellow officers leave viewers on the edge of their seats, wondering how much worse the day could get. And they aren’t disappointed. Harris and his young protégé wind through their day of malfeasance seemingly trying to violate every law in the California penal code. Harris’s control over his life is rapidly coming apart and disaster looms around every corner. Hoyt finds himself involved in all of it.

The movie has an all-star cast, with Denzel Washington giving a top-notch performance as the Rafael Perez-inspired Detective Alonzo Harris. Washington won the Oscar for best actor for his portrayal. Ethan Hawke was nominated for best supporting actor for his role as Officer Jake Hoyt. Supporting actors include Scott Glenn as drug dealer “Roger”, Tom Berringer as ADA Stan Gursky, Cliff Curtis as gangster “Smiley”, Eva Mendez as Harris’s girlfriend, Sara, and Raymond Barry as LAPD Captain Lou Jacobs. Even Dr. Dre, Snoop Dog, and singer Macy Gray get cameos in the film.

The film portrays cops at their worst, but it is entertaining nonetheless. The audience is left wondering if this could actually ever happen, but unfortunately the film is an amalgamation of acts of corruption that have occurred at one point or another.

Training Day is two hours of pure corruption and violence. Detective Harris is initially seen as a corrupt cop in complete control of the streets, but slowly the audience realizes that he has put himself on the road to self-destruction – just like most corrupt cops. What initially appears to be a film glorifying police misconduct turns to a tragedy and a lesson for those who think they can get away with such behavior.

You can catch Training Day on Amazon Prime Video for the usual $4. Enjoy this action-packed portrayal of corruption and remain hopeful that the bad old days of police misconduct remain where they belong - in the rear-view mirror.

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At a time when Hollywood increasingly mistakes noise for substance, Hard Times feels almost revolutionary in its restraint. There are no bloated speeches, no unnecessary subplots, no gratuitous blood or explosions, and no desperate attempts to explain every emotion or political nuance to the audience. Hill trusts viewers to absorb the world through mood, action, and character. The result is a film that feels timeless.

At the center is Charles Bronson delivering his best performance, period. Never noted as a great actor, his grim stoicism is exactly on-point for this one.

Bronson plays Chaney, a mysterious drifter who arrives in New Orleans during the Great Depression with little more than the clothes on his back and a frightening ability to fight bare-knuckle. Chaney barely speaks, but Bronson turns silence into a weapon. Every glance and measured movement tells you exactly who this man is. In lesser hands, the role could have become a parody of masculine cool. Bronson instead gives Chaney a weary dignity that makes him magnetic from the moment he appears onscreen.

What makes Hard Times special is that it understands toughness without glorifying cruelty. Chaney isn’t a superhero. He’s a survivor. The movie presents fighting not as spectacle, but as labor — brutal, exhausting, and transactional. There’s dirt under the fingernails of this film. It reminds you of how tough boxers and MMA fighters actually have it.

And the New Orleans setting becomes a character itself. Hill captures the city as humid, battered, and half-forgotten, full of smoky back rooms, crumbling streets, riverfront shadows, and desperate hustlers trying to scrape by during the Depression. The city gives the movie its soul. Without New Orleans, Hard Times would lose much of its melancholy charm and authenticity. And the bayou scenes alone drip with character — you’ll feel like you were invited to a genuine crawfish boil (which I suspect the film crew was). It’s true Americana, without the kitsch.

Walter Hill directs with discipline, especially for a debut feature. Every frame feels purposeful. The fight scenes are quick and vicious, avoiding the cartoon choreography that infected later action films. When punches land in Hard Times, they feel painful.

The supporting cast is equally strong. James Coburn steals scenes as Speed, Chaney’s fast-talking promoter and gambler. Coburn brings humor, desperation, and charm to the role, creating the perfect contrast to Bronson’s stoic calm. Their chemistry quietly drives the movie. And any movie with Strother Martin is okay with us.

Visually, the film is gorgeous in a dusty, worn-down way. The Depression-era settings never feel artificial or overdesigned. The jazz-infused score adds another layer of grit and melancholy, making the film feel like an old American folk tale.

What’s remarkable is how modern Hard Times still feels. It predates the stripped-down masculinity later celebrated in films like Drive or The Wrestler, yet it accomplishes many of the same things with greater subtlety.

For years, Hard Times has lived in the shadow of bigger Bronson hits like Death Wish. But this is a much better film — tougher, smarter, and far more artful.

It’s not just a great Charles Bronson movie. It’s one of the great underappreciated American films of the 1970s.

I found and watched if for free, with limited commercials, by simply downloading the Roku app on my television. There appear to be other free options; here’s the link.

Hard Times runs about an hour-and-a-half. It’s a callback to when movies could genuinely transport you to another place and time, without being overdone. A great late night flick — and one that’s aged beautifully, like an Edward Hopper painting come to life.

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