MOVIE REVIEW : Gang That Couldn’t Sell Straight

The worse it gets for salesmen, the more desperately they search for opportunity, the more pressing their hunger for respect, the lonelier their Edward Hopper lives, the better it seems to get for American drama. But even characters as bracingly tormented as Eugene O’Neill’s Hickey in “The Iceman Cometh” and the protean Willie Loman in Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” have nothing on the shenanigans of the gang in “Glengarry Glen Ross.”

As delineated by David Mamet (in a script based on his Pulitzer Prize-winning play), the real estate salesmen who work for Premier Properties in the far reaches of New York City are a ferocious lot, abrasive, abusive and tormented by turns, casually corrupt wizards of deception who live by their wits if they live at all. But when they talk, everybody listens.

It’s not because they’re classically well-spoken, because they’re not. It’s not because they lead blameless lives, because their life’s work turns out to be selling worthless swampland to unsuspecting marks. Rather it’s because Mamet is a true magician with streetwise words, a writer who recognizes the poetry hidden in the most scalding language and creates profane dialogue hot enough to suck all the air out of the screen and leave an audience gasping.

Filled as it is with bravura verbal arias, almost overloaded, in fact, with soliloquies where actors can showcase their technique, “Glengarry” (citywide, rated R for language) is also a potential minefield, lying in wait to trip up the unwary and overenthusiastic. But under the discreet direction of James Foley, the high-profile cast (including Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Alec Baldwin and Ed Harris) goes through it all flawlessly. Like the salesmen they portray, they know enough not to overdo this kind of opportunity.

And opportunity is what this angry sales-oriented tribe covets most. Members of a murky subculture with its own slang and its own hard-earned, politically incorrect knowledge (never try to sell a doctor or an Indian named Patel), these men worship the fabled, elusive “good leads,” the names of likely victims, of people who’ve expressed a willingness to listen to a pitch about buying into grandiose-sounding but non-existent residential communities like Rio Rancho Estates or the tantalizing, just-hatched Glengarry Glen Ross.

But Mitch and Murray, the unseen powers behind this shaky empire, have decreed that the good leads go only to closers, people like Ricky Roma (Pacino) who have an almost hypnotic level of success even with casual acquaintances like the faceless man (Jonathan Pryce) met at the bar of the local Chinese restaurant. Roma is in fact in line for the Cadillac Eldorado that is first prize in the office sales contest. Second prize is a set of steak knives, and third prize, well, third prize, the salesmen are informed at the film’s opening, is being fired.

Giving them the news is Blake (Baldwin, in a part not in the original play), a hard-nosed professional motivator whose motto is “ABC--Always Be Closing” and who insists that “only one thing counts in this life, getting them to sign on the line which is dotted.” The three salesmen who hear his talk react to it with varying blends of anger and indifference, for they all have their problems and frustrations, all feel misused as only victimizers can. And all will wonder about the best way to deal with this latest humiliation, as the less than 24 hours the action takes place in unfolds.

Angriest of the three is Dave Moss (Harris), the office hothead who responds to a request for entry-level civility by screaming, “What is this, courtesy class?” More troubled is George Aaronow (Alan Arkin), uncertain if he’s even in the right business anymore. And most disturbed of all is Shelley Levine (Lemmon). Once eulogized as the Machine for his enviable sales record, still a wizard on the telephone, Levine has hit what he calls “a bad-luck streak” and is further distracted by the specter of a hospitalized daughter.

Aside from providing the words to bring these master manipulators to life, Mamet’s achievement is getting us to care about their fates, making us accomplices in the world view of men who wouldn’t think twice about victimizing anyone who crossed their paths. Clearly admiring of how these never-at-a-loss types can talk rings around dazed civilians, Mamet has created a version of their staccato speech patterns, their complex call and response rhythms and elliptical references that is as good as modern American dialogue gets.

Helping make these words as effective as they are on screen is the picture’s decision not to unduly open up Mamet’s play, to keep its focus on the claustrophobic rooms and phone booths its habitues frequent. This has placed more of a burden on director Foley, who has, with the help of expert cinematographer Juan Ruiz Anchia and editor Howard Smith, come up with a variety of ways to make the nonstop dialogue visually exciting.

While some of Foley’s earlier work, for instance the Madonna-vanity production “Who’s That Girl?,” have been marked by excessive solicitude for the actors, the director hits the right balance here. He is rewarded by fine, intelligently showy performances by the entire cast, most notably, perhaps, by Lemmon.

Given that the role of the frenetic loser that Lemmon takes on here is one he has attempted often before, it would be no surprise to anyone if he more or less walked through it this time around. But, rather like Clint Eastwood in “Unforgiven,” whom he likely will be facing on the best actor Oscar ballot, he has found a way to re-attack the character, has managed to make something familiar seem close to new. Even in a film like this, where fine acting is the rule not the exception, his work stands out in a very classy crowd.

‘Glengarry Glen Ross’

Al Pacino: Ricky Roma

Jack Lemmon: Shelley Levine

Alec Baldwin: Blake

Ed Harris: Dave Moss

Alan Arkin: George Aaronow

Kevin Spacey: John Williamson

Jonathan Pryce: James Lingk

Released by New Line Cinema. Director James Foley. Producers Jerry Tokofsky, Stanley R. Zupnik. Executive producer Joseph Caracciola Jr. Screenplay David Mamet, based on his play. Cinematographer Juan Ruiz Anchia. Editor Howard Smith. Costumes Jane Greenwood. Music James Newton Howard. Production design Jane Musky. Art director Bill Barclay. Set decorator Robert J. Franco. Running time: 1 hour, 40 minutes.

MPAA-rated R (language).