Hoffa (1992)

In this current time of union busting, perhaps it is fitting to take a look back at Jimmy Hoffa. Hoffa was the union leader who best epitomized what the opponents of unions most hated about them. Was he corrupt? Yes. Did he have mob ties? Yes (though he may or not have had mauve ties). Was he a son of a bitch? Yes. Was he effective? Hell yes.

The movie Hoffa isn't a bio-pic in the strictest sense. I don't get the impression that its makers cared that much about name or dates, and there are perhaps too many composite or fictional characters, but what the movie is trying to get across is an impression of the man. Hey, I know practically nothing about Jimmy Hoffa, but it feels like he would be like this, it feels like he would be a man of contradiction, if he wasn't there really wouldn't be a lot of point to this movie.

The framing story is of course fictional, liberties are taken about the man's final hours, and I'm okay with this because no one (whose talking) knows about the final hours of Jimmy Hoffa. His death is the second half of the 20th century's Amelia Earhart story, nobody knows exactly what happened, but I feel we have a pretty good idea.

Some have commented that the life of Jimmy Hoffa is a pretty good summation of the arc of organized labour in America over a roughly fifty year period, it started out idealistic, ambitious, and a little corrupt, and it ended cynical, ambitious, and very corrupt. The merits and draw backs of unions can be debated endlessly, though in many ways I don't think that the film makers particularly care, as this is a surprisingly nonjudgmental movie.

The screenplay by writing god David Mamet of course has his trademark violence, ambiguity, and elaborate story structure. He makes of the life of Jimmy Hoffa a series of vignettes, often fictional flashbacks (even had by a fictional character), on the life of a man, on whom it has no particular take other then 'these are the kinds of things that he did'. They must add up to the kind of man that he was, but its up to the viewer to make the call on what that means.

I add in closing only that Danny DeVito is a pretty good director. You get the sense that he has a great affinity for the style of films made under the old studio system. Some of his sets really look like sets, and I think that's intentional. He plays with conventions of style and genera type (gangster, bio-pic) and gives you a satisfying picture, that though it doesn't stray too far from the expected, definitely bears the unique imprint of it impresario. Though maybe it was just a little too long. Grade: B+