Jimmy Markum (Sean Penn) and his friends Sean Devine (Kevin Bacon) and Dave Boyle (Tim Robbins) grew up near Mystic River in the blue-collar East Buckingham area of Boston, playing ball in the streets. One day, after scrawling their names into freshly laid concrete on the footpath, Dave is taken away in a car by two men with police badges. It’s 25 years before the lives of the threesome are hurled together again, in the wake of the senseless murder of 19 year old Katie (Emmy Rossum), Jimmy’s daughter from his first marriage. Sean is now a detective and is assigned the case with his partner (Laurence Fishburne), which drags out some terrible demons, including Dave’s memories of those painful days of his youth. And a heartbroken Jimmy is determined to avenge his daughter’s killer before the cops find him.

	"Mystic River" Trailer
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A skilful combination of whodunit and character study, Mystic River is superbly adapted by Brian Helgeland and powerfully directed by Clint Eastwood, who seems to be at his filmmaking peak. Maybe it’s easier if he just directs, although many of us would have loved him to play a cameo even … the only one right for him would have been the role of the elderly shopkeeper played by Eli Wallach (Clint’s famous sparring partner, Tuco, from The Good The Bad And The Ugly, 1966).

The story builds beautifully from character and incident, and some may argue with Eastwood’s sense of pace (preferring more snap) but any time saved there would jeopardise the extremely intricate set of relationships and story possibilities. Each character is a point on this massive web that the novelist and the script writer have spun, and each scene gives us another small piece of the puzzle. Of course the whodunit aspect is critical, but Eastwood ensures that we care just as much about the people caught in this terrible episode.

To his great credit, too, Eastwood handles the material with great subtlety, ensuring that only the right kind of sensationalism appears on screen – the kind that that we decode ourselves through the pain-racked faces and tear-filled eyes of his characters. It’s a superb cast and they all stretch a bit to go places of great inner pain. But if this makes the film sound a heavy, desperate affair, it isn’t mean to. Indeed, Kevin Bacon’s decent and troubled detective helps to take us into the film and stay in it on an even keel while the characters around him start unravelling. Henry Bumstead’s unlaboured production design is so good it disappears, as does Tom Stern’s straight-forward but effective cinematography. (Stern shot Eastwood’s Blood Work.) I also like the score, which Eastwood put together with his frequent collaborator Lennie Niehaus.

The film is saturated with details and layers that add great depth to the experience, showing how even the lowly murder mystery movie can be elevated to a work of lasting value.

The dryly humorous Tim Robbins and Kevin Bacon collaborate on the commentary, in a relaxed, anecdotal style. They comment on the cast, the scenario and the dynamic of the three friends at the centre of the story.

While Clint Eastwood doesn’t participate in the audio commentary, he does turn up very briefly in the Beneath the surface/behind the story documentary, which is an underwhelming 22 minutes of congratulations all round. For a more solid piece of Erastwood, see the 40 minute Charlie Rose interview. Here, at least we get a glimpse into how he works and why he is so non-interventionist and minimalist as a filmmaker.

Ted Robbins’ interview runs even longer at 50 minutes, but he’s worth it – if you’re interested in the workings of actors.

Kevin Bacon’s slot is a shade under 20 minutes, and he looks as though he’s wearing a long, dark wig. Once you get used to this, he provides further insights in a laid back style…into Eastwood’s laidback style. (All three interviews were recorded between October and December 2003.)

The Bravo TV special, just over 10 minutes, is a hotch podge of interview grabs, clips from the film and some repetitious material from the other items on the disc. The one interesting additional element, however, is author Dennis Lehane, who talks about the issues of adapting the novel to the screen.

The quality of the audio visual elements are outstanding, and this is obviously a collector’s item, for the film alone, although the sum of all the extras does provide some added value.

TITLE: MYSTIC RIVER: DVD

RATING: (MA)

ORIGIN: (US, 2003)

FOREIGN TITLE:

SECTION: DVD

CAST: Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon, Laurence Fishburne, Marcia Gay Harden, Kevin Chapman, Laura Linney, Adam Nelson, Emmy Rossum, Cameron Bowen

DIRECTOR: Clint Eastwood

SCRIPT: Brian Helgeland (novel by Dennis Lehane)

RUNNING TIME: 132 minutes

DVD

PRESENTATION: 2.35:1, 16:9 enhanced; D 2.0, DD 5.1;

SPECIAL FEATURES: Disc One: Audio commentary Kevin Bacon & Tim Robbins;Disc Two: Mystic River: Beneath the surface/behind the story documentary; 2003 Bravo TV Special; Charlie Rose Show interviews with Clint Eastwood, Tim Robbins and Kevin Bacon; trailers; subtitles for the hearing impaired.

DVD DISTRIBUTOR: Roadshow

DVD RELEASE: July 22, 2004