Is it shallow to admit I was only initially interested in seeing Cop Car because director Jon Watts is set to helm the next Spider-Man movie?
I had never heard of Watts before Marvel and Sony announced he had been hired, but quickly learned that his film was a hit at the Sundance Film Festival and drew a bidding war among distributors. Since then, Cop Car has been on my radar. It did get a theatrical release where I live, but for those who don’t live near arthouse and indie-friendly cinemas, the film is also available through iTunes, Amazon and on demand. It’s worth seeking out.
But if you go into Cop Car thinking you’ll see shots that make it apparent why Watts was chosen to direct a Spider-Man flick, you’ll probably be disappointed. And it’s not fair to view this movie through that lens anyway. This is a very different film, with a much smaller setting and far different stakes. The stakes are certainly important gravely so for the characters involved, but Cop Car won’t tell you how Watts handles Peter Parker or Spidey’s next on-screen nemesis.
Well, maybe it provides some insight into what conversations between Parker and Aunt May could be like. Not really. But Cop Car does show that Watts has a gift for writing good dialogue and filming talky scenes between characters.
I have read reports from industry insiders that Marvel tends to favor filmmakers who can handle dialogue, humor and character moments well. The action and special effects are already taken care of through pre-visualization, so someone needs to come in and tie those scenes together. And the studio’s history with directors like Jon Favreau, Joss Whedon and the Russo brothers bears that out.
So does Watts fit that profile? Until its climax, there’s not a lot of action in Cop Car. That is, unless you consider two 10-year-old boys stealing a sheriff’s car and driving it on fields and open roads to be action. Those scenes are shot quite well, by the way. Watts and his cinematographers manage to capture the thrill of being a kid who’s never driven a car before suddenly having the power of an automobile — and the world of adult possibilities that seemingly comes with it — at their command, with no one in sight who’s going to end the fun and take their new toy away.
The movie is at its most entertaining in the first act when the two kids Travis (James Freedson-Jackson) and Harrison (Hays Wellford) discover an unattended sheriff’s car in the woods. Though little backstory is given for any character in this movie, there is an allusion to the fact that these kids are running away. However, that may just be a kid’s fantasy carried on while out playing in the woods and exploring. Neither kid brought anything along for this supposed getaway, other than a Slim Jim tucked in a shirt sleeve.
But then everything changes when they find that cop car. Where is the sheriff? No one is around. The only sign of life is an empty beer bottle placed on the trunk. Free to do whatever they want, it seems, the kids get in the car. Sitting at the wheel of any car would be exciting at that age. But this is a sheriff’s car. There’s the CB radio, the switches for the lights and sirens, and… holy shit, the keys were hidden under the visor.
We soon find out why the car was unattended. Sheriff Mitch Kretzer (Kevin Bacon) is not a good man and left his car behind so he could bury the evidence of some of the bad things he did out in the woods. (More remains in the trunk, which becomes a major factor in the story by the end of the second act.) The sheriff has the whole routine down too, with everything already set up and the necessary materials on hand, so it’s clear he’s done this sort of thing before — many times, perhaps.
This is a guy who is used to being in control, who has used his position of authority to impose his will upon others. He doesn’t apparently assert himself over the regular civilian population (though we don’t know that), but rather the criminal element of the small town where Cop Car takes place. (The movie was filmed in Colorado, but this could be in any rural area with a lot of open fields and roads, any small town where a sheriff could be a very big fish.) From them, he can get money, drugs, guns and whatever else he needs to live out his own power fantasy. And it appears he beats the crap out of those small-time hoods to show who the boss is.
But Kretzer’s carefully constructed little fiefdom shows how fragile it really is when those two kids steal his car. The look on Bacon’s face when he returns to where the car is supposed to be is wonderful. Not only is leaving his car unattended to be stolen potentially embarrassing, but what was he doing out in the woods to begin with? And then there’s what the sheriff left in the trunk. But Kretzer didn’t get to where he is just because he has a uniform, badge and gun. He’s clever, and uses every resource and trick at his disposal to find his car — without letting the dispatcher or his fellow officers know what happened. Bacon is great here, knowing just what to do with a meaty role.
Of course, Kretzer getting his car back and regaining control is contingent upon everyone cooperating, and when you’re dealing with people — whether it’s kids or interlopers who weren’t anticipated — things can go very, very wrong. And that’s where Cop Car goes from what could have been something of a dark comedy into a gripping thriller that belongs on a shelf with the early work of the Coen brothers and David Gordon Green.
The world of this movie is very small, and has “indie” written all over it. But this fits nicely into the middle class of movies that aren’t superhero blockbusters, slapstick comedies or Oscar-bait dramas. Maybe Cop Car would have been a bigger deal 15 or 20 years ago, when independent film provided an infusion of new talent, writing and storytelling into movies. Yet it’s a refreshing alternative to much of what’s offered in theaters — or on-demand viewing — and a reminder that good writing and actors can make a small movie feel very big.
