Director: Brian De Palma
Writers: David Koepp (screenplay), Edwin Torres (books)
Stars: Al Pacino, Sean Penn, Penelope Ann Miller

This review is part of the feature:

The 33 Gangster Films You Can’t Refuse

Carlito’s Way is a character study of a Latino gangster, Carlito Brigante (Al Pacino), who is released early from a lifelong prison sentence due to the use of illegal evidence during his trial.

He desperately wants to stay clean, but the underworld of New York City keeps drawing him back in. In that sense, it is also a plot-driven movie: can Carlito escape with his love, the dancer Gail (Penelope Ann Miller), to the Bahamas?

Carlito’s Way is based on two novels – ‘Carlito’s Way’ and ‘After Hours’ – written by a New York judge of Puerto Rican descent, Edwin Torres. It’s an intriguing crime story with an interesting lead character and thereby the perfect vehicle for the reteaming of Brian De Palma and Al Pacino after the gangster classic Scarface ten years earlier.

De Palma is often called the second Master of Suspense (second only to Alfred Hitchcock), and with Carlito’s Way he lives up to that reputation. The film is very much a thriller as well as a gangster picture. De Palma even has the nerve to show us how the movie will end right at the beginning. Yet the suspenseful scenes lose none of their power, even though as a viewer you already have a pretty good sense of how things will play out.

The masterful finale at the train station is, just like the unforgettable train station sequence in De Palma’s The Untouchables (1987), a classic nail biter with fantastic cinematography.

Pacino is once again excellent in the lead, and the supporting cast members all hit the mark. The outlier is Sean Penn who is sensational as the sleazebag lawyer Kleinfeld, whose awful haircut inspired the classic video game character Ken Rosenberg in GTA Vice City.

The ending, even though it’s expected, will hit you hard. ‘You are so beautiful’, a wonderful song by Joe Cocker, never sounded more poignant.