ARBITRAGE
Robert Miller Richard Gere
Ellen Miller Susan Sarandon
Det. Bryer Tim Roth
Julie (mistress) Laetitia Casta
Roadside Attractions presents a film written and directed by Nicholas Jarecki
Running time: 107 minutes. Rated R (for language, violent images and drug use)
Lillian sez: POWER IS THE BEST ALIBI
Having just phoned his lawyer, instructing him to contact the district attorney and arrange a meeting where he will face indictment and turn himself over to the police, Richard Gere, seen from above, is on his bed, hands behind his head, staring directly up at us, the camera, on the bedroom ceiling of his Gramercy Park mansion. Suddenly he bolts from the bed, grabs the phone and calls his lawyer again. "Have you contacted the D.A.?!" he shouts into the phone. "No? Great! Don't!" He's had a sudden inspiration.
Gere plays Robert Miller, CEO of a billion dollar hedge fund. He's on the verge of selling the company to a rival firm -- in part so he can pay back the $410 million a friend loaned him to cover a loss in a Russian copper mining deal gone bad that Gere/Miller has hidden by juggling the books. However, it's not the debt and hidden loss causing him to lose sleep nor is that the subject of his sudden inspiration.
While the sale of his company was inching towards conclusion, Gere/Miller caused a fatal accident on the northbound side of the Bronx River Parkway. Driving a vintage Mercedes sedan belonging to his mistress, new owner of a Soho art gallery which Gere/Miller has funded -- with her sleeping on his shoulder, he falls asleep at the wheel and the car crashes -- flipping and rolling spectacularly. Gere/Miller survives the crash. The mistress dies. No one is witness to the crash. It is late at night and the parkway is deserted. In a moment of panic-driven inspiration Gere/Miller, about to dial 911 on his cell phone, puts it back in his pocket and instead uses a nearby pay phone and makes a collect call to the Harlem home of Jimmie, the son of his former corporate chauffer. Speaking rapidly, Gere/Miller gives young Jimmie, explicit instructions about how and where to find him on the parkway. "Take I-95," he tells him. Jimmie follows those instructions to the letter.
Weeks later, Gere/Miller is under suspicion when investigators discover his collect phone call to Harlem in the records of the pay phone. Looking for the disappeared driver of the fatal crash, they have also discovered: Gere/Miller was the victim's lover and benefactor; Gere/Miller was the last person seen with her on the night of the crash; they know that Gere/Miller employed Jimmie's father; they know Jimmie accepted the collect phone call and talked for 1.5 minutes. They suspect he left home and drove somewhere, but have no proof. They suspect Gere/Miller is the missing driver and want to connect him to the phone call and to Jimmie.
In a moment of inspired desperation, the lead detective manufactures a piece of evidence. He doctors a photo from the Robert F. Kennedy Triborough Bridge tollbooth, making it show Jimmie's Jeep Grand Cherokee and rear license plate. This evidence is presented to a grand jury. Jimmie is about to be indicted as accessory after the fact. He's in trouble. Although Jimmie is a former felon, Gere/Miller has sworn him to secrecy and offered big money, two million dollars. Jimmie has his pride. He refused the money, but promised to keep his mouth shut. Now, facing serious jail time, Jimmie is incensed -- he never even went near the Triborough bridge. Gere/Miller told him not to.
This is what wakes Gere/Miller from his tormented reverie, as he seemed about to sacrifice his family, his company, his own future -- everything he had worked so hard to construct and acquire -- in order to repay Jimmie for his silence and loyalty -- taking the rap himself. Gere/Miller has suddenly realized that the photo evidence must be fake, and he can prove it. He gets his own lawyer and the high-powered lawyer he's hired to defend Jimmie into a meeting and they concoct a plan to get a Triborough bridge license plate photo of their own to match against the photo presented as evidence to the grand jury. When the two photos are placed side by side under a magnifying glass -- it's clear: the police photo is a Photoshop fake, and a crappy one at that.
Whoever made the composite was a Photoshop amateur, unfamiliar with the Distort and Skew tools. The image of Jimmie's license plate, composited onto a picture of a different Jeep Grand Cherokee, is out of proportion and of lower resolution than the tollbooth original onto which it has been crudely pasted. Case closed. Grand jury dismissed. Jimmie is free. Any link between Gere/Miller is gone.
Take another look at the evidence, please. There was no need for Gere/Miller's sleepless nights. Any competent photographer or digital retoucher would immediately recognize that the photograph provided by the police had been digitally altered. Moreso, take a look at a map. Leaving Harlem to drive north to the Bronx River Parkway takes you nowhere near the Triborough Bridge, just like Jimmie said. You would have to drive south to go north. Nobody in New York does that, especially not a street-smart young man from Harlem. Case closed.
Jan Galligan
75Grand/Sur
Santa Olaya, PR
http://75Grand.posterous.com [foto blog]
http://cinefestsanjuan.posterous.com [cine blog]
http://about.me/JanGalligan [about me]