The Drop

Where everybody knows your name

The Brooklyn we see in The Drop is not the gentrified borough, with its hip street food markets, renovated waterfront and niche coffee shops familiar to many of today’s tourists, but a close-knit community of people struggling to get by, plying their way through a concrete jungle of cold streets, wire mesh fences and dimly-lit houses. It’s a place where the local bar has become a sanctuary for working class stiffs who pound brews to forget the daily grind and salute the glory days of the past in the company of their own.

Naturally, this being inner-city America these sanctuaries are also the ideal place for the local Mafiosi to collect their dirty money from those operating on their turf.

Everyone knows what goes on behind the beer pumps, but the process still requires a certain amount of subterfuge so you never know when the deposits will be made until you are told, croaks Bob (Tom Hardy), the tender at one of the designated establishments called Cousin Marv’s. When the packages do arrive, they get delivered in discreet fashion into a safe beneath the counter – hence ‘the drop’. All there is to do for Bob in between time, he tells us is to ‘tend bar and wait’.

Though you could categorize The Drop as a gangster film, there are no mobs of wise-guys in crisp suits such as those found in the likes of Goodfellas or Casino; only average joes working in twos and threes doing stick ups in clown masks and clothes they’ve worn for the last fortnight. As with Killing Them Softly, Andrew Dominik’s highly lauded neo-gangster effort from last year, there seems to be a growing desire for filmmakers to ditch past conventions in order to present the new face of grass-roots organised crime in the 21st century.

If films such as Dominik’s are wider statements about corporation America however, The Drop stays firmly within the self-governing microcosms that dot the locals of its society – offering a sneak-peek at the how, but never really exploring the why. The Drop’s screenplay was written by Dennis Lahane and like Shutter Island, which was also based on Lahane’s own novel, he chooses to focus on a solitary male protagonist with a sketchy past.

Tom Hardy turns out a physically-nuanced performance for the introverted Bob, shuffling with a half-hunch, stammering mumbled dialogue and doing a fine job with the thick Brooklyn accent; no easy task for a Limey. Bob may not be all he seems at first glance however and as things proceed Hardy gives subtle hints through tiny gestures and cold-eyed glances of a veiled persona. We watch closely when Bob gains the attention of local tough-guy Eric Deeds (Matthias Schoenaerts) after adopting a dog he finds beaten and left for dead in his neighbour’s trash. Deeds claims the dog is his and begins making unwanted visits to the bar and Bob’s home, threatening him if he is not compensated.
Complicating things further, he turns out to be the ex of Bob’s new lady friend Nadia (an excellent Noomi Rapace) who is helping him raise the pooch. Worse still, a detective by the name of Torres (John Ortiz) starts snooping around the bar after a robbery there leads to an investigation, which in turn leads to more bad news for Bob and manager Marv (James Gandolfini) as the Chechen mafia come-a-knocking, asking to be reimbursed for the stolen money.

With all these moving parts things seem geared towards a lot of dog mess hitting the fan, but in the end they come to a head in a relatively reserved manner. Director Michael R. Roskam teases the tension on slowly throughout the film until the point where it’s obvious something has to go pop. When we reach that point the swiftness of resolution is shocking, but by then we’ve been anticipating the event for so long that the overall dramatic impact trickles away quickly when it finally arrives.
This also upsets the effect of the ‘killer twist’ upon which The Drop has been billed. Anyone with a discerning mind can see what is coming a mile off (especially when Hardy starts the twitchy eyebrows) and disappointingly the actual ‘twist’ that comes before the denouement in reality turns out to be no more than a delayed plot detail.

Despite the fact that The Drop scuffs its chance to be a great gangster film as opposed to simply a decent one, its significance in history will still be guaranteed if only because it features what is to be James Gandolfini’s final acting credit after his untimely death in 2013. After decades of The Sopranos and featuring in countless films of the gangster genre, Gandolfini has had ample practice playing the part of the mobster and his display inThe Drop is as good as any in his long career.

Through him Marv, once head-honcho in the borough but now demoted to intermediary, is given a distinctly human edge, hiding a great deal of pain and regret behind his wry smile and dry banter. He used to have respect he says to Bob, opening up momentarily about the lifestyle that once gave him status but has since leached him of all his vigour. Now old ladies sit on his prized stool at the bar and he is forced to kow-tow to the bloodthirsty Chechens through gritted teeth during their every visit.

The actor’s stand out moment however has to be a short exchange, full of restrained emotion, between Marv and his sister as they argue whether to pull the plug on their sick father’s life support machine. It’s a scene which to all intents and purposes didn’t have to be there having no real bearing on plot, but because of its inclusion the whole feel of the film becomes suddenly, greatly enriched. Fitting testimony then, to Gandolfini’s talent and how much it will be sorely missed.

Salút big G.