Mikey and Nicky

Joyce's Shem and Shaun, from dusk till dawn in seedy Philadelphia. Holed up in a fleapit, Nicky (John Cassavetes) ponders the gangland contract on his head, "ready for the straitjacket." Mikey (Peter Falk) is the childhood pal in Judas cloak, straight man in their jumpy vaudeville duo. One starts brawls in bars and buses, the other struggles to leave a trail of bread crumbs for the hired killer (Ned Beatty). "I got a terrific suggestion for you, Nick. I suggest you find somebody you can trust." An Elaine May comedy of betrayal wearing the skin of a fraught underworld meander, a thorough dissection of terrors masked by camaraderie. The weasel with his back to the wall is a master class in Cassavetes jitters, his grin freezes and drops when the possibility of a double-crossing friend crosses his mind. Falk's brilliance meanwhile is in locating the stolid sidekick's pain and anger, his own volatile fuse—looking for milk to soothe his buddy's perforated stomach, he leaps over the diner counter and terrorizes the clerk who won't sell him cream without coffee. "Every good boy does fine on his lines," says the thief who could have been a pianist (cf. Fuller's Pickup on South Street), the turncoat's thoughtful side comes out in a pit stop at the cemetery, reciting the Kaddish in a nocturnal void. (For his part, Beatty's hitman is a beleaguered salesman, fretting about parking and getting stuck with kung-fu movies.) "Good Times, Bad Times," one of the funniest and bleakest of films. The devastating centerpiece finds Nicky humping a grudging mistress (Carol Grace) while Mikey sits on a trash can and smokes a cigarette, a Diebenkorn in black and red. "I'm really getting the treatment. Tonight's my night." Suburban furniture for the last barricade, with marked consequences for The Killing of a Chinese Bookie. With Joyce Van Patten, Rose Arrick, Sanford Meisner, William Hickey, and M. Emmet Walsh.