Angel Heart (1987) from Johnny Web (Uncle Scoopy; Greg Wroblewski) and Tuna

Scoop's notes in white:

Mickey Rourke has taken some grief in the past for his performances in roles that just seemed wrong for him, but I think he's terrific when he gets the right part, and he sure got it here. In 1955, Harry Angel, a lower-class stumblebum detective from Brooklyn, who is no NASA candidate, is hired by a stranger to find a singer missing since the war. The singer is believed to have breached a contract with the mysterious stranger.

Along the way to this ostensibly simple assignment, Rourke finds a trail of grisly murders, confusing clues, beatings, black magic, and plenty of atmosphere in New Orleans, Harlem, and Coney Island. As time goes on, both he and we discover that he is searching for something else besides a singer - something sinister and somehow related to the detective himself.

What we do know is that Mr. Johnny Favorite, the missing singer, was one serious sleazebag who engaged in some blasphemously evil practices.

At one time I tried to figure out some of these unexplained details, so I read the prize-winning book upon which the film is based, then lent it to a friend to read. Between the two of us, we had no more clue after reading and discussing the book than before we started it. I think you have to just accept that it is some dark evil stuff, and forget about trying to tie it down too tight. I can't say much more because the mystery is much more fun if you try to solve it along with Harry Angel.

There is a crazy scene on Coney Island between Rourke and a carnival geek who has an entire box of nose shields. This one of the oddest and most memorable conversations ever recorded on film.

In addition to the atmospheric direction, there is some interesting casting to support Rourke.

• Former Cosby kid Lisa Bonet took the most un-Cosby role she could find, showing her breasts constantly as Rourke's lover and daughter. Their sex scene was hot enough that it had to be trimmed for the R rating. Bonet showed more than flesh. She also demonstrated some talent. She was quite natural and sexy as hell, but her career fizzled into nothingness. (Rumor is that she was not an easy person to work with, to state it mildly.)
• Robert DeNiro holds down the other lead, as the mysterious client, speaking with a refinement not usually found in his range, and all the while doing a very odd impersonation of his good friend Marty Scorsese.

Angel Heart (1987) is a better than average horror/mystery/thriller. Mickey Rourke is believable as an unwashed and mostly unemployed private eye in New York, who suddenly is contacted by a rich but very strange client (Robert De Niro), and asked to find a missing person. De Niro claims his only interest is to find out if the man is alive or dead. The missing man was a well known crooner before WW II, but was horribly disfigured during the war, and hospitalized with amnesia. The client had regular reports from a hospital that he was there, condition unchanged, but the last report didn't arrive. Rourke checks with the hospital, and finds that the missing man has actually been gone for twelve years, but a doctor was paid a large sum of money to make people think he was still at the hospital.

With a little help from his reporter girlfriend, Elizabeth Whitcraft, the detective eventually figures out that New Orleans is the place to look. As he gets closer to the truth, a hefty body count is building, including an ex-girlfriend of the missing man, a psychic played by Charlotte Rampling. The more he learns, the more frightened and uneasy Rourke becomes. One of the more pleasant parts of his investigation is Lisa Bonet, who is the daughter of one of the women he wanted to track down. As I strongly recommend this to those who haven't seen it, I will leave the plot there.

Whitcraft shows breasts in a pre sex scene with Rourke, Rampling shows one breast after having had her heart cut out, and Bonet shows her breasts in several scenes, including a see through while washing her hair, a bathtub scene, a voodoo chicken execution dance, and a lengthy sex scene with Rourke that really sizzles. It is an unusual film that is strong with the critics, and also with general viewing audiences. This film is a B-.