City Hall
Short description
City Hall is a political thriller set in New York, where Mayor John Pappas has built a successful administration with his young deputy, Kevin Calhoun. Their partnership has earned the mayor broad popularity as he looks toward higher office. That balance is disturbed when a child is killed during an exchange of gunfire involving police and drug dealers, and when the arrested dealer is quickly released, the idealistic Calhoun begins asking questions the mayor's circle would rather leave alone. His inquiry draws him into a tangle of bribery, corruption and organized crime reaching the upper levels of city power.
Harold Becker directed the film, which sits between Malice and Mercury Rising in a run of features that began with Taps. Paul Schrader, Bo Goldman and Nicholas Pileggi wrote the screenplay, and the cast is led by Al Pacino as Pappas, John Cusack as Calhoun, Bridget Fonda, Danny Aiello, Martin Landau and David Paymer, among 46 credited performers. The production, from Columbia Pictures and Castle Rock Entertainment, cost about 40 million dollars and took roughly 33 million dollars worldwide, so it did not recover its budget at the box office.
Audience response was moderate: on IMDb it holds 6.2 out of 10 from around 24,000 votes, and on TMDB 6 out of 10 from 334 votes. A critics' rating of 6 out of 10 from 25 reviews places professional opinion close to the audience scores.
What's left behind the scenes
- The character of Frank Anselmo, played by Danny Aiello, was partly based on Donald R. Manes (1934-1986), a politician from the Democratic Party. He was caught in real estate fraud and attempted suicide by slashing his veins, but was saved. A couple of months later, he nevertheless carried out his intentions, stabbing himself in the heart with a kitchen knife.
- The film's plot is based on a true story, the political turmoil that took place in New York in the mid-1980s. Edward A. Koch was the city's mayor at the time and played a cameo role as an announcer in the film.
- Screenwriter Ken Lipper worked in the city administration under Ed Koch (1924-2014) as Deputy Mayor for Finance and Economic Development.
- In preparation for his role, Al Pacino often had long conversations with then-Mayor of New York Rudolph Giuliani (who served as mayor from 1994-2001) and his predecessors Ed Koch (1978-1989) and David Dinkins (1990-1993).
- The scenes at the snowy station were filmed at a temperature of minus 3 degrees Celsius.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
