Coroner’s Corner
by John Bikowski
illustration by Eric Johnson
If you enjoy powerful drama jammed with tons o’ stars, check out Sleepers – a well-crafted tale of four young boys sent to Juvie Hall. While in their early teens, the guys accidentally crush an innocent person with a hot dog cart. They get sentenced to a boys’ prison where the guards are a bunch of sick, sadistic, pedophilic bastards. You know you’re in for uncharted terrain when Kevin Bacon, as Noakes the floor guard, has a boy named Shakes strip just so he can check out his cookies. Unfortunately for the kids, the politeness stops there. Over the next 45 minutes, we see them subjected to all forms of sexual abuse, mental torture, and grievous bodily harm. As a viewer, you cannot help but want to kick the shit out of the guards. I also kept thinking about how harrowing this movie would be for anyone who has been even remotely tortured like that as a kid. The flashbacks and subliminal atrocities that Sleepers flings at them would lead to a psychotic implosion sending gray matter into the balcony seats.
Anyway, the jail term is served and the boys grow to men who carry around pent-up hatred. Two of them are street punk killers while the other two (Brad Pitt and Jason Patric) have honorable careers. Each of the men seems to have been dreaming of revenge in his own unique way. However, the street punks begin the payback first. They come upon Noakes in a bar, explain who they are and then blow him away limb by limb. Since the murder was done in front of several witnesses, they guys are apprehended easily and brought to trial. Their old buddy (Pitt) takes the case as the lawyer who seeks to prosecute them. But don’t worry… he has a plan and that’s all I care to give away. You should definitely see this film because it has a good story, and is filled with many memorable characters. Robert DeNiro (the best actor in the world) creates another multi-layered character as the priest who looks after the kids. Dustin Hoffman also does a great job as a dorky, alcoholic defense attorney.
I originally had hoped that the grown men would slowly, painfully torture Noakes and the other guards for the remainder of the movie. But on second thought, I decided that my idea was originally realized on film as I Spit on Your Grave. Tipper Gore started a national hate bandwagon on I Spit… and she was probably justified. The plot of the film can be basically summed up as “Rape Me and I Will Kill You.” Since they needed 1 1/2 hours to call it a film, the multiple rape/sodomy scenes take about 1/2 an hour, the murders take about 1/2 an hour, and absolutely nothing happens for (you guessed it) a 1/2 an hour. Viewer beware: the castration in the bubble bath scene made my wee-wee jump off, run out the door, and head for Texas. Well, gotta go catch it… see ya.
