Dick Tracy (1990) * * *

Directed by:  Warren Beatty

Starring:  Warren Beatty, Glenne Headly, Madonna, Al Pacino, Dustin Hoffman, James Caan, Charles Durning, Dick Van Dyke, Paul Sorvino, Charlie Korsmo, Seymour Cassel, William Forsythe

If there was ever a comic book movie which looks and feels like a comic book, it is Dick Tracy, which pops with color and grotesque, hideous villains.    Straight-arrow detective Dick Tracy (Beatty) inhabits this world of crime and battles Big Boy Caprice (Pacino), who is part-Quasimodo, part-rabid dog, and his batch of disfigured cronies.     Beatty is the right man for Tracy, whose girlfriend is Tess Trueheart (Headly), but his first love will always be crime fighting. 

Big Boy has just taken over crime in the big city, after dispatching of rival Lips Manlis (Sorvino) and taking over his club.    The main attraction of the club is sultry Breathless Mahoney (Madonna), who witnessed Big Boy killing Lips, but doesn't want to testify.    She is more interested in seducing Tracy, but Tracy stands his ground...barely.     Along the way, Tracy and Tess adopt a homeless, nameless Kid (Korsmo), whose primary question is, "When do we eat?"   Tracy and the Kid form a strong bond as Tracy inches ever closer to bringing down Big Boy, but not without complications.

With its ritz, glamour, and period music, Dick Tracy manages also to capture the feel of a 1930's crime drama, or at least a modern-day retelling of one.    The most interesting characters are the villains, who go about their jobs with relentless glee.    They love being bad, but I would guess when you look like they do your future is pretty much set in stone.     Even a villain who is relatively normal looking, Mumbles (Hoffman) is flawed.     He speaks so fast that Tracy has to slow down a recorded interrogation of him to understand him.     There is also the emergence of The Blank, who wears a faceless mask and whose loyalties are questionable.    The Blank seems to be both a friend and enemy of Tracy (and Big Boy) at the same time. 

Pacino, who was Oscar-nominated for his role here, has a ball growling at his cronies to kill Tracy.   We get the sense that no amount of money or power could ever satiate him, which makes him a forever dangerous adversary.    I could never warm up to Madonna as an actress, while I confess I have yet to see Evita.    She always speaks with a weird, distracting affect or accent, which only draws attention to the accent and detracts from the performance.    

Dick Tracy isn't deep, but lovingly realized and imagined by Beatty as a visual feast which still holds up.    The actors don't seem to inhabit the scenery, but emerge from it, like the characters in a comic strip.    The movie is uniquely full of life, although truth be told I wish Madonna were recast.