Miller's Crossing (1990)

In the Coen Brothers' twisty and complex gangster-crime drama (their third feature) with elements including power struggles, double-crosses, one traditional love triangle and a destructive homosexual love triangle, blackmail, mixed-up identities, greed, and lust - it was their third feature film following Blood Simple (1984) and Raising Arizona (1987). The immensely-watchable character study and intriguing period-piece film was set in the year 1929 - the Prohibition Era - during a period of an intense power struggle and bloody warfare between two rival gangs.

The remarkable script's dense plot and dialogue, in the spirit of novelist Dashiell Hammett (with the film based upon his 1930 serial and 1931 novel The Glass Key (1942)), was about the strategic maneuverings of one prominent, smart but amoral and heartless mobster-enforcer, who was caught in the middle between two rival warring gangs (Irish vs. Italians). To survive, he played both sides against each other as he shifted allegiances between them. He was able to successfully take advantage of the situation, although it meant carrying through with brutal violence (the film's body count was 14), and being beaten up numerous times by both gangs.

The neo-noirish film paid considerable homage to the hard-boiled 1940s gangster films, although it was shot in visually-beautiful color by cinematographer Barry Sonnenfeld. The locale of the film was unidentified and unnamed, but one mention of "The Palisades" hinted that it might be in NY. [Note: The film was shot on location in the New Orleans area.] Although the under-rated and little seen film had a budget of around $14 million, the film was a commercial failure and only acquired gross revenues of about $5 million.

• in the opening pre-title credits scene (similar to the opening sequence in The Godfather (1972)), prominent Prohibition-era Irish gangster-boss Liam "Leo" O'Bannon (Albert Finney) - in his office in an unspecified city - was holding a meeting with anxious and sweaty Italian mob rival Giovanni 'Johnny Caspar' Casparo (Jon Polito) (who kept mentioning he had a strict code of ethics), Caspar was accompanied by his second-in-command heavy - the brutal and bi-sexual Eddie Dane (J. E. Freeman); O'Bannon was backed by his own right-hand man and tough advisor Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne)
• the Italian mobster was there to complain and inform O'Bannon and Reagan about two-bit "son of a bitch" Jewish grifter-bookie Bernie Bernbaum (John Turturro) for double-crossing him; Bernie was accused of revealing Caspar's fixed fights to other gamblers and lowering the payoffs and odds: ("He is sellin' tips on how I bet....It's gettin' so a businessman can't expect no return from a fixed fight. Now if you can't trust a fix, what can you trust?...Bernie Bernbaum is a horse of a different color, ethics-wise, as in he ain't got any....we gotta go to this question of character to determine just who, exactly, is chiselin' in on my fix. And that's how we know that it's Bernie Bernbaum, the Shmatte kid-- 'cause ethically, he's kinda shaky"); the two Italians explicitly denied that it was Eddie Dane's homosexual lover ("boy") "Mink" Larouie (Steve Buscemi), another Caspar gang member, who was passing along the tips
• O'Bannon asked: "So you wanna kill him?", but then firmly refused to allow their plan to go forward and eliminate Bernie - he affirmed that Bernie shouldn't be touched: "Sorry, Caspar. Bernie pays for protection"; O'Bannon refused to cooperate, even knowing that his defense of the loathsome Bernie threatened a turf war: ("You haven't bought any license to kill bookies, and today I ain't sellin' any. So take your flunky and dangle")
• the furious Caspar displayed his antagonism toward the Irish king-pin ("big-shot"): "You think I'm some guinea fresh off the boat and you can kick me, but I'm too big for that now. I'm sick of takin' the strap from you, Leo. I'm sick of marchin' into this god-damned office to kiss your Irish ass! And I'm sick of the high-hat! You's fancy-pants, all of youse"; as Johnny marched out the door with Dane, O'Bannon reminded him: 'You're exactly as big as I let you be and no bigger, and don't forget it, ever"
• O'Bannon's trusted and loyal aide Tom Reagan had only a few words of advice to Leo: "Bad play, Leo"; to calm things down, the "big-hearted" O'Bannon offered to pay Tom's gambling debts to his bookie Lazarre, but Tom refused ("I don't need it"); in regards to the disgruntled Italians, Tom offered advice to O'Bannon to agree to Caspar's demands to avoid further warfare: ("Think about what protectin' Bernie gets us. Think about what offendin' Caspar loses us"); Tom's unconvincing recommendation only flustered Leo who responded to Tom: "Oh, come on Tommy, you know I don't like to think," to which Tom retorted: "Yeah, well, think about whether you should start"
• after the title credits, the title screen was accompanied by a fedora hat that floated through a wooded forest propelled by breezes and gusts of wind (the metaphoric object in the dreamy repeated sequence identified Italian consigliere Tom Reagan's character-defining item of clothing)
• Reagan was both a hard-drinking card-player and a horse-gambler, who had just lost his fedora hat in a late night card-game to "Mink" (Dane's lover, and a close friend of Bernie's) and Bernie's sister Verna Bernbaum (Marcia Gay Harden)
• shortly later, Tom (with Verna hidden away in his bed in a rear bedroom) was visited by Leo; he again urged Leo to break up with Verna, calling her a "grifter" like her unscrupulous brother Bernie, for faking romance with Leo to keep her brother safe: ("It's a grift. If she didn't need you to protect her brother from Johnny Caspar, you think she'd still be going on slow carriage rides with you through the park? That's the deal, isn't it?"); Leo recognized that Tom was very wise about people's true motivations: "You know all the angles, Christ, better than anybody"; Leo told Tom that after Verna temporarily went missing, he had hired toupee-wearing private detective "Rug" Daniels (Salvatore H. Tornabene) to "tail" and follow Verna around and "keep her out of trouble"; this would prove to be very worrisome for Tom, who was sleeping with Verna behind his boss O'Bannon's back, and now, he feared being found out by O'Bannon's hired detective; however, a problem immediately arose with the coincidental disappearance of "Rug"
• during their lengthy conversation, Reagan again reiterated to Leo that he shouldn't be confronting Caspar (who was growing stronger) while still shielding Bernie: ("You can't trade body blows with him"); Leo complimented Reagan for his tough stance: "I reckon I can still trade body blows with any man in this town. Except you, Tom"; before leaving Tom's place, Leo admitted he deserved being called a "sap" for loving Verna
• after Leo left, Tom spoke to Verna still in his bed, and told her Leo was looking for her (and had hired "Rug"), and that he had again urged Leo to break up with her: "I told him you were a tramp and he should dump you"; she threw a shoe at him and called him an SOB
• [Note: There was a tangled mess of relationships between the various characters. Bernie was living dangerously by receiving tips from his homosexual lover "Mink" Larouie, a member of Caspar's gang who was also the lover of Caspar's main hit-man Dane (a homosexual love triangle); Bernie was also the brother of Leo's mistress Verna Bernbaum - but she was only pretending to be romantically interested in the good-hearted Leo to protect her brother; simultaneously, Verna was also carrying on an affair with Tom Reagan, O'Bannon's self-confident, heartless and intelligent de facto consigliere (a heterosexual love triangle).]
• in an alleyway, a young male street urchin (Kevin Dearie) with his dog discovered "Rug" Daniels dead from a .22 gunshot wound in the chest; the boy stole his toupee-hairpiece before running off; The Evening Post reported: "Gangland Slaying - Politician's "Aide" Found Dead in Alley"

		"Gangland Slaying"
"Rug" Daniels - Found Dead in an Alleyway (with His Toupee Removed)

• as Reagan entered O'Bannon's Members' Only Shenandoah Club, fast-talking "Mink" Larouie urged him to continue having Leo vouch for Bernie (his "amigo" or lover) although he also admitted that he had a conflict of interest - he was also Eddie Dane's "sycophant" (homosexual lover-friend); in O'Bannon's upstairs office in the club, Reagan found Leo meeting with the city's Mayor Dale Levander (Richard Woods) and the Chief of Police O'Doole (Tom Toner) who were working for him; Leo was upset by "Rug's" death: "They took his hair Tommy. Jesus, that's strange. Why would they do that?", to which Tom replied comically: "Maybe it was injuns"; Leo suspected (wrongly) that Caspar's men had murdered "Rug"
• Leo was pressuring the Mayor and Chief of Police to raid his rival Caspar's clubs in the city; Reagan again strongly advised Leo: "Stirring up this hornet's nest won't be good for anyone, and it'll mean killing," but he was ignored when he proposed an easy solution to end the tensions and find peace between the warring gangs - give up Bernie Bernbaum to Caspar; Tommy walked out when Leo refused to heed his advice; Leo reacted: "Goddamn kid's just like a twist"
• downstairs in the club's ladies rest-room, Tom confronted Verna, who spitefully told him to mind his own business; to protect his boss Leo, Tom warned that Leo would "shoot himself in the foot" for her if he continued to protect her brother Bernie (she claimed that people wrongly called Bernie a "degenerate" and "scum"); she asserted her own support for Bernie: ("I'll do what I have to do to protect Bernie"); Tom pressured Verna to leave Leo alone, but she reminded them that he was also sleeping with her - he acknowledged her accusation ("I can see the angles"); they left on bad terms when he forced her to kiss him - and she punched him hard in the face
• upon his return to his apartment, Tom found Bernie seated in his living room - the scheming bookie suggested that in return for Tom ending his vendetta against him, that he would help alleviate Tom's huge gambling debts to Lazarre with a "Big Saturday payday": ("I can help you with your debts if that would make us friends"); he offered a tip on another fixed fight; Tom suspected Bernie's tips were coming from "Mink" and said he'd think about Bernie's offer
• while attempting to place another risky horse bet with his friend Adolph (Michael Jeter) on the street, Tom was detained by two of Caspar's thugs - a tall and imposing Frankie (Mike Starr) and a shorter veteran Tic-Tac (Al Mancini); he was brought in to speak to Caspar in his warehouse, and pressured to join up with Caspar's forces; the mobster sweetened his deal by writing out a check to Tom for $1,500 that would easily cover his gambling debt to Lazarre - in exchange for revealing Bernie's whereabouts; Reagan refused the deal, but said he would "think about it" - he was subsequently beaten up by Frankie and Tic-Tac, but saved when the police raided the place; outside, Chief of Police O'Doole questioned why Tom's boss O'Bannon was increasing tensions between the gangs and was unnecessarily endangering the peace: ("It ain't right all this fuss over one sheeny. Let Caspar have Bernie"), but Tom defended his boss' decisions: ("Leo will do what suits him, and you'll do what he tells ya. Last I heard, Leo was still running this town")
• during his next visit to Verna's place, Tom accused her or Bernie of murdering "Rug" (he surmised that their motive was to continue covering up her affair with Tom to deceive Leo), but she counter-accused Tom of being jealous: ("You don't like me seein' Leo 'cause you're jealous"); they made love (off-screen)
• in an iconic, dialogue-less, 5-minute beautifully choreographed sequence, there was an attempted assassination shoot-out attempt on Leo O'Bannon's life; as he was smoking and reclining in a red robe in an upstairs bedroom while listening to a 78 rpm grammophone record playing 'Danny Boy' (sung by Irish tenor Frank Patterson), he sensed trouble (smoke in the floorboards from a downstairs fire accidentally started after his cigarette-smoking bodyguard had his throat slit) as two topcoat-wearing, Tommy Gun-wielding assassins (Monte Starr and Don Picard) sent by Caspar approached up the stairs; with a handgun, he single-handedly killed one of the two men by leaping under the bed and shooting at his legs and then putting a bullet in his head, while the second man fled into the hallway; after grabbing the man's discarded machine-gun, Leo lept onto the roof and then onto the ground, and fired mercilessly at length at the second assassin in an upstairs window who violently and spastically vibrated from the barrage of bullets (a "dance of death"); his last outwitting of his attackers occurred when he shot and killed the two remaining hit-men (a driver and a third assassin) fleeing in a black car when it crashed into a tree, caught fire, and the gas tank exploded

The Attempted Assassination Shoot-Out on O'Bannon's Life in His Burning Residence (To the Tune of "Danny Boy")

• after the assassination attempt, in his Shenandoah Club office, O'Bannon was reminded by loyal mobster Tom Reagan that Caspar's attack had endangered Leo's power (with the Mayor and Police Chief) and made him look vulnerable and "shaky"; he predicted that his rival's aggression would only intensify: ("Goin' toe-to-toe with a psychopath will get ya nowhere"); he again recommended that it was foolhardy for Bernie to continue to be protected just because O'Bannon's mistress Verna was Bernie's sister; Tom suggested: "You lay back, you give Bernie up"
• O'Bannon informed Tom that he was planning on proposing marriage to Verna; to instill doubts, Tom raised the possibility that either Verna or Bernie had killed "Rug"; to further dissuade Leo from proceeding with marriage plans, Reagan admitted to his boss that "Rug" had discovered that Verna was also sleeping with him: "She was with me, the night Rug was followin' her, the night you dropped by" - he boldly confessed that he was involved in a love triangle with Verna; the admission was devastating for O'Bannon who was seething with rage; in his outer hallway, he repeatedly hit Tom and threw him down the stairs; on the main floor of the club, he continued to pummel Tom with punches, and then expelled him from the organization after throwing Tom's rumpled fedora hat at him: ("It's the kiss-off. If I never see him again, it'll be soon enough")
• Tom began to consider siding with Caspar's crime gang; in the meantime, a morose Verna arrived to tell Tom that his ploy had failed, and that Leo had ended his affair with her: "Leo says we're quits. But you know I didn't have anything to do with Rug"; they agreed that he had finally maneuvered everything to have Verna all to himself; after a fade to black interlude (love-making with Verna), Tom described a dream of chasing his hat in the woods after the wind blew it off - a metaphor of his loss of control in his life: "There's nothing more foolish than a man chasing his hat"
• with nothing keeping Tom in town, Verna attempted to persuade Tom to leave town with her and Bernie; Tom offered to warn Bernie to skip town now that Leo wasn't protecting him anymore; Verna informed Tom about Bernie's location (at the Royale Hotel, Room 302); she also mentioned their common status as double-crossers of Leo: "The two of us, we're about bad enough to deserve each other...We're a couple of heels, Tom"
• simultaneously, Caspar began to ascend to power in town and take control over the city's Mayor and Chief of Police, thus further weakening O'Bannon's operation; it was an opportune time for Reagan to be recruited into Caspar's gang ("Circumstances have changed"), although he was secretly still loyal to O'Bannon; Tom reconsidered his entry into Caspar's ranks and met with the crime boss, now that he no longer worked for O'Bannon; before bringing Tom on in full confidence, Caspar suggested to take it one step at a time: "You gotta put something on the table first, ante up"; he asked for Bernie's location, and Tom promptly passed on Bernie's location - and added that he had vague suspicions about "Mink" and Bernie working together: ("Bernie and Mink are cozy as lice. And it ain't just business") - although Dane strenuously objected
• as a further test designed to prove Tom's loyalty in switching his allegiance to Caspar, he was assigned to eliminate the double-crossing bookie Bernie; Tom, Frankie and Tic-Tac kidnapped Bernie from his hotel and drove him to the designated execution spot in the woods, Miller's Crossing - a place known for gangland slayings and burials
• before the killing, Tom was guided by Caspar's henchman Tic-Tac about how to proceed with the murder, and given specific instructions: ("Okay, take him in the woods and whack him....That's right. The boss wants you to do it. Make sure you're with the good guys. Now, you know how to do this, right? You gotta remember to put one in his brain. Your first shot puts him down, then you put one in his brain, and he's dead, then we go home")
• during the execution scene, Reagan marched crooked bookie Bernie Bernbaum far into the woods to shoot him; Bernie began to beg and soon was pleading on his knees for his life - it was a remarkable monologue: ("Tommy, you can't do this! You don't bump guys! You're not like those animals back there. It's not right, Tom! They can't make us do this. It's a wrong situation. They can't make us different people than we are. We're not muscle, Tom. I- I-I never killed anybody. I used a little information for a chisel, that's all. It's my nature, Tom! I- I-I can't help it, somebody gives me an angle, I play it. I don't deserve to die for that. Do you think I do? I'm-I'm-I'm just a grifter, Tom. I'm-I'm-I'm-I'm-I'm a nobody! But I'll tell ya what, I never crossed a friend, Tom. I never killed anybody, I never crossed a friend, nor you, I'll bet. We're not like those animals! This is not us! Th-th-this is some hop dream! It's a dream, Tommy! I'm praying to you! I can't die! I can't die out here in the woods, like a dumb animal! In the woods, LIKE A DUMB ANIMAL! Like, like a dumb animal! I can't, I can't, I CAN'T DIE OUT HERE IN THE WOODS! like a dumb animal. I can't die! I'm praying to you! Look in your heart! I'm praying to you! Look in your heart! I'm praying to you! Look in your heart! I'm praying to you! Look in your heart. I'm praying to you! Look in your heart. I'm praying to you. Look in your heart, look in your heart! You can't kill me, look in your heart")

Miller's Crossing - The Execution: Bernie's Pathetic Pleading and Groveling - "Look in your heart!"

• to fake the execution, Reagan deliberately fired his gun in a different direction toward the ground and then freed Bernie; he emphasized that Bernie must disappear forever: ("Shut up! You're dead, get me?...Shut up! You have to disappear. You have to blow for good. No one can see ya. No one can know...Go somewhere no one knows you. Anyone sees you, you really are dead. You're not my problem anymore"); as Bernie ran off, Reagan fired a second shot; Caspar's two henchmen who were closeby heard the two gunshots, but didn't personally witness the shooting and neglected to check the body afterwards
• to cause more dissension amongst Caspar's gang-members, Tom called Mink from a phone booth, told him about Bernie's execution, and urged him to hide-out for awhile since Caspar suspected that Mink was also in on Bernie's fixes (due to Tom's earlier lie); Tom added: "I'm the only one who can get ya out"; then in a second meeting with Caspar, Tom lied to him by blaming Dane and Mink - not only Bernie - for betraying Caspar and cutting into his winnings by secretly selling information; Caspar was led to believe that Tom was telling the truth about how Mink was in the fix together with Dane and Bernie, now that Mink had "taken a powder" (disappeared); Caspar divulged to Tom that since their last meeting, Dane had suggested double-crossing Tom and bumping him off after Bernie was whacked; Tom sowed more dissension in Caspar's mind by offering an accusatory theory that Dane might double-cross Caspar to protect his lover "Mink": ("There's always that wild card when, uh, love is involved"); Caspar ordered Tom to find "Mink" and check it out
• meanwhile, one of Leo's henchmen Terry McGill (Lanny Flaherty) warned Tom that Leo was no longer there to protect him with any "special favors" and recommended that Tom remain neutral in the on-going gang rivalry: "If you're on the wrong side, you take your chances like anybody else"
• a little later in Sullivan's Gym, Tom suggested to Verna that to avoid upcoming "heat", she should hide out in the "Palisades" and he would soon join her - to possibly leave town with her and Bernie; he wasn't aware that Dane - who was increasingly suspicious of Tom's loyalty as a new gang-member - was trailing him and saw that he was still "slutting around" with Verna; Dane strong-armed Verna in her apartment and revealed to her that Bernie had been killed by her boyfriend: ("the guy who put a bullet in your brother"); Verna fled out a window when Dane was attacked by two of Leo's armed bodyguards (Charles Gunning and Dave Drinkx) and easily dispatched with both of them by killing them
• while visiting with Tom in his apartment and threatening to come out of hiding, the conniving, pathetic and insufferable Bernie began to blackmail Tom and pressured him to murder Caspar, or else he would appear in public in two days time and thus implicate Tom: ("I want to watch you squirm. I want to see you sweat a little")
• later during a surprise visit to the Shenandoah Club (just before O'Doole's men raided the joint, indicating Caspar's supremacy), Tom learned from bartender Tad (Olek Krupa) that heavy bets were continuing to be placed on long-shot fighters for next Saturday's fight (for example, an unusual $2,000 bet on an undercard fighter named Sailor Reese) - an indication that someone was continuing to inform on Caspar's fixed matches
• Tom was picked up by Tic-Tac and Dane, who had misgivings and doubts about Bernie's 'execution' (since the two thugs accompanying Reagan admitted to Dane that they hadn't personally witnessed Bernie's execution); Reagan was led back to the execution site with Dane, Frankie, and Tic-Tac to verify and prove that the killing had actually taken place; during a somber walk deep into the woods, Reagan feared the worst and vomited next to a tree as Dane pulled out his gun; however, to everyone's utter surprise and Tom's relief, a decomposed corpse was located there (identified by Bernie's clothing), but the face was indistinguishable due to gunshot wounds and defacement by birds

		The Sight of 'Bernie's' Decoy Corpse
In the Woods, "Hanky Time" for Tic-Tac and Frankie - Discovery of a Smelly, Decomposed Corpse

• Tom visited the apartment of dim-witted boxer Clarence "Flop" Johnson (Mario Todisco) (aka 'The Battling Butcher Boy') in the Terminal Hotel; he was the one who had made a suspicious bet (since he rarely wagered on fights) on the second undercard Saturday night' fight at the Masonic Hall; Johnson was set to compete in the first fight against Lars Thorvald [Note: This was a veiled reference to a villainous character in Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954)]; the second under-card fight of the night was between Sailor Reese and Bunky Knudsen; Tom suspected that it was another of Caspar's fixed fights, and that Bernie was continuing to share information about the fights and take bets, but "Drop" denied ever having seen Bernie
• a major gunfight broke out between score of police and occupants of one of Leo's clubs - the Sons of Erin social club - that was raided and fire-bombed; meanwhile in a nearby downtown office, the now powerful and in-charge Caspar ("I'm runnin' things now!") was pressuring the Mayor into patronage favors; Caspar actually ordered the recalcitrant Mayor out of his own office and sat behind his desk, as Tom appeared; he presented more credible theories to Caspar about how his own henchmen Dane and "Mink" were continuing to offer bets on Caspar's fixed fights and double-cross him; Dane had presumably pretended to be concerned that Bernie was still alive, so he and Mink (in hiding) could continue to leak tips about upcoming fights; Tom suggested that ultimately, Dane wanted to 'sell out' Caspar and take his place
• on the phone, Tom heard Bernie's confession that he had secretly murdered "Mink" - his own and Dane's homosexual lover, and placed his body as a decoy at the site to cover up the deception as "insurance"; Bernie also admitted to Tom that Mink had killed "Rug" Daniels with a .22 when he got nervous about being followed when he was with Verna; Tom called Bernie's bluff, and blackmailed him into coming to his apartment at 4:00 am with $2,000 dollars to pay him in order to spare his life; otherwise, he would tell Caspar that he was still alive; as Tom left his apartment, he was confronted by Lazarre's messenger (David Darlow) and beaten up by two toughs (Robert LaBrosse and Carl Rooney) to coerce him to pay up his horse-gambling debts
• at Caspar's luxury apartment, Tom made further accusations against Dane; he cleverly and falsely claimed that Mink was still alive and in hiding, and that Mink and Dane were betraying their boss and taking advantage of fixed fights; Dane vigorously defended himself, and accused Reagan of killing Mink instead of Bernie, and then began to strangle Reagan; by this time, Tom had made enough believable and convincing counter-accusations and arguments against Dane to the suspicious Caspar; Caspar chose sides - he retaliated against Dane by hitting him twice in the head with a fireplace shovel, and then brutally shooting him in the back of the head ("Always put one in the brain!")
• the shrewd, tricky and manipulative Reagan suggested that Caspar meet up with Mink to see him for himself, and kill him when he was expected at Tom's place at 4:00 am the next morning; in reality, it was set up to have Bernie there, knowing what would inevitably happen; as Tom was returning home at around 3:30 am, he was confronted on the street by Verna with a gun who considered shooting him for the death of her brother; she changed her mind when he informed her that Bernie was still alive, but still doubted that he was telling her the truth: "That's you all over, Tom. A lie and no heart"
• as Tom entered his own Barton Arms apartment after sending Caspar's driver Sal (Michael Badalucco) away, he heard two gunshots; inside, he discovered that Bernie had already confronted Caspar and shot him to death; his bloody head dangled through the upper hallway railing; he cleverly asked for Bernie to surrender his gun ("With him dead, you and me got nothin' on each other"); Tom suggested to Bernie that they blame Caspar's murder on Dane (Bernie was obviously unaware that Dane was dead); he urged that Bernie needed to turn over his gun - to hide the incriminating weapon that had been used by Bernie to kill both Mink and Caspar

		Bernie: "Look in your heart" - Tom: "What heart?"
Caspar Found Dead, Shot by Bernie at the Top of the Stairs in Tom's Barton Arms Apartment Building

• after stealing cash out of Caspar's wallet in his pocket, the vengeful Tom was finally able to seek retribution against Bernie's blackmailing attempts against him; Tom told the surprised Bernie that Dane was already dead, and that Bernie would have to now face punishment and take the fall; this time there would be no second chances as a result of Bernie's begging and pleading: ("Tommy! Look in your heart. Look in your heart"); he couldn't be forgiven again: ("What heart?"); Reagan put a bullet in Bernie's forehead with Caspar's gun; he then arranged the murder scene to look like a shootout between the two
• Tom entered his apartment and phoned Tad with a message for Lazarre, and agreed to settle and pay off his debt (with Caspar's stolen cash); he also made a bet on the night's fixed fight with Sailor Reese
• in the film's ambiguous conclusion (a scene that echoed the early cemetery scene in The Third Man (1949)), power shifted back to Leo O'Bannon as the town's boss; at Bernie's funeral and gravesite in a woodsy area, Verna reacted coldly toward both Tom and O'Bannon and drove off without them; however, she had resumed her affair with O'Bannon and Leo announced his upcoming marriage to Verna: ("She asked me to tie the knot")

"Goodbye, Leo"

• after Tom admitted his unpredictability in "going over" to the other side, Leo commended him for the "smart play, all around" although he stated how he had been confused by it all; Leo offered forgiveness and Tom's old job back: ("I need you. Things can be the way they were...Damn it, Tom, I forgive you"), Tom spurned and rejected the offer: ("I didn't ask for that and I don't want it. Good-bye, Leo"), and sadly watched as Leo walked away; Tom pulled his hat down over his forehead and stared out from under the hat's brim as the film ended on a note of melancholy - their loyal and unrequited love for each other had ended with an emotional break-up between them