CRUISING
1980,
Warner Bros.,
106 min,
USA,
Dir: William Friedkin
A bleakly chilling emotional travelogue of desperation, loneliness and spiritual hunger, CRUISING stars Al Pacino as a naïve undercover cop who descends into the leather-bar underworld of New York’s gay S&M scene. Widely condemned and misinterpreted on its release, CRUISING emerges today as one of Friedkin’s major works - it succeeds as a police procedural, horror film (there are scenes every bit as terrifying as THE EXORCIST), and saga of one seemingly "decent" man’s inability to face the truth about himself. Featuring a terrific score by composer Jack Nitzsche, with songs by The Germs.