THE UNTOUCHABLES: CAPONE RISING
By
David Levien and Brian Koppelman
115 pages

El Mayimbaso here...

HAPPY THANKS GIVING!

Since we are all stuffing ourselves this weekend con pabo I wanted to take a sec and address all my displaced East Coast Latinos out here in L.A. like yours truly. You see the biggest complaint I get from East Coast Latinos — other than how royally flat the asses are out here — is that Latin food in L.A. sucks big time. It’s a disgrace. Anyway, driving on Sunset the other day with the fellas, I stop at the light at the corner of Sunset Blvd and Gardner here in Hollywood and notice a big ass Puerto Rican flag sticking out like a sore thumb!

Que in el carajo es eso?!

Growing up in New York, you get used to seeing the flag all the time especially in June pero this is damn Hollywood we talking about! Curious as hell, I pull into the lot and discover THE FIRST EVER PUERTO RICAN RESTAURANT IN HOLLYWOOD — LA ISLA BONITA! Holy shit! You see, a crazy ass and ballsy Boricua from Brooklyn got damn tired himself of the bad Spanish food out here and opened up this spot not even two weeks ago! Being Dominican, I sat down with my entourage — also East Coast Boricuas for the ultimate Chuchifrito Pepsi challenge!

What’s the verdict?

A couple of Chuletas, Bistec Encebollado, Pollo Asado, and Arroz con Gandules later...
        ... it was like we were back at your Aunt Cuca’s Kitchen in New York!

The food was absolutely slamming! I am harsher and absolutely ruthless on the Spanish food out here than I am on bad writing so La Isla Bonita gets una bendicion from me. We were in El Cielo and I was thanking the Lord and the owner Abel Rivera for finally making the Caribbean cuisine manageable for us displaced New Yorkers in this city. So stop by and give this spot a shot. Bigger things are planned for the venue and the menu.

Tell Abel — EL MAYIMBE ME MANDO!

Now if only las nalgas out here got curvier...

Nourished with a good meal, I head back to the lair, plop down on the sofa and pick up the Untouchables Prequel script after reading in the trades that Brian DePalma is directing.

The problem is that I wish the script was as good as the meal I ate earlier.

The script is not bad but it isn’t good either. It’s okay. But I don’t blame the writer’s whatsoever. The structure is good, the beats are there.

Here is the problem. This prequel has a lot to live up to. It had Connery in his Oscar performance as Malone, it had DeNiro as Capone. Characters larger than life. Hell, even the secondary characters like Andy Garcia’s character shined.

Not only that, the script is missing...

..DAVID MAMET. The Demigod of Dialogue.

The dialogue and the characterizations are the prequels biggest flaws. The characters are flat in the prequel — nowhere near their counterparts in the future. The characterization blows. When DeNiro spoke Mamet’s dialogue, it made Capone mesmerizing. In the prequel, he is simply a thug who doesn’t say or do much. Sure he has an occasional monologue or two, but for the most part he is reduced to a typical movie heavy without any depth. None of that charisma that both Mamet and DeNiro brought to the character. That sinister charm is completely absent in the prequel.

The script is in it’s early stages but how the hell do you measure up to the poetry of David Mamet of all things?!

Art Linson, if you are reading this, get Mamet bro. Get him to do a pass. I just watched the documentaries on the special Collector’s edition dvd and it was Mamet’s script that got all those A caliber actors to bring their A game to the film.

So what is the setup?

We open with councilmen EDWIN MACY in Herald Square, NY giving a speech about how prohibition will be enforced. He goes home later and in the backyard plays with his daughter. Capone shows up in the backyard and blows away the councilman in front of his daughter. Capone goes home to his tenement and meets up with his wife Mae and his 9 year old son Sonny. Capone tells Mae that they have to move.

We super in on Chicago, 1922 and are in Colosimos as patrons hear the radio broadcast of the Dempsey-Firpo fight. A 30 year old JIMMY MALONE, who's getting drunk with his detective buddies, is celebrating Malone’s promotion to detective.

Also at Colosimos are Capone along with CHARLES FISCHETTI and some other goons.

Malone meets his love interest ELLA, who is the daughter of the mayor and bumps into Capone by accident at the Bar. They discuss the Dempsey fight which PAYS OFF later towards the end of the script.

The Dempsey fight has a lot to do with the theme of the prequel of having heart and getting back up after being knocked down. Malone’s character will get knocked down a lot.

In the first half of the prequel, Capone and Malone are friends. He is not on the take like the rest of his colleagues. Malone does a favor for Capone when Capone is at a ballgame with his son Sonny. Capone’s goons get arrested but not Capone because he is there with his kid.

When Capone goes on his rise to power, whacking everybody, a witness is left that Capone and his killer FRANKIE YALE missed. A maid HALINA. She hid in the stairwell during the assassination of JIM COLOSIMO. Malone protects the maid from the gangsters and the corrupt cops by having her hide out in his brother BRENDAN’s house.

Malone goes to plead with Capone personally for Halina’s life after Capone comes out of a brothel. Capone is an alpha male in the prequel banging call girls left and right —, perhaps how he got his syphilis. Malone wants Capone to let Halina get out of town on the next train and live. Capone owes Malone a favor. Capone agrees, or so we think.

She gets whacked on the train. Capone changed his mind.

It is the turning point for Malone’s character where he tries to fight the Capone organization by getting the Irish gangsters to go to war with Capone ultimately culminating in the climax of the movie — The St. Valentine’s Day massacre.

We get to see how Malone becomes the beat cop that Sean Connery eventually becomes.

That’s the story.

So I hope everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving. I’m off to go get my pernil.

Check back in next week when we take a look at the craziest script I read in 2006. A rock and roll biography movie based on the book about a certain heavy metal band in the 1980’s.

Can you guess which one?

HASTA EL PROXIMO CAPITULO...

…YO SOY EL MAYIMBE!