What finally turns him around is when a nun (Frankie Thorn) is raped by two Hispanic boys, who also defile the church. Despite what happened to her, she refuses to name her attackers, and even forgives them, saying that's what Jesus would do. To Keitel, this is unthinkable. How could someone do something that heinous and still get forgiveness? And if they can get forgiveness, what does that say about him?
Keitel bares all in this movie - even literally, appearing naked in one sex scene. He and Ferrera (who co-wrote the film with Zoe Lund; she appears as a hooker) seem to be going by the dictum that you can't really understand good unless you try and understand the nature of evil. And there's no moralizing of any kind in Keitel's performance. He makes the depravity of his character as if it was a matter of course, which makes us see why the nun shakes him. In the film's most memorable scene, he yells at a statue of Jesus, wondering how dare He think Keitel is worthy of forgiveness. Ferrera went overboard on sleaze in KING OF NEW YORK, and there are times when he threatens to do so here. Still, the quest to find good is a compelling theme, and BAD LIEUTENANT manages to keep you watching even when you don't particularly want to.
RESERVOIR DOGS, by contrast, features more conventional bad guys, but is interesting in its own way. Of course, later, several people pointed out the obvious debt Tarantino's debut owed the Hong Kong crime film CITY ON FIRE, not to mention Stanley Kubrick's THE KILLING and Joseph Sargent's THE TAKING OF PELHAM 1, 2, 3. Still, Tarantino's film is entertaining in its own right.
On its surface, or course, this is like a number of crime movies. Joe (Lawrence Tierney), a raspy-voiced gangster, and his son Nice Guy Eddie (Chris Penn) put together a group of thieves for a diamond store robbery. To ensure they don't rat each other out, he gives them assigned names - Mr. White (Keitel), Mr. Blonde (Michael Madsen), Mr. Pink (Steve Buscemi), Mr. Orange (Tim Roth), Mr. Blue (Eddie Bunker), and Mr. Brown (Tarantino). Naturally, the bust goes wrong, with cops, bystanders, and even their own dying, and Mr. Orange gets a bullet in the stomach. Mr. White and Mr. Pink end up debating whether someone ratted them out, and who it might be, while Mr. Blonde tortures a cop (Kirk Baltz) to find that out, or maybe just to torture him.
