When I want to watch a movie that explores what makes people tick, I watch Sydney Lumet. Human dramas with complex, layered characters (even if he barely ever wrote the screenplays, though he did write Night Falls on Manhattan). Because he made his directorial debut in 1957 with 12 Angry Men, he could write your own ticket and Lumet’s ticket is often exposes and morality plays. In his best works, he is forcing his well-drawn, near-puritanical protagonists into a crisis at the heart of some societal institution that will push the characters and the institutions to their limits and beyond. Manhattan, from one of Lumet’s only 4 penned screenplays, is another such film.

Andy Garcia is an assistant to the, I shit you not, “the assistant to the assistant deputy istrative assistant to the District Attorney of New York County” (Ron Liebman, who I’m guessing is an NYC theater legend, is just absolutely KILLING IT in a few scenes – “Louise, I told you I don’t want this too spicy!” and plenty of Yiddish profanity). Garcia’s dad is veteran NYPD cop, Ian Holm, who is partnered with James Gandolfini. And there’s a murder trial afoot for Harlem’s biggest drug dealer who is repped by Richard Dreyfuss (and his monstrous wig). Can Garcia help IAD root out some corruption or will he compromise his idealism?

Absolutely brilliant opening that showcases Lumet’s very stagey monologues about the fast-paced rat race and pitfalls of the NYC criminal justice system. He makes being an ADA in NYC seem like the most unglamorous grunt job in America (and Garcia gets to smack around a suspect before we even stretch our legs). After that blitzing five minutes, we almost grind to a complete halt for the film’s other gear: purposeful, semi-grounded police drama as Holm and Gandolfini are on a stakeout poised to nab New Jack City himself. (Beautiful use of shadows in the squad car and even a super awesome “jump scare.”)

The film is aces in either gear and when those gears are combined in the featured trial which comes fairly early on in the film. The credit goes to Lumet’s strong writing (“Nail ‘im” and the like) and strong performances. Holm, Gandolfini, Liebman, Dreyfuss are just incredible in all their scenes and even nice ing bit parts like from Sopranos’ Junior as the judge and other cops or attorneys only having a line or two. The only real drag on the film is Lena Olin as a gold-digger, clout-chasing defense attorney that basically throws herself at Garcia as soon as he’s on the fast track to the big time. Their chemistry is not the best, and her role doesn’t really seem necessary.

But, in what’s also a bit typical of a late Lumet film, things get a bit hairy the further removed we are from the film’s heart. Garcia is basically a shoe-in for governor right around the time that Liebman has a stroke and, like a Depression-era grandma from the old country, is confined to a wheelchair covered with tattered shawls that overlooks the Hudson River Bay. The film gets preoccupied with Garcia’s rise through the ranks and his relationship with Olin, both of which are a bit too clean and expedited for my taste. (He’s proposing marriage after like 3-5 minutes of screen time together.)

When the corruption plot revs back up, the film comes alive again, and though dealing with well-trod ground, Lumet shows a depth, sincerity, and humanity to these people and the situations. It’s hard to tackle a subject that is rife with cliched representations and bump against those same cliches and come out better than the company the film is keeping, but Lumet walks that tightrope.

Whole thing feels a bit like Lumet saw Harold Becker’s City Hall and decided to one-up him, but this is a very effective crime drama.