Robbery According to 'Coyle,' Part Two

"There's Something Going On":  On a stroll around Boston City Hall Plaza, Dillon (Peter Boyle, left) tells federal agent Dave Foley (Richard Jordan) of his suspicions about the criminals who frequent his bar.

For Part One, click here.

As in Higgins's novel, the scene in the film that immediately precedes the initial bank holdup brings together Dillon and federal agent Dave Foley. Having depicted a series of surreptitious meetings between criminals—all focused on the goal of delivering guns to a particular pair of hoods—the film now shows us an equally surreptitious encounter, staged as a stroll around Boston City Hall Plaza, between the ex-con informant (who very much remains an active criminal) and the principal cop in this cops-and-robbers tale.

Since pivotal moments of the prior activity occurred in and around his bar, Dillon has become suspicious. "There's something going on," he tells Foley. He's not sure what it is, he says, since "people are sorta avoiding me." In exchange for the names of those people—Jimmy Scalise and Eddie Coyle—Foley hands Dillon twenty bucks.[1] It's made clear that this is a meeting they have on a weekly basis. "Have a nice day," says Foley with seeming nonchalance as the two of them separate, but we can see that Dillon's suspicions have piqued his interest.

The scene adds complicating factors to the narrative mix. By bringing in a cop and revealing that Dillon is a longtime informant who's mindful of the furtive goings-on, it forecasts the coming conflicts among the various forces at work in this grubby world. More immediately, though, this quiet scene—a simple conversation, straightforwardly filmed—works as the proverbial "calm before the storm," for it's in the next scene that the specific "something" Dillon senses is in the air comes to fruition.

*   *   *

The first heist sequence—a three-segment tour-de-force lasting twelve minutes—begins with an exterior shot of the Partridge home, recognizable from the earlier scene (fig. 1).[2] Cut to an interior shot of Partridge descending the stairs, dressed for work (fig. 2); when he reaches the bottom and turns toward the dining room, his back to the camera, we see his wife and son sitting there, tense with fear (fig. 3). (Partridge's daughter is also present, but the banker's body blocks the view of her in this shot.) Partridge pauses, and an off-screen voice says, "Mr. Partridge." Stunned, Partridge turns, and there's a quick cut on his movement to a closeup of a man in a translucent plastic mask (fig. 3). The image is genuinely startling, terrifying even, because the features of the disguise are just lifelike enough to throw us off balance. The face looks human, but its rigidity and unnatural sheen give it an almost monstrous quality. Only after a second do we realize that the man is wearing a mask.[3] 

Fig. 1: The Partridge home.

Fig. 2: Partridge descends the stairs,
the camera following him.

Fig. 3: Partridge turns toward the dining room. Something is wrong. Suddenly, a voice: "Mr. Partridge."

Fig. 4: The intruder. The quick cut to this frightening image, combined with the unexpected greeting we just heard, gives the banker—and us—a jolt.

Although the mask muffles the intruder's voice, attentive viewers will recognize it as that of Jimmy Scalise, first heard when he was casing the bank during the opener. He tells Partridge that they'll be going to his bank together—"you and I and my friend." As Scalise speaks, Partridge is isolated in a similar closeup (fig. 5); this shot and that of the masked Scalise set up a shot–reverse shot pattern that will be repeated a few moments later. When Scalise says "my friend," the camera is on Partridge; the words prompt him to look toward screen left. A wider shot, reversing the earlier angle on the dining room, reveals everyone present: Mr. and Mrs. Partridge, their son and daughter, and Scalise and two accomplices (fig. 6).

The criminals are all dressed identically: in addition to the masks, they wear black knit caps, black gloves, and workman's coveralls. And they all have guns—thanks, of course, to Eddie Coyle. The accomplice closest to the window signals to someone outside, indicating that another gang member is involved. This wide shot neatly resolves the three shots that preceded it: first we saw Partridge coming down the stairs and (within the same shot) a partial view of the dining room; then we saw Scalise in closeup; then Partridge in closeup; and now comes this wide view that brings all the prior elements together, while introducing, as the final kicker, Scalise's two partners.

Fig. 5: After the closeup of Scalise comes a reverse angle on Partridge, also in closeup.

Fig. 6: A wide shot reveals all of Partridge's family—his daughter was previously unseen—as well Scalise's two accomplices on either side of the room. This shot brings all the essential pieces together.

 

With the spatial relationships fully established, Yates resorts to what film scholar David Bordwell aptly terms "analytical editing"—that is, cutting to closer views of elements within a scene after a  master shot has revealed all of those elements.[4] Scalise, again seen in closeup, lays out the ruthless conditions of his plan: one of his accomplices ("my other friend," he calls him) will remain at the house to ensure that Partridge will cooperate. If he doesn't, Scalise says, "at least one of them [Partridge's family] will be shot." As he says this, there's a cut to a medium view of Partridge's son (fig. 7).

Fig. 7: The cut to Partridge's son comes occurs as Scalise explains to Partridge what will happen
to his family if he doesn't cooperate.

Then comes another repetition of closeups—from Partridge to Scalise and back to Partridge—as the bank robber finishes his speech. "Here's your coat," says Scalise in his closeup, handing the garment toward the camera (fig. 8). Partridge receives it in his closeup (fig. 9); then, without a cut, the camera follows him as he turns toward the table behind him and circles around it, bending down and reassuring each member of his family—his son, his wife, and finally his daughter (figs. 10–12)—that everything will be all right because the men "only want the money." Scalise affirms this: "He's right. We don't get any kicks from hurting people. Nobody does anything silly, nobody gets hurt."

Fig. 8: Scalise hands Partridge his coat.

Quite starkly, this scene makes explicit those life-and-death stakes I mentioned earlier. That children are among those in danger is especially chilling, with the cut to Partridge's young son just as Scalise warns of what could happen to his family going straight for the gut. Most impressive, though, is the shot in which Partridge walks from right to left around the table, comforting each member of his family—an exemplary melding of form and content. By showing Partridge moving from an isolated closeup into what is, in effect, a series of two-shots linked by the panning and tilting camera, it reaffirms the spatial relationship between the banker and his family; but more important, with every pause of the camera as Partridge consoles a loved one, the shot gives each person under threat an individual moment and effectively drives home the urgency of the situation.

Fig. 9: Partridge takes his coat from Scalise. He will then turn to comfort each member of his family individually (figs. 10–12 below).

Fig. 10.

Fig. 11.

Fig. 12.

Next, a low-angle reverse shot puts Partridge, his wife and daughter, Scalise, and one of the other intruders into the same frame (fig. 13), reestablishing the spatial link between the criminals and their victims. It's time to head for the bank. Partridge is led outside (fig. 14) and taken into the garage, where Scalise places a black hood over his head (fig. 15). Another member of the gang—apparently the one who was signaled from the dining room window earlier—is already at the wheel of the banker's Mercedes. After Scalise forces Partridge to crouch in the back seat, the masks come off, revealing Scalise's face for the first time in the scene (fig. 16). (Though we catch only the slightest glimpse of the other two thugs' faces, neither of them appears to be Artie Van. Perhaps he's the one left behind in the house.) The car starts to back out of the driveway.

Fig. 13: A reverse angle places Partridge, his wife, and daughter in the same frame with Scalise (far left) and one of his accomplices.

Fig. 14: Partridge is led to the car.

Fig. 15: Inside the garage, Scalise blindfolds Partridge.

Fig. 16: After Partridge is forced into the back seat, the masks come off,
and Scalise's face is finally revealed.

Fig. 17: Framed by the garage door, the sedan heads for the bank.

With the garage door serving as a frame within the frame, a reverse angle on the Mercedes backing out and heading down the street ends the first segment of the sequence (fig. 17), which has lasted slightly over two minutes. Filled with mounting tension, this segment has set the stage for the much longer and even more suspenseful segment that follows.

Cut to a shot of a man in a phone booth (fig. 18). When Partridge's sedan pulls into a spot in the parking lot across the street—catching the man's attention and prompting him to close the door of the booth, turn toward the phone, and begin dialing—we immediately realize, thanks to the visual preparation provided by the movie's opener, that we're at the bank. We also realize, because of the man's reaction (not to mention his visual prominence in the shot), that he's likely another member of the bank-robbing crew. With these elements in place—the bank, the man in the booth, the car carrying the three robbers and Partridge—all within a single shot, we have the basic setup for what will follow during the next few minutes.

Fig. 18: Another member of Scalise's crew, watching from a phone booth across the street, spots Partridge's sedan pulling into the bank's parking lot.

Fig.. 19: In the car, Scalise puts on his mask again.

Inside the car, a closeup of Scalise putting on his mask and knit cap (fig. 19) is followed by a similar shot of the men in the front seat restoring their disguises. Cut back to Scalise. He has Partridge sit up and removes the black hood from his hostage's head. He directs Partridge's attention to the man in the phone booth, who is shown in a POV shot (figs. 20 & 21).

Fig. 20: Scalise points out the man in the phone booth.

In a return to the two-shot of Partridge and Scalise (as in fig. 20), the latter explains that the man in the booth is calling the gang member at the banker's home. Once he's made contact, which he'll indicate by hand signal, Partridge will enter the bank as he usually does, tell his employees what's going on, and then let the robbers in through the back door. He has exactly one minute to do so. If he delays, says Scalise with cold-blooded authority, "you know what will happen to your family, and we will leave immediately in a car you have never seen."

Fig. 21: From the car, a POV shot of the phone booth. This is followed by another two-shot of Scalise and Partridge as in fig. 20, and then by a closer shot of the man in the booth (fig. 22, below).

Fig. 22: The hand signal indicates contact with the man at Partridge's home.

After we see the hand signal in a closer view of the booth (fig. 22), it's back to the two-shot of Partridge and Scalise (see fig. 20); the latter tells the banker to leave the car. Partridge opens the door. Cut to a shot similar to the one that began this segment: the man in the phone booth is in the foreground, the car in the background (fig. 23). Although the man on the phone dominates the shot, it's Partridge's action of exiting the car, precisely matched with his opening the door in the preceding shot, that catches our eye.[5] Simultaneously, by putting the man in the booth so prominently into the frame, it reminds us that the lives of Partridge's family are at stake: if something goes wrong, this is the man who will relay the deadly order.

Fig. 23: Partridge, visible in the background of the shot, leaves the car. He begins walking toward the bank entrance, the camera panning with him.

Fig. 24: Approaching the door, Partridge glances
back at the car.

The banker begins walking toward the entrance, the camera panning with him from left to right; this movement slides the man in the booth out of the frame. Now seen from a 90-degree angle, Partridge casts a backward glance (fig. 24), which is answered by a shot of the three thugs in his car (fig. 25). The latter isn't really a POV shot—the oblique angle isn't right for that—but it serves much the same purpose: to stress how closely Partridge is being watched and, when coupled with his backward glance, his own fearful awareness of that fact. In a crucial sense, it puts us inside the banker's head: the anxiety he feels becomes our own.

Fig. 25: The robbers watch Partridge as he walks toward the entrance.

Fig. 26: From a closer distance and a different angle, Partridge continues walking, the camera following him.

Now it's back to Partridge, seen in a closer shot from a 45-degree angle as he continues walking (fig. 26); the camera pans with him until he reaches the door and rings the bell. He's now positioned with his back to the camera. As he waits, he glances toward screen left, in the direction of the car (fig. 27). This time we see the car from a more distant, perpendicular angle; this view corresponds to Partridge's sight line, making it a true POV shot (fig. 28).

Fig. 27: After ringing the doorbell, Partridge looks toward screen left.

Fig. 28: Partridge's view of the car while he stands at the door.

The next shot reverses the angle by 180 degrees to place us inside the car. Scalise's head is out of focus in the left foreground, and we see Partridge waiting at the door (fig. 29). While this isn't a POV shot since Scalise shares the frame, it does approximate his sight line and thus connects the shot to his perspective. Partridge turns to look over his left shoulder, and to recall for us once more the threat to his family, a shot from Partridge's POV shows the phone booth  (fig. 30).

Fig. 29: As Scalise watches from inside the car, the banker looks over his left shoulder.

Fig. 30: Partridge's view of the phone booth.

In the next shot, a bank employee—an older man who didn't appear in the opener (the assistant manager perhaps?)—comes to the door to let Partridge in (fig. 31). It's a new angle, a 45-degree two-shot, showing Partridge from behind (compare to fig. 27).

Fig. 31: A bank employee appears at the door to let Partridge in.

From inside the car, Scalise observes Partridge entering the bank (fig. 32). Once the door closes behind him, a focus pull brings Scalise into clearer view. Now seen in profile, he raises a stopwatch into the frame and presses the button (fig. 33).

Fig. 32: Partridge enters the bank as Scalise watches.

Fig. 33: Scalise presses a stopwatch. Note the shift in focus.

In a return to the same angle depicted in fig. 25, Scalise orders the driver to "back up so we can see the door." Cut to a slightly wider, lower-angle shot, in which the car is put in reverse and comes to a stop behind the bank (fig. 34). Next comes a view of the bank's rear entrance—the perspective shared by Scalise and his accomplices (fig. 35).

Fig. 34: The Mercedes backs up into
position behind the bank.

Fig. 35: The rear entrance of the bank.

What Yates does next is something he doesn't do at virtually any other point in the movie. It's been evident throughout this analysis that he moves the camera a lot, but the movement is almost always—with the principal exception of the shot I'm about to describe—linked to that of a vehicle or a character within the frame, as when Partridge walks from the car to the bank entrance in this scene. In moviemaking lingo, these are motivated camera movements in that they appear to follow the lead of the action on screen. In the shot that comes after the one of the bank's rear entrance, however, Yates begins with a tight view of the two men in the front seat of the Mercedes (fig. 36); then, independent of any movement within the frame, the camera pans from left to right to a close view of Scalise in the back seat (fig. 37)—an unmotivated camera movement. It's as if the camera suddenly has a mind of its own.[6]

Fig. 36: From this tight framing of the men in the front seat, the camera pans to the right to show Scalise in the back seat (fig. 37, below).

Fig. 37.

This particular movement is a small formal rupture in that it shows up relatively late (more than twenty minutes in) and nothing quite like it (with one exception) is used again.[7] However, the intent—to ramp up the tension and stress Scalise's prime role as the conductor of this holdup—is obvious. The seconds are ticking away on Scalise's stopwatch. If Partridge doesn't appear at the doorway within the allotted time, Scalise will abort the holdup, and someone at the banker's home will be killed. Yates apparently believed that a wider view showing all three criminals in the same frame, intently watching the rear entrance, wouldn't have the same dramatic impact as this tighter framing, and he was probably right. He could have used two separate shots instead—first the front seat, then the back—but the unmotivated pan works as an added emphatic gesture, even though it departs from the "form follows function" rule that governs the other camera movements in the film.[8]

The next three shots—also meant to build suspense—provide the most explicit reminder in this segment of the lives at stake. Yates cuts away from the rear of the bank to show the man in the phone booth, followed by a closeup of the man in Partridge's home holding a telephone receiver and then by a medium shot of Mrs. Partridge and the two children (figs. 38–40).

Fig. 38.

Fig. 39.

Fig. 40.

These three shots constitute a brief example of crosscutting, a cinematic device as old as D. W. Griffith. They take us away for a few seconds from the situation behind the bank to revisit the parallel situation involving the banker's family. Note that in fig. 38 the man in the booth is facing toward screen left, his back to the camera; the masked face of the thug at the Partridge home (fig. 39) is directed (more or less) toward screen right. It's almost as if the two men are facing each other—a juxtaposition that affirms their alliance—even though we know that they are several miles apart and that their only connection is a phone line. Behind the man in Partridge's home is the staircase; this tells us (based on the spatial relationships we saw in the first segment of this sequence) that he has a view of the dining room. The stone-faced gazes of Mrs. Partridge and her daughter, directed at their captor, recall how we saw them earlier and emphasize their vulnerability. It's no accident that the masked hoodlum is the only character seen in closeup—an indication of the power he holds in this situation.

After this three-shot crosscut, we return to the rear of the bank with a closeup of Scalise just as we saw him at the end of that unmotivated panning shot I described above (see fig. 37). Next comes another shot of the bank's rear entrance. After a beat, the door opens. Partridge appears in the doorway (fig. 41). Scalise, again in closeup, raises his chin in recognition (fig. 42).

Fig. 41: Partridge opens the door for the gang.

Fig. 42: Scalise spots Partridge.

A reverse angle puts us just inside the bank, looking over Partridge's shoulder and through the doorway out onto the parking lot. As Partridge backs out of the frame, the Mercedes screeches into a spot next to the door (fig. 43), and the three gang members pile out. The panning camera follows them as they rush into the bank, hustling Partridge along as they head down a small hallway (fig. 44).

Fig. 43: The Mercedes screeches up to the doorway just outside the bank.

Fig. 44: The robbers rush in, hustling Partridge through a hallway.

The robbery has begun in earnest. What comes next is the most complex orchestration of shots in the entire film, which I'll examine in Part Three. Before I get to that, however, a couple of reflections on what we've just seen are in order.

*   *   *

Whereas analytical editing is the key structuring device in the first segment of this sequence, POV shots dominate the moments outside the bank. Of course, analytical editing is still involved, in that the master shot beginning the segment (see fig. 18) is followed by shots that subdivide the space in various ways. But more often than not, this subdivision takes the form of intercutting shots of characters looking at something with shots of what they see. I noted in Part One how this technique is used in the opener to dramatize the way in which Scalise and Artie Van track the movements of Partridge and the activity around the bank. There, the "subjective treatment" (to quote Hitchcock again) creates an air of intrigue about the purpose of their surveillance. By the end of that sequence, even if we don't know the how and when yet, we've pieced together the what—an imminent robbery—by seeing through their eyes, as it were, the things the two men are monitoring so closely: Partridge's routines, the bank, the security cameras, and so on.

In this, the actual heist scene, however, the technique is used as Hitchcock most often used it: to heighten suspense by putting us in the shoes of a person in danger. This time Partridge is aware that he's being watched by Scalise and his accomplices, who have given him an ultimatum to let them into the bank within one minute. Though he tries his best to keep his cool, the worry on his face is plainly evident. His backward and sideways glances at the car, followed by shots of the men in that car watching him, further translate his fear and anxiety into external, visual terms. The same goes for the POV shots involving the man in the phone booth.

Once Partridge enters the bank, the subjective treatment shifts to the robbers, especially Scalise, as they watch the back door, waiting for Partridge to let them in. Although their masked faces deny us any visual clue about their emotions, it's safe to assume that they're almost as edgy as Partridge is. They've planned this job well, but they know that their own lives are at risk should anything go awry. The film doesn't invite any sympathy for them, of course—the crosscut to Partridge's home while they wait for the door to open makes clear who we're meant to root for—but, perverse as it sounds, we want them to succeed with the robbery so that innocent lives will be spared. Remember Scalise's words: "Nobody does anything silly, nobody gets hurt."

It goes without saying that Yates has raised the emotional tension to a high level by this point. The trick is to sustain it through the rest of the scene.


NOTES
[1] Artie Van is not one of the names Dillon gives Foley, but Foley does mention him earlier in this conversation. In a later scene, after the robberies begin, Foley reveals that he's aware of Artie and Scalise's past association and the possibility that they might both be involved. A side note: for those who may be surprised at how cheaply Dillon sells his services, be aware that $20 in 1973 had the purchasing power of about $120 today.
[2] All the scenes in The Friends of Eddie Coyle were shot on location. This shooting method had its disadvantages in that the weather changes—from sunny to gloomy—with unnatural rapidity in a number of  scenes, this one included. It's sunny in the Partridge's neighborhood but overcast, with rain-soaked pavement, when Partridge and the gang arrive at the bank. Similar continuity disruptions occur in the scene analyzed in Part One of this piece. Given the suspense these sequences generate, however, few viewers are likely to notice.
[3] It is in fact a Clark Gable mask: note the bushy eyebrows and mustache in fig. 4. In the book, for all of the heists, the robbers use nylon stockings to disguise themselves; their features are "frighteningly distorted," Higgins writes (p. 42). In contrast, with each robbery scene in the movie, different masks are used: rubber masks in the second holdup scene and ski masks in the third. I suspect Yates did this for no other reason than to add some visual variety.
[4] For a video crash course in Professor Bordwell's teachings on film editing, click here. Bordwell distinguishes analytical editing from constructive editing, which dispenses with the establishing shot and, says Bordwell, builds "the screen space" entirely out of closer views. (The early Soviet filmmakers, with their montage experiments, were among the key pioneers in this form of editing. The French director Robert Bresson was a later master.) This scene begins in the constructive mode but quickly reverts to analytical mode once the establishing shot appears (see fig. 6).
[5] Patricia Jaffe's timing of the cuts cannot be overpraised.
[6] I've always found the term "unmotivated camera movement" misleading in that there is obviously directorial motivation behind such movements—often the desire to underscore the emotional content of a shot or scene (the apparent intent here).
[7] I was able to detect only four other unmotivated movements in the film. One occurs when Jackie Brown is meeting in a riverside park with another of his gun-purchasing clients. As the two of them converse, the camera moves in slightly for a tighter framing. It's almost imperceptible. The second unmotivated movement, the one that's most similar to the shot I'm describing here, happens during a subsequent heist; in this instance the camera pans across the line of teller's windows to show the hostages waiting anxiously as the gang goes about its work. The third unmotivated movement occurs near the end, when the camera tilts upward from a view of a commuter train roaring through the frame to a view of Dillon standing on an overpass above the tracks. Here the intense right-to-left motion of the train distracts us so that the tilt doesn't quite register as an unmotivated movement. Finally, as the film draws to a close, Eddie attends a hockey match with Dillon, a scene that was shot at an actual game. To catch the flavor of the event, documentary-style, Yates includes a number of random shots of the spectators, one of which is a whip pan executed with a handheld camera. Here, the energy of the crowd combines with the swiftness of the pan to make it seem more like a motivated camera movement.
[8] Yates and cinematographer Victor Kemper occasionally employ the zoom lens, but the zooms are always incorporated within panning shots, thus disguising their inherent artificiality. That's a good thing, in my opinion, considering how often zoom shots were overused during this period of Hollywood filmmaking, typically as optical exclamation points.

For Part Three, click here . . .