“One cannot be betrayed if one has no people.”
The usual suspects are five felons: Dean Keaton (Gabriel Byrne), a former cop-turned-crook with a cool head; Michael McManus (Stephen Baldwin), a loose cannon pointman; Fred Fenster (Benicio del Toro), McManus’ flamboyant wingman; Todd Hockney (Kevin Pollak), a weapons expert; and Verbal Kint (Kevin Spacey), a weak-willed, gimpy con man.
After a short peek at its drug-deal-gone-awry climax, The Usual Suspects opens with these five petty criminals being chaperoned into a police lineup on the suspicion that one of them was involved in the recent hijacking of a weapons shipment. None of them crack as they humorously mock the detectives, but as they stew in a cell together, ruminating on their unfair treatment at the hands of the NYPD, McManus suggests a retributive jewel heist, launching a briefly lucrative collaboration that escalates into an explosive finale on a boat off the coast of LA.
Only two people survive the massacre: Verbal Kint and a severely burned Hungarian mobster (Morgan Hunter). The former is brought in by the LAPD to face a barrage of questions from cocksure U.S. Customs agent Dave Kujan (Chazz Palminteri), while the latter is taken to a hospital where a visit from FBI agent Jack Baer (Giancarlo Esposito) leads to mention of Keyser Söze—a nigh mythical drug lord of uncertain origin.
I got a guy trying to walk out of a hospital on a fried drumstick because he’s afraid of Söze. Yeah, I’ll run it up the flagpole.
Christopher McQuarrie’s manipulative, logically dubious, and ultimately hollow screenplay alternates between these two timelines, with the immunity-protected Kint looking back and relaying his memories of events under pressure from Kujan, while Baer and sergeant Rabin (Dan Hedaya) frantically try to reconcile his story with the Hungarian’s delirious ramblings. Because we know that Kint is a con man by trade, we never quite trust his account. But like agent Kujan we cannot totally dismiss it either. As Kint talks about singing in barbershop quartets in Skokie, Illinois, picking coffee beans in Guatemala, dealing with an enigmatic lawyer named Kobayashi (Pete Postlethwaite), and ultimately getting blackmailed into pulling off the shakedown on the cargo ship, the stakes are continually raised even as the convoluted yarn’s veracity remains uncertain.
Like Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, The Usual Suspects demonstrates that intelligent narrative construction, inspired casting, and creative direction can can outstrip big-budget pyrotechnics and expansive sets. And yes, I think it’s perfectly acceptable to admit that the story’s contrivances are utterly ridiculous and severely dampen audience engagement on subsequent viewings, while acknowledging that the film presents itself with enough chutzpah and layers of deception so as to gloss over its shortcomings and work its mesmerizing effect regardless. Indeed, the introduction of massive plot holes aside, its late revelation is the kind of thing great communal movie watching experiences are made of, and it’s immensely satisfying to watch with an unwitting friend or two. That final twist, which rivals the rug pulls in The Prestige and Shutter Island, has left first-time viewers floored every time I’ve seen it. The joyous frisson of that initial experience only works the one time, and there’s little that resonates once the artifice is revealed, but the outlandish personas, hardboiled banter, solid action, smart editing, and stylish direction sustain the repeat viewer.