The movie Al Pacino called “an unhappy experience all around”
Al Pacino is a de facto icon of the silver screen, but he is also a man you would not want to upset. Given that many of his most iconic roles – in works like The Godfather, Scarface, and Serpico – have revolved around gritty crime stories, most often featuring the New York-born actor as hot-headed criminals, the actor has grown something of an infamous reputation. By all accounts, Pacino is a pleasant enough fellow to encounter, but most people would still make an effort to stay on the right side of the Michael Corleone actor.
Nevertheless, more than a few people have managed to make Pacino unhappy over his many years in the film industry. While his filmography features some truly groundbreaking, beloved films, the actor has also appeared in his fair share of stinkers. From box office flops like Gigli or Misconduct to misguided performances in The Son Of No One and Jack and Jill. For Pacino, though, one film in particular stands out as a troubling experience.
The career of the actor was going from strength to strength during the late 1970s, as the success of The Godfather Part II opened a vast array of doors for Pacino. Performing stand-out roles in works like Dog Day Afternoon and Bobby Deerfield. The success of these pictures led the Italian-American actor to be cast in a gritty New York crime thriller, 1980’s Cruising, directed by Academy Award-winning director William Friedkin.
Cruising follows the story of Detective Steve Burns – portrayed by Al Pacino – who is tasked with going undercover into the leather scene of the LGBTQ+ community in New York in order to catch a serial killer targeting gay men. The film was plagued with production difficulties, many of them resulting from a growing protest movement that targeted the film. The LGBTQ+ community in New York understandably felt as if the film stigmatised their existence, which was already fairly stigmatised during the ignorance of the 1980s.
The protests meant that much of the film had to be dubbed over in an attempt to cut out the sounds of protestors who had attempted to disrupt filming. Cruising also suffered major setbacks after multiple leather bars and gay-owned businesses refused to support its production. Despite the protests, Pacino maintained that the leather scene was “just a fragment of the gay community” and that he would “never want to do anything to harm the gay community.”
Of course, the film did harm the gay community, and its chaotic production also culminated in an exceedingly poor box office reception upon its eventual release. While promoting another misguided film, The Godfather Part III, in 1990, Pacino reflected on Cruising, telling Entertainment Weekly, ”If I were writing a book and it came to the Cruising page, I would have a blank,” explaining, ”Cruising was an unhappy experience all around.”
Seemingly, the final product of Friedkin’s film was not good enough to quell Pacino’s upset at the protests which had dominated the production of the film. While the film is probably not Pacino’s only regret, especially taking into account the ‘Dunkaccino’ scene from Jack and Jill, it clearly remains a source of upset for the veteran actor.
