There may be no greater '90s action coming-of-age nostalgia mid-life crisis black comedy than Grosse Pointe Blank, and that is somehow not damning with faint praise. Indeed, the indelibly '90s trappings (dial up internet! car phones! shoulder pads and pant suits!) adds a second layer of nostalgia amongst the '80s callbacks; the action is sparse, in a good way, as characters take realistic damage and fight like...well, humans, not steroidal supermen hamstrung by a PG-13 rating (or, for that matter, goring it up to justify an R); the comedy is (mostly) not dated, and relies on recognizable human responses (if your high school flame deadpanned “I'm a professional killer,” wouldn't you assume he was joking?).
Grosse Pointe Blank operates from a doozy of a tagline premise: hit man Martin Blank (John Cusack) returns to the titular suburb of Detroit the weekend of his ten year high school reunion, with a job in the offing. While reconnecting with his long-ago-stood-up prom date Debi Newbury (Minnie Driver, whose improbably cool hometown job as a radio DJ delivers the pitch-perfect soundtrack of '80s classics), he circles around a rival (Dan Aykroyd), a mystery man (Benny Urquidez), two G-men (Hank Azaria and K. Todd Freeman), and a few old friends (most notably a pre-hairpiece Jeremy Piven). His secretary and Gal Friday, a hilarious Joan Cusack, teases and prods, while his therapist (Alan Arkin) despairs of ever shaking his murderous client. The screenplay by John Cusack, Tom Jankiewicz, D.V. DeVincentis and Steve Pink crackles along, balancing Breakfast Club-type high school reminisces with shoot-'em-up action and a refreshingly tart romance; George Armitage's workaday direction stays out of the way and lets the sharp ensemble carry the film.
Throughout, the sense of the world permeates, as Martin's demons evolve and resettle in his old home town. Grosse Pointe itself is an invaluable extra cast member, as the height of the Clinton years holds the decline of Detroit at bay, and the suburb reads now as the last gasp of the 20th century American Dream. When Martin sees his old buddy's BMW and cracks “In Detroit?! That's sacrilege!”, it acknowledges the town's glory days are in the past – the folks around here just haven't caught up yet. When Martin visits his old house to find it replaced by a convenience store, it's a kind of canary-in-a-coal-mine commentary on the cynical corporatism that would bloom with catastrophic results in the new millennium.
And then there's the violence. In a pre-Columbine, pre-9/11 world, the idea of an 18-year old kid disappearing on prom night and becoming a hit man seemed oddly romantic. “I'm a loaner, lone gunman...I like the image, look at the way I dress!” – Martin is a symbol of white, male American hubris (who cares about all the people he's killed, as long as he finds himself along the way), but an oddly sympathetic one, as he sees the world with a clarity lacking in those who extoll the ideals of freedom and democracy while turning away from the dirt done in their name. Martin has seen the ocean on fire in the Persian Gulf, has killed the president of Paraguay with a fork, is on his way to whack a whistleblower: he does the dirt, and when his moral compass kicks in (albeit belatedly), he bails hard, guns a-blazing because that's how he has learned to deal with things. While lacking truly tragic consequences, the moral bankruptcy on display lends a surprising poignancy to Martin's little lost boy returned home. His oft-stated maxim that “if I show up at your door, chances are you did something to bring me there” is a cop out, but at least he eventually realizes it.
Perhaps the key to it's impressive staying power is in its solid execution of a concept that was the norm back in 1997: a self-contained universe that existed within just one film. Rewatching Grosse Pointe Blank, one is struck by all the lore that is alluded to, but never explored, because it doesn't have to be to tell the story. Martin and Grocer banter about past scuffles and snafus, but not as a setup to a prequel already on the release schedule – it's just because they're old frenemies with history. A weary Dr. Oatman spools out his and Martin's backstory with a weary repetition, because in the film's world, he has argued this many times before. Most importantly, Cusack and Driver radiate chemistry and slide right back into their arrested high school courtship, while learning about each other's intervening decade along with the audience. It's not part of a continuous cinematic universe, but a snapshot into a world created just for this film. When the closing monologue plays over credits, it's not a setup for something coming soon to a theater (or device) near you: it's a capstone to a rollicking caper carried on able shoulders.
It's the kind of movie that isn't made anymore, at least not with A-list actors and a solidly mid-size budget. It's not a self-serious Message Movie, nor a dumb action romp; it is tied to it's time in a way that still resonates, rather than dating poorly. As a chronicle of just how close the rot was to the surface in the seemingly-invincible United States of the '90s, you could do worse, and you would likely not be quite as entertained. You can't go home again, but at least you can shoot it up.
