“PETER BOYLE’S BAR,” THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE (1973)



Peter Boyle's Boston Irish bar in The Friends of Eddie Coyle is a low-key, specialized place, a dimly lit oasis where the community's down-and-out, aging petty criminals, such as Eddie Coyle (Robert Mitchum), can seek refuge, wet their whistles, and bitch and moan a little about the cruel hand dealt to them by the fates. Mind you, we don't mean to imply anything by referring to it as "Peter Boyle's bar."  Boyle, who definitely works there managing the counter, does slip once in conversation with the federal agent (Richard Jordan) he deals information to and calls it his bar, and Jordan has to correct him: "You mean you work for a man who has a liquor license, right? You're a convicted felon." "Like I said," replies Boyle without missing a beat, "I work for a man who has a liquor license. I forget sometimes." Boyle must have some wicked student loans to pay off, because even with the gig at the bar and whatever he gets from Jordan, he still has to hold down a second job as a hit man. When Boyle sells out Alex Rocco and his crew of bank robbers to Jordan and the big boys think that Mitchum might have been the rat, Boyle ties everything up neat as a pin by agreeing to whack Mitchum for his treachery, and even makes sure the job will be easy to perform by plying Mitchum with free booze until he's practically ready to be poured into his coffin. Somehow we feel certain that the man who has the liquor license will understand.

And what goes together better than booze and violence, you may ask? Why, milk and ultra-violence, as we jet overseas for a little in-out, in-out with the gang at the...

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