James Hoffa, a labor leader who served as president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters throughout the 1960s, was a celebrity when he was alive. Now, he is best known forthe unsolved mysterysurrounding his death and disappearance. Any movie that tells Hoffa’s story has to come to terms with this unknown ending. In Martin Scorsese’sthree-hour 2019 epicThe Irishman,Al Pacinoplays Hoffa, andRobert De Niroplays Frank Sheeran, a close friend who betrays and kills him on behalf of the mob. That narrative is almost certainly fictionalized, thoughit is based on Sheeran’s supposed confession. However,before Pacino played Hoffa, he was portrayed by another acting giant:Jack Nicholson. Nicholson played Hoffa in a far more conventional 1992 biopic titledHoffa. ThoughHoffa’stitle is generic, and the film has been largely forgotten, it has a few distinguishing features – a rare performance from Nicholson as a fundamentally decent person, a script fromDavid Mamet,and direction from actorDanny DeVito. But perhaps what’s most interesting about the ‘90sHoffais the strange choice it makes in its own fictionalized depiction of Hoffa’s death.
The story follows Jimmy Hoffa, a prominent labor union leader whose fervent advocacy for workers’ rights catapults him to national fame. His tenure with the Teamsters Union is marked by contentious alliances with organized crime and political figures. The film delves into Hoffa’s relentless pursuit of power and justice for laborers, culminating in the enigma of his sudden disappearance and the lasting impact of his legacy.
What Part of Hoffa’s Life Does ‘Hoffa’ Focus On?
Hoffais structured asa series of flashbacks.It opens inside a parked Cadillac in the 1970s, where Hoffa sits with his friend Bobby Ciaro (played by Danny DeVito himself), waiting to meet an unnamed colleague who is ominously late. The two men are old, and Hoffa is noticeably a weakened man. From here, we flash back to the night that these two met. No date is given, but clearly we are well in the past, with 1930s-era cars. Ciaro is a truck driver, napping in his cab on a lonely road, and Hoffa is a vigorous young organizer for the Teamsters. He elbows his way into Ciaro’s truck, to try and persuade him to join the truckers union. This changes the course of Ciaro’s life.
The tension of labor organizing is that you have to convince workers to act as a unit.Workers gain power when they act together, such as by going on strike. But as individuals, they’re vulnerable to the retaliation of their bosses, especially if they’re seen as a threat to start a push to unionize.Convincing people in this position to take the first step to unionizing requires a powerful personality,and that’s what Hoffa has. When we see Hoffa next, he is singlehandedly rallying the dissatisfied drivers at Ciaro’s trucking depot into walking off the job. In the process, he gives away the fact that he has spoken to Ciaro, which costs Ciaro his job. One thing leads to another, and soon Ciaro is working as Hoffa’s bodyguard.
It’s a relationship that will last for the rest of both men’s lives. AsHoffawinds through the critical events from Hoffa’s biography, Ciaro is almost always there, playing a pivotal role.The strange thing is,“Bobby Ciaro” was not a real person.And whilereviews often described the characteras an amalgam of several real people, it’s not clear who those people are.
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Take that, ‘Goodfellas.’
‘Hoffa,’ Like ‘The Irishman,’ Depicts Hoffa Through the Eyes of a Fictional Confidante
It’s a perplexing choice to give Hoffa a fictional right-hand man, and a misleading one.The film depicts well-known events from Hoffa’s life.He rises in the ranks of the Teamsters, becoming president, and a beloved hero to the working class. He allies himself with organized crime, most notably with mobster Carl D’Allesandro (Armand Assante), another fictional character, but one who is understood to be based onAnthony Giacalone. He does battle withRobert Kennedy(Kevin Anderson), who relentlessly seeks to have him jailed for corruption, and eventually succeeds, after Hoffa is betrayed by an associate portrayed by an extremely youngJohn C. Reilly. He’s freed from jail, but at the cost of his position as Teamster president. And his attempts to get back the power he lost eventually bring him into contact with his former mob allies, who have him killed.
The film retells these events through Ciaro’s perspective, often making him the one who sets things in motion. Ciaro goes to jail with Hoffa, and is the one who brokers the deal that gets him released. Even stranger, the film puts him there on the day Hoffa is killed, as a fellow victim! This choice allows the film to keep Hoffa at a distance, making him almost a secondary character in his own biography. Nicholson gets a chanceto demonstrate what got Hoffa fired up, and he does some fun accent work bringing Hoffa’s Midwestern pugnacity to life. But he doesn’t get a chance to play him with much nuance.
Still, this choice createsan interesting parallel withThe Irishman, which also creates an ahistorical friend for Hoffa in Frank Sheeran. Sheeran, ultimately, betrays Hoffa, whereas Ciaro dies defending him. But both films use these characters to demonstrate what has become an essential fact about Hoffa – how much he was beloved by his union.Both films portray him through the adoring eyes of a subordinate, and that subordinate stands in, in a way, for the entire working class.To succeed as Hoffa did in the labor movement, in a job that relies on earning trust, you have to have an unnatural ability to win people’s hearts. Ciaro and Sheeran embody that devotion.
Is ‘Hoffa’ Worth Watching?
Overall, not much aboutHoffaworks that well. Danny DeVito is better known asa director of strange and unsettling comedies, and is unable to import his signature strangeness to this boilerplate ’90s biopic. His direction seems a bit imitative ofBrian De Palma, particularlyThe Untouchables, which was also scripted by David Mamet.
The script is, ultimately, where most of the problems lie. Mamet has an extremely recognizable style, most familiar fromthe highly quotableGlengarry Glen Ross, and his writing is noted for its idiosyncratic, testosterone-laden, rhetorical combat. Hoffa is undeniably a Mamet script —just listen to Hoffa, locked in a battle with Robert Kennedy and the McClellan Committee, warning his adversaries “don’t use words with me,” while RFK claps back “I don’t know what you’re trying to prove, but you’re proving it.” But the style here is superficial; usually, Mamet’s bombast is tied to the expression of a larger idea. But here, the characters largely lack a point of view. The movie’s take on Hoffa’s life is both broad and shallow. It simplifies the people in Hoffa’s life to “amalgams,” and in the process, strips them of complexity. There’s very little psychology motivating anyone’s decisions.
However,the subject matter of the film means that it will always have a little juice.It’s not that Hoffa’s life is necessarily that interesting, and Hoffa was criticized at the timefor sugarcoating his life. But Hoffa stood up for the labor movement, and was adored for it. It is always a little bit of a thrill to watch the working class making demands, even in a mediocre film.
Hoffais available to rent or buy on Prime Video in the U.S.
