L.A. Confidential (1997)

Ron Rifkin: D.A. Ellis Loew

Photos 

Quotes 

• [White approaches Loew in the bathroom after he refused to answer Exley's questions] 

  Ellis Loew : Unless you came here to wipe my ass, I believe we're through.

  [White looks at him, silently] 

  Ellis Loew : Come on, don't try that "Good Cop-Bad Cop" crap. I practically invented it. So what if some homo actor is dead, huh? Boys, girls, ten of them step off the bus to L.A. every day...

  [White smashes Loew's head into the mirror and then sticks it into the toilet] 

  Ellis Loew : Pull him off me, Exley!

  Ed Exley : I don't know how.

  Bud White : Now, I know you think you're the A-number one hotshot. But here's the juice: if I take you out, there'll be ten more lawyers to take your place tomorrow. They just won't come on the bus, that's all!

  [White drags Loew into his office and dangles him out of the window by his legs until he confesses] 

  Ed Exley : Was that how you used to run the "Good Cop-Bad Cop"?

• [as Exley explains the mystery, while the Chief, Lowe and several Department officials watch through the two-way mirror] 

  LAPD Official : Christ, it'll stain the Department for years.

  Police Chief : Decades.

  Ellis Loew : If we can get the kid to play ball, who's to say what really happened? Maybe Dudley Smith died a hero.

  [the interrogator leaves the room and shuts the door. Alone in the room, Exley smiles] 

  Police Chief : [through intercom]  You want to tell me what you're smiling about?

  Ed Exley : A hero.

  LAPD Official : How could he know what we were saying?

  Police Chief : [through intercom]  And?

  Ed Exley : In a situation like this, you're going to need more than one.

• Ed Exley : During our investigation of events surrounding the Nite Owl case, Jack Vincennes, Bud White, and I learned the following.

  Ellis Loew : Your golden boy's throwing his whole life away.

  Ed Exley : The three Nite Owl suspects, while guilty of kidnapping and rape, were innocent of the multiple homicides at the Nite Owl. The actual gunmen were most likely Los Angeles Police Department officers Michael Breuning and William Carlisle, and a third man who may or may not have been Captain Dudley Smith. The objective: the elimination of another police officer, Richard Stensland, who, along with former LAPD officer Leland "Buzz" Meeks, also committed multiple homicides on behalf of Captain Smith and then betrayed him over twenty-five pounds of heroin, the retrieval of which was the ultimate motivation behind the Nite Owl killings. Beginning with the incarceration of Mickey Cohen, Captain Smith has been assuming control of organized crime in the city of Los Angeles. This includes the assassinations of an unknown number of Mickey Cohen lieutenants, the systematic blackmail of city officials, and the murders of Susan Lefferts, Pierce Patchett, Sid Hudgens, and Sergeant Jack Vincennes. Captain Smith admitted as much to me before I shot him at the Victory Motel.

• Ed Exley : I want D.A. bureau men to tail Dudley Smith and Pierce Patchett 24 hours a day. I want you to get a judge to authorize wiretaps on their home phones, and I want authorization to check their bank records.

  Ellis Loew : On what evidence?

  Bud White : Call it a hunch.