Freebie And The Bean
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''Freebie and the Bean'' is a 1974 American
buddy cop Buddy cop is a film and television genre with plots involving two people of very different and conflicting personalities who are forced to work together to solve a crime and/or defeat criminals, sometimes learning from each other in the process. ...
black comedy Black comedy, also known as black humor, bleak comedy, dark comedy, dark humor, gallows humor or morbid humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally ...
action film The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as D ...
starring
James Caan James Edmund Caan ( ; March 26, 1940 – July 6, 2022) was an American actor. He came to prominence playing Sonny Corleone in ''The Godfather'' (1972), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, Academy Award an ...
and
Alan Arkin Alan Wolf Arkin (March 26, 1934 – June 29, 2023) was an American actor, filmmaker and musician. In a career spanning seven decades, he received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Tony A ...
, and directed by
Richard Rush Richard Rush (August 29, 1780 – July 30, 1859) was an American lawyer, politician and diplomat who served as the 8th United States Attorney General from 1814 to 1817 and the 8th United States Secretary of the Treasury from 1825 to 1829. He serv ...
. The film follows two police detectives who wreak havoc in
San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...
attempting to bring down an
organized crime Organized crime is a category of transnational organized crime, transnational, national, or local group of centralized enterprises run to engage in illegal activity, most commonly for profit. While organized crime is generally thought of as a f ...
boss. The film, which had been originally scripted as a serious crime drama, morphed into what is now known as the " buddy-cop" genre due to the bantering,
improvisation Improvisation, often shortened to improv, is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. The origin of the word itself is in the Latin "improvisus", which literally means un-foreseen. Improvis ...
al nature of the acting by Caan and Arkin. Reportedly, by the end of filming, both actors were confused by the purpose of the movie, not knowing that they had stumbled into a successful character formula. The film was popular enough to spawn various other successful film franchises such as, ''
Lethal Weapon ''Lethal Weapon'' is a 1987 American action film directed by Richard Donner and written by Shane Black. It stars Mel Gibson and Danny Glover alongside Gary Busey, Tom Atkins, Darlene Love, and Mitchell Ryan. In ''Lethal Weapon'', a pai ...
'', ''48 Hours'' and ''
Beverly Hills Cop ''Beverly Hills Cop'' is a 1984 American buddy cop action comedy film directed by Martin Brest, with a screenplay by Daniel Petrie Jr., and story by Danilo Bach and Daniel Petrie Jr. It stars Eddie Murphy as Axel Foley, a street-smart Det ...
''.
Loretta Swit Loretta Jane Swit (born Loretta Jane Szwed; November 4, 1937 – May 30, 2025) was an American stage and television actress. She was widely known for her character roles, especially her role as Major Margaret "Hot Lips" Houlihan on '' M*A*S*H' ...
and
Valerie Harper Valerie Kathryn Harper (August 22, 1939 – August 30, 2019) was an American actress. She began her career as a dancer on Broadway, making her debut as a replacement in the musical ''Li'l Abner''. She played Rhoda Morgenstern on ''The Mar ...
appeared in supporting roles.


Plot

Freebie and Bean are a pair of maverick detectives with the San Francisco Police Department Intelligence Squad. The volatile, gratuity-seeking Freebie is trying to get promoted to the
vice squad Vice Squad are an English punk rock band formed in 1979 in Bristol. The band was formed from two other local punk bands, The Contingent and TV Brakes. The songwriter and vocalist Beki Bondage (born Rebecca Bond) was a founding member of the b ...
to garner perks for his retirement while the neurotic and fastidious Bean has ambitions to make lieutenant. Against a backdrop of the
Super Bowl The Super Bowl is the annual History of the NFL championship, league championship game of the National Football League (NFL) of the United States. It has served as the final game of every NFL season since 1966 NFL season, 1966 (with the excep ...
weekend in San Francisco, the partners are trying to conclude a 14-month investigation, digging through garbage to gather evidence against well-connected racketeer Red Meyers, when they discover that a hit man from Detroit is after Meyers as well. After rejecting their pretext arrest of Meyers to protect him, the district attorney orders them to keep him alive until Monday. After locating and shooting the primary hit man, and distracted by Bean's suspicions that his wife is having an affair with the landscaper, they continue their investigation seeking a key witness against Meyers who can explain and corroborate the evidence. In the midst of this, they foil a second hit on Meyers by a backup team, leading to a destructive vehicle and foot pursuit through the city, after which they learn that Meyers is planning to fly to Miami before Monday. Tailing him, they receive word that their witness has been located and a warrant issued for Meyers' arrest. Unknown to them, a woman Meyers picked up at a local park is a female impersonator looking to rob him. During the arrest attempt at
Candlestick Park Candlestick Park was an outdoor stadium located in the Bayview-Hunters Point, Hunters Point area of San Francisco, California, United States. It was originally the home of Major League Baseball's San Francisco Giants, who played there from 1960 S ...
, Bean is shot by the thief, who flees with Meyers into the stadium where the Super Bowl is underway. Freebie corners the thief in a women's restroom. Despite being shot himself, he rescues a hostage and kills the thief after he nearly bests Freebie with his unexpected martial arts skills. The D.A. arrives after the shootings and tells Freebie that the warrant is canceled because the witness was assassinated on the way to the station. Freebie goes nuts and demands to be allowed to arrest Meyers, which is granted by the lieutenant in command of his squad, only to find that Meyers has died of a heart attack. Freebie is further demoralized to learn that the evidence they gathered was planted by Meyers' wife in an extra-marital conspiracy with his lieutenant. Bean is not dead after all, however, and in the ambulance the two wounded partners engage in a free-for-all when Freebie thinks Bean has been playing a joke on him, causing yet another accident.


Cast


Production


Development

The film was based on an original script by
Floyd Mutrux Floyd Mutrux (born June 25, 1941) is an American stage and film director, writer, producer, and screenwriter. Career He began his work in Hollywood as an uncredited writer for ''Two-Lane Blacktop'' (1971). His career continued with '' The C ...
, who originally intended to produce his own property. In April 1972, he sold it to Warner Bros. Mutrux maintained he had gotten offers from other studios but elected to go to Warners because he felt studio vice president
Richard Zanuck Richard Darryl Zanuck (; December 13, 1934 – July 13, 2012) was an American film producer. His 1989 film ''Driving Miss Daisy'' won the Academy Award for Best Picture. He was also instrumental in launching the career of director Steven Spielber ...
was "the straightest shooter I've ever known."Another Joanna for Johnny Carson? Haber, Joyce. Los Angeles Times 22 June 1972: g19. The comedy followed on the heels of two popular action films about the San Francisco Police, ''
Bullitt ''Bullitt'' is a 1968 American action thriller film directed by Peter Yates from a screenplay by Alan Trustman, Alan R. Trustman and Harry Kleiner and based on the 1963 crime novel ''Mute Witness'' by Robert L. Fish. It stars Steve McQueen, Ro ...
'' (1968) and ''
Dirty Harry ''Dirty Harry'' is a 1971 American action-thriller film produced and directed by Don Siegel, the first in the Dirty Harry (film series), ''Dirty Harry'' series. Clint Eastwood plays the title role, in his first appearance as San Francisco Polic ...
'' (1971), and incorporates plot elements prominent in both. James Caan later called the film "sort of ''The Odd Couple'' in a squad car, detectives, hopefully funny." Mutrux claims
Al Pacino Alfredo James Pacino ( ; ; born April 25, 1940) is an American actor. Known for his intense performances on stage and screen, Pacino is widely regarded as one of the greatest actors of all time. His career spans more than five decades, duri ...
was offered one of the leads but his agent requested $250,000 plus a percentage of the profits, so Warners went with
James Caan James Edmund Caan ( ; March 26, 1940 – July 6, 2022) was an American actor. He came to prominence playing Sonny Corleone in ''The Godfather'' (1972), for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, Academy Award an ...
. This casting happened in June. By August Richard Rush was attached to direct. Rush described the original script as about:
Two corrupt cops who ride around in a police car, quarreling with each other like an old married couple. You were never sure which one was the wife and which one was the husband. They became interchangeable. There was also the somewhat clumsy, rough skeleton of the plot concerning a criminal that they must keep alive to testify while assassins are contracted to kill him, which survived through our final film screenplay. I liked these ideas but there was nothing else there to make a movie work.
Rush says John Calley, head of Warners, told the director he could turn it into a "Dick Rush picture...He was very generous and promised the studio would be very agreeable. It was the kind of offer that you can't refuse." Mutrux left the project and Rush rewrote the script with Robert Kaufman. The director says "we wrote a new screenplay about two bickering cops that became a prototype of the buddy cop movie. I put a lot of meat on the bones, with the unstereotypical wife of Freebie tormenting him with jealousy and the comic relief of their relationship." In October,
Alan Arkin Alan Wolf Arkin (March 26, 1934 – June 29, 2023) was an American actor, filmmaker and musician. In a career spanning seven decades, he received numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Tony A ...
signed to costar with Caan. Rush says Calley, who had worked with Arkin on ''Catch-22'', warned the director that Arkin was "a director killer", but Rush insisted. Before filming, Rush worked on the script with the two stars and Kaufman in several
improvisation Improvisation, often shortened to improv, is the activity of making or doing something not planned beforehand, using whatever can be found. The origin of the word itself is in the Latin "improvisus", which literally means un-foreseen. Improvis ...
al sessions. Rush says "at my suggestion they turned what had originally been serious drama into bizarre comedy. Slowly their relationship took on the pains and pleasures of a friendship neither could live with or without." Arkin admits that it was Rush's idea to turn the film into a comedy. "I hadn't thought about it. I didn't see it in the script."


Shooting

Filming took 11 weeks in 1973. It was a difficult shoot, in part because Arkin and Caan felt their characters were being made secondary to stunts and action sequences. Arkin said his relationship with Caan "was great. There is a very exciting interaction between us. Jimmy pushes me and forces me to change...But a lot of the time we've taken a back seat to the action." There were difficulties between Rush and Arkin/Caan. Rush says "the main factor was Arkin. Caan was a copycat. He was Arkin's buddy and would do anything Arkin did...Arkin needed conflict as part of his method, and it was horribly disruptive, but it didn't show in his work." Key scenes were shot on location in San Francisco at Candlestick Park. Dealing with local authorities reportedly was difficult for the crew. The plot includes the protagonists’ repeated "totaling" of a series of their own unmarked police vehicles during three different chase-crash sequences. One sequence was filmed on an elevated portion of the since-demolished Embarcadero Freeway, ending with their police vehicle car crashing into an apartment building. After the car lands in an elderly couple's bedroom as they are watching television, Arkin's character collapses from nervous shock against the wall as Caan's character calls for a tow truck, adding that their location is “on the third floor”. The couple retains their aplomb throughout. Rush said he "shot the film partly in a Tom and Jerry style, with lots of car chases and car crashes, and the heroes are being indestructible. The audience is laughing and enjoying themselves and suddenly Freebie would drive around the corner into a marching band of kids, and just sloughed through them. The audience thought ''Wait a minute. What am I laughing at?'', and the style of the film had changed to stark realism. There was a lot of game-playing in the picture." "I never actually knew what Rush wanted," said Arkin at the end of filming. "He ushis so uncertain it's hard to handle," said Caan.


Release

Plans to distribute the film in early 1974 were shelved due to concerns about competition with Peter Hyams' similar ''
Busting ''Busting'' is a 1974 American buddy cop film, directed by Peter Hyams in his theatrical directorial debut, starring Elliott Gould and Robert Blake as police detectives of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD). The film was the main inspirati ...
''. The film opened the 1974
Chicago Film Festival The Chicago International Film Festival is an annual film festival held every fall. Founded in 1964 by Michael Kutza, it is the longest-running competitive film festival in North America. Its logo is a stark, black and white close up of the comp ...
. ''Freebie and the Bean'' was issued as a Christmas release.


Home media

The film was released on DVD in 2009 through
Warner Home Video Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment, Inc. (doing business as Warner Bros. Home Entertainment; formerly known as Warner Home Video and WCI Home Video and sometimes credited as Warner Home Entertainment) is the American home video distribution ...
's
Warner Archive The Warner Archive Collection is a home video division for releasing classic and cult films from Warner Bros.' library. It started as a manufactured-on-demand (MOD) DVD series by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment on March 23, 2009, with the int ...
label.


Reception and legacy

The film was panned by critics upon release. A.D. Murphy of ''Variety'' called it a "tasteless 'comedy' about two dumb cops breaking the law".
Peter O'Toole Peter Seamus O'Toole (; 2 August 1932 – 14 December 2013) was an English actor known for his leading roles on stage and screen. His numerous accolades include the Academy Honorary Award, a BAFTA Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and four Golde ...
agreed to be in ''
The Stunt Man ''The Stunt Man'' is a 1980 American satirical psychological black comedy film starring Peter O'Toole, Steve Railsback and Barbara Hershey, and directed by Richard Rush. The film was adapted by Lawrence B. Marcus and Rush from the 1970 nove ...
'' on the basis of Rush's work on ''Freebie and the Bean''. The film was featured in the 1995 documentary film '' The Celluloid Closet''. A 2018 article in ''Rolling Stone'' alleged that
Stanley Kubrick Stanley Kubrick (; July 26, 1928 – March 7, 1999) was an American filmmaker and photographer. Widely considered one of the greatest filmmakers of all time, Stanley Kubrick filmography, his films were nearly all adaptations of novels or sho ...
called ''Freebie and the Bean'' the best film of 1974.


Box office

The film became a substantial box office success. Through early 1976 it had earned rentals of $12.5 million in the United States and Canada. It was one of Caan's most successful movies after ''The Godfather''.


Television

A short-lived nine-episode television series based on the film and sharing its title, starring Tom Mason and
Héctor Elizondo Héctor Elizondo (born December 22, 1936) is an American character actor. He is known for playing Phillip Watters in the television series '' Chicago Hope'' (1994–2000) and Ed Alzate in the television series '' Last Man Standing'' (2011–2021 ...
in the title roles, was broadcast on CBS on Saturday nights at 9:00 PM in December 1980 and January 1981.


Accolades

Harper was nominated for the
Golden Globe The Golden Globe Awards are awards presented for excellence in both international film and television. It is an annual award ceremony held since 1944 to honor artists and professionals and their work. The ceremony is normally held every Januar ...
for New Star of the Year for playing the Hispanic wife of Alan Arkin.


See also

* List of American films of 1974


References


External links

* * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Freebie And The Bean 1974 films 1974 action comedy films 1970s action comedy-drama films 1974 black comedy films 1970s crime action films 1970s buddy comedy-drama films 1970s crime comedy-drama films 1970s buddy cop films 1970s police comedy films American action comedy-drama films American buddy comedy-drama films American crime action films American buddy cop films American crime comedy-drama films 1970s English-language films Fictional portrayals of the San Francisco Police Department Films adapted into television shows Films directed by Richard Rush Films scored by Dominic Frontiere Films set in San Francisco Films set in the San Francisco Bay Area Films shot in San Francisco American police detective films Warner Bros. films 1970s American films English-language crime action films English-language crime comedy-drama films English-language black comedy films English-language action comedy-drama films English-language buddy comedy-drama films English-language thriller films