``Narc'' Tom Cruise also fell in love! A masterpiece of social suspense

Did the police badge protect the actor?

Carnahan was originally inspired by a documentary about a police murder case and made a short film in college. This real-life case never left his mind, so he tried to turn the short into a feature-length film. This was the beginning of the production of this film. Carnahan first sent the script to Liotta, who loved it and offered to produce it. His wife at the time, filmmaker Michelle Grace, also became one of the producers, supporting Carnahan, who was unknown in Hollywood at the time.

Patrick also fell in love with the script, and accepted the role because Nick was a character he had never played before. Both he and Liotta are in a position to receive a reasonable salary if they star in a Hollywood blockbuster. However, it was clear that this was a low-budget film directed by an unknown director. Nevertheless, they accepted the role for almost nothing. That is how powerful Carnahan's script for this film was.

There were budgetary constraints for filming as well. Only one day was shot in Detroit. The rest of the film was shot in Toronto, Canada, which has a similar climate to Detroit and is less expensive. The scenes shot in Detroit include Nick and Henry going out into the streets to make inquiries. Patrick borrowed a real police badge from a security officer and actually spoke to people hanging around the street. If he didn't have a real badge, he would have been suspected and his life would have been in danger... It was a life-risking shoot, but it was this filming method that gave the film its documentary-like realism.

"Narc" (c)Photofest / Getty Images

Rails laid by T. Cruise

The film was completed, but since it was an indie production, it was inevitable that the number of theaters it would be shown in would be limited. However, an unexpected stroke of good fortune came along. Tom Cruise saw a preview and liked the film, so he approached major studio Paramount, saying that it should be released on a larger scale. Although it wasn't on the scale of a Hollywood blockbuster, it was a perfect release system for a film with a low budget of $6.5 million (for comparison, the production cost of " Minority Report, " starring Cruise, released in the same year, was $100 million), and the film ultimately made a profit from the US release alone.

Liotta, Patrick, and Cruise are all from a generation that was bombarded with 60s and 70s movies at the theater and on TV, and all have strong feelings for that era. It was inevitable that they would resonate with Carnahan, who revived the solid social suspense of that era for the modern era. When talking about this film, the most common comparison is " The French Connection " (1971). The protagonist of this film, who pursues an international drug syndicate, is not afraid to use rough tactics to investigate. It is natural to see him as Henry from "Narc."

Nick's appearance with his beard and knit cap is reminiscent of the protagonist of Sidney Lumet's masterpiece " Serpico " (1973). The protagonist of the film, played by Al Pacino, is a rookie police officer with the NYPD, Serpico, who is a serious man who believes in justice, but believes in his own way and pursues drug crimes, which ends up alienating his corrupt colleagues. This situation also has many similarities to Nick in "Narc".

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