Alan Drew's "The Recruit," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Recruit: A Novel by Alan Drew.

The entry begins:

The Recruit is a character-driven thriller set in 1987 Southern California, when growing white supremacist movement begins using the fledging internet to spread hate across the nation, plan attacks, and recruit young men. In Rancho Santa Elena, a master-planned exurb of Los Angeles, Jacob Clay, a troubled fifteen-year-old kid, is indoctrinated into the terror network and attacks the Vietnamese refugee community. Ben Wade’s got to stop the boy and the network while challenging his own racism and the racism in his community. Also, there’s a snowmobile chase, a plane crash, a big fire, gun shots fired, among other things. Even though the book is set in 1987, it speaks to much that is happening today, including conspiracy theories and the attack on the January 6 attack on the Capitol.

If we could go back in time and make a film out of The Recruit in, say, the mid to late 90’s, I would want Chris Cooper to play Ben Wade. Ben can play the tough guy cop, but he’s carrying around a very painful past which makes him emotionally vulnerable—something he works hard to hide. I think about Cooper’s role in John Sayles’s Lone Star. As an actor, he seems capable of exuding a tough exterior that hides a deep well of emotion and intelligence, which would work perfectly for Ben Wade.

I could see another Cooper work for Ben, too:...[read on]

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--Marshal Zeringue