<p> THE BOTTOM LINE: Hollywood heavyweight Barry Levinson
tries a cop show. It's good, but it's still a cop show.
</p>
<p> In the besieged Metropolis of network television,
mild-mannered shows are too often expected to be Superman. Barry
Levinson, the acclaimed director of the films Diner and Rain
Man, was commissioned by NBC some time ago to develop a TV
series based on David Simon's book Homicide: A Year on the
Killing Streets, an account of real-life Baltimore homicide
detectives. With a Hollywood heavyweight taking a crack at one
of TV's most durable genres, the project seemed like a good bet.
</p>
<p> But suddenly, an enormous amount is riding on it. NBC, the
onetime kingpin of prime time, has seen its fortunes turn sour
almost overnight. Its biggest hit of the '80s, The Cosby Show,
took early retirement last spring, while several other veterans--The Golden Girls, Matlock and In the Heat of the Night--were given their unconditional release. (All were later picked
up by rivals.) The network's last remaining Top 10 hit, Cheers,
will call it quits at the end of this season; highly regarded
younger shows like Seinfeld have not lived up to ratings
expectations; and with the loss of David Letterman, even NBC's
dominance of late night seems in jeopardy. The network is
desperately in need of a miracle. Homicide: Life on the Street,
which makes its one-hour debut in the coveted time period
following the Super Bowl, will have to serve.
</p>
<p> Though set and filmed in Baltimore, the show never wanders
far from the old Hill Street Blues neighborhood. There's the
inevitable ensemble cast (fancy TV talk for lots of characters),
a jumble of story lines and a gritty street atmosphere. But
Homicide owes an equal debt to a more recent series--Fox's
reality show Cops. Like that video-verite program, Homicide pays
less attention to the crime solving (cases come and go so
quickly it's hard to keep track) than to the character and
workaday lives of the crime solvers.
</p>
<p> A strong cast--including Yaphet Kotto, Ned Beatty and
Richard Belzer--helps make the group portrait work, and
Levinson (who directed the first episode) shows off his Diner
talent for small talk tinged with satire. ("Dry wall," says one
detective, musing about leaving police work for another job.
"You put up dry wall, and you got a sense of accomplishment.")
Though the hand-held camera and jump cuts seem like
affectations, the show hums along smoothly and is refreshingly
light on violence. Detectives who grill suspects in Homicide do
it with verbal cunning, not strong-arm bullying. (Belzer to one:
"If you're gonna lie to me, lie to me with respect! Don't you
ever again lie to me like I'm Montel Williams. I'm not Montel
Williams.")
</p>
<p> In the end, however, Homicide doesn't stand out in bold
enough relief from TV's background clutter. The characters are
too pat, their conflicts too predictable. The premiere episode
revolves around a naive newcomer to the squad (Kyle Secor) who
faces, yes, resentment from the old pros, because he came from
a wimpy job on the mayor's security detail. By Episode 2 (the
following Wednesday), the show already seems to be marking time
with goofy character diversions. One detective jabbers
obsessively about finding the real killer of President Lincoln;
another gets crime-solving help from a ghost; a third, a
middle-aged divorce, turns into an imbecile when he tries to ask
a colleague for a date. Homicide does a professional job when
it stays on the case. But even then, it's no miracle worker.
