Experimental in form, City of Hope views like a feature-length episode of L A Law with a touch of Twin Peaks thrown in. Director John Sayles' fascinating, some would say ambitious, study of corruption and community in a fictitious East Coast city has as many plot threads and characters as Hill Street Blues. Is it cinema or is it television? Well the answer is clearly the former whose rich camera style, with the action bouncing from one group of characters to another, literally turning on its heel to follow a new set of people, makes this superior fare. Good performances, too, especially from Vincent Spano, who is superbly feckless in the lead, and Barbara Williams as an former classmate.


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