Abel Ferrara continues to make dark, brutal, punishing movies that piss people off. Obviously, the director of Bad Lieutenant and King of New York is doing something right. The Funeral isn't up to those twin Ferrara peaks, but this Depression-era crime drama, with a script by Nicholas St. John, has some of the same jangling tension. When racketeer Johnny Tempio (Vincent Gallo) is shot down after seeing Humphrey Bogart in The Petrified Forest at a movie house, his family joins his fiancee, Helen (Gretchen Mol), to mourn at the coffin. Johnny's two brothers, Ray (Christopher Walken) and Chez (Chris Penn), search for the killer. A rival hood, Gaspare (a superb Benicio Del Toro), is the obvious suspect in a film that works hard to dodge the obvious.

Ferrara is less interested in who done it than why they done it. Flashbacks reveal the three Tempio brothers, raised in savagery by a sadistic father, in emotional conflict. Johnny wanted out of the crime game to pursue leftist politics. Ray, married to the canny Jeanette (Annabella Sciotra), hides his anger. Chez, married to the fearful Clara (Isabella Rossellini), can't control his. In a film of strong performances, Penn's is the standout. He finds the madness in Chez that is the key to Ferrara's tale of blood ties that choke off compassion and hope.

“All Along the Watchtower”

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."