"Cop"

"Cop wot," my sister says. She is handing me a glass of water. "Huh?" She points out that "cop" means "take," and that she is instructing me to take the glass of water ("wot.") Having just watched the spectacular acting of Al Pacino and the lovely Kitty Wynn in The Panic in Needle Park, I associate the use of "cop" with 1970s junkies who resent having to go all the way up to Harlem to "cop." Her other favorite habit is repeatedly to ask, "Who you tekkin', kid, who you tekkin?" whenever I am sending someone a text message. There is little doubt in my mind that this is some sort of gateway to terrible slang-related decisions, like using "jive" as a verb. (I'm ok with it as a noun, though, or whenever it precedes "turkey" - is that adjectival?)



Incidentally, the movie is really impressive and was co-written by Joan Didion and her late husband John Donne. The movie has no soundtrack and most reviews of it use words like "grim," and "stark," which are certainly apt. And certainly more refreshing than hammy stuff like "Requiem for a Dream," in that I don't think there is a latent sermonizer hiding behind the camera. The final scene, a jittery, long shot featuring Wynn waiting for Pacino's release from prison, conveys all the desperate claustrophobia of their condition, their young and beautiful energy totally dissipated, good intentions evaporating into death and disease. She turned him in to keep from doing time. We surmise that she has prostituted herself, again, while he was in prison, in order to feed her habit. When Pacino is released, he walks out fuming, shot out of a cannon. He pointedly walks away from her, and the camera stays a few steps ahead of him. We see her looking dejectedly after him, and she breaks into a slow jog, calling out his name. The dynamic holds for several seconds, seemingly interminable. You wonder if they have finally been torn apart by the depths of their own addictions. He finally stops walking, and gives her a furious look as she catches up with him. "Well?" he shouts. Cut. Credits roll.