Weary of his beat, a cop takes his fight against drugs into the schools

By Rebecca Caldwell

The Life Sunday, 9p.m., CTV

Not to be confused with The Simple Life, The Life isn't about the people living on easy street, but rather, the hardest streets in Canada. Executive producer and co-writer Chris Haddock draws on his Da Vinci's Inquest credo to tell the story of two beat cops Arnie (Bruce Greenwood) and Tony (Brian Markinson) who grew up in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside only to watch it decay into the "poorest postal code" in the country.

Night after day after night of trying to win the war on drugs is beginning to take its toll on Arnie. "As long as there's been a drug trade, I've followed the conventional wisdom of the drug war: arrest the dealers, chase the addicts, pretend it's getting better," he remarks on one shift. "It's not. There's a 24-hour-a-day drug scene down here. The list of casualties is getting longer and younger, and we're lying to ourselves about it."

Tired of making visits to high schools where the students they are hoping to protect mock them for their earnestness, Arnie and Tony persuade addict and parttime prostitute Crystal (a twitchily convincing Alisen Down) to visit a classroom and tell her story. The gimmick works. The kids are horrified that someone not much older than they are has become such a strungout mess in such a short period of time. Inspired by Crystal's success with the students, Arnie decides to document other addicts on film to show at schools. "You want to make a horror movie?" his partner askes him.

Takedown: Bruce Greenwood (left) and Brian Markinson) employ the physical approach on a suspect.

And Tony's right, because these lives aren't the stuff of After-School Specials, Hollywood or even Irvine Welsh, but the intense, sobering realities of addiction from contracting a whole alphabet of hepatitis and HIV down to the rotting teeth heroin brings along with its highs.

Occasionally The Life comes close to Nancy Reagan-era anti-drug ad territory. But director Lynne Stopkewich (Kissed, Bliss) infuses the film with a stylized, highly effective detachment, coaxing out subtle, understated performances from her two leads. The result presents the story as if it were a documentary, instead of asking viewers to pass judgment.

This is a very democratic film in other ways: as pro-police as a Christie Blatchford column, portraying the beat cops as calm, decent guys, concerned about the welfare of the regulars they run into night after night. At the same time, The Life is also sympathetic to those who call the street their home: Amber, the teen runaway whose parents (Nicholas Campbell, Karin Conoval) are desperate to rescue her from her vicious pimp Vic; Ed, who abandoned his family and job as a school teacher for crack; and Rose, the addict who makes it off the streets.

Like Arnie's videos, The Life can be tough viewing. When someone comments to Arnie about his first tape of Crystal, "It's hard to watch. It's too heavy," his reply is simple. "Yeah, well, it's supposed to be heavy," he says. "It has to disturb people." And The Life will.

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