Brad Pitt will star for director Andrew Dominik in a film version of George V. Higgins' super novel, "Cogan's Trade." That's got to be good news of some kind for Higgins fans. During my first professional job in journalism, at Boston magazine, I had the pleasure to interview and once or twice edit Higgins, the lawyer turned fiction-writer whose debut book, "The Friends of Eddie Coyle," is a perfect novel about imperfect crimes. Like Hammett in his day, Higgins (who died in 1999) brought American writing closer to crime as Americans actually lived it in the streets -- meaning, in Higgins' case, the saloons, dives and alleyways of Boston. He also transformed the art of hardboiled storytelling, developing plot and character almost entirely through dialogue. Higgins fans would go around for weeks repeating lines like, "This life's hard...but it's harder if you're stupid."
"Cogan's Trade" (which I reviewed for the Boston Phoenix in 1974) is Higgins at his pinnacle. It's the taut, mordant tale of an enforcer bent on restoring gangland equilibrium after the stick-up of a high-stakes card game that was supposed to be shielded by the Mob. A movie version would at least bring the book back into print. And Pitt has shown the acting chops to play a member of Higgins' Beantown rogue's gallery. My fear is that director Andrew Dominik will art it up and ruin it the way he did Ron Hansen's "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford." (That's Pitt as James, above). But even a failed film of "Cogan's Trade" could be worthwhile if it sparks a Higgins print revival.
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