American Gangster Ridley Scott's new movie American Gangster (honestly, how many directors can get you excited just because you see their name flash across a brand new movie trailer) is the most recent in a long line of movies and CDs with the same kinda of gangster name. You might get the impression that being called a gangsta is a badge of honor among some people (I haven't seen the Jessie James movie yet though). The movie is based on the true story of New York drug dealer Frank Lucas, played here by Denzel Washington, and the efforts of the cop Richie Roberts, played by Russell Crowe, to bring Frank's career to an end. I saw an interview with the real Frank Lucas and what he seemed proudest of was that he started out poor and ended up a millionaire (that it got him thrown in jail for a good chunk of time didn't seem to bother him all that much). The movie does present this aspect of Frank, though Washington portrays Frank in the movie as a lot smarter than you get the feeling the real Lucas actually is. The movie starts out with Frank as an aide to his boss, and then follows his rise to the top of the food chain in the drug business.
The story is told using two parallel story lines at the same time. This movie could have been split the same way that the Iwo Jima movies were split into two separate movies. In the Iwo Jima case, the first showing the American viewpoint and then the second showing the Japanese viewpoint. American Gangster is structured a lot in the same way. The movie tells two different stories till the very end of the movie when they clash together with a huge KABOOM. The two posters for American Gangster catch this perfectly, one using the image of Frank Lucas and the other using the image of Richie Roberts. Of the two stories Richie Roberts struggle to be a good cop and actually catch the bad guy (shades of Serpico) and the price he pays to be a good cop, is more interesting than his goal to bring down Frank Lucas.
  The Frank Lucas part of the movie never really comes together. On paper it probably looked and sounded great, there is no part that doesn't really function as it should. It is the weaker part of the movie, by a hair or so. There are no scenes that were poorly written. Maybe we have just seen so many variations of this type of movie before, and the little parts just feel like they are following a formula. Maybe Scott felt trapped between making a movie and being true to the source material. There wasn't anything really here on the gangster side of American Gangster, that wasn't dealt with in a deeper more satisfying fashion already in The Sopranos, in a somewhat different form. There is a scene where Frank gets up from eating dinner with his disciples and walks across the street, and then shoots a rival, walks back across and sits back down to eat as if nothing happened. The scene is suppose to shock and show how ruthless Frank is. It doesn't work that way. It seems to come out of left field and doesn't ring true.
 Also I LOVE Denzel Washington, but as I watched this, I was thinking that I have seen these same mannerisms before, in other characters that Washington has played on the big screen, and it was distracting. I was busy thinking about Washington when I should have been thinking about Frank Lucas. The mannerism seemed to spring from Washington's limited acting arsenal instead of from Frank Lucas. This is not a huge flaw. Washington has enough charisma that we will follow him anywhere, but his part of the movie never gets off the ground as it should. Also the marriage between Frank and Eva (played by Lymari Nadal) also never takes off. We never really get a feel why Frank is attracted to her.
The movie works quite well overall, and I was with American Gangster till the very end. It is well worth seeing (as long as you take the fact that this movie is based on a true story with a big grain of salt). I have never like movies that plot lines don't make sense or get to tricky for their own good, and this movie does a good job of telling it's story, despite minor flaws. American Gangster is very well thought out (as are most of Ridley Scott's movies) and the care shows up on the screen. It takes the time to set up Frank's environment. The movie is also very even-handed in showing the good and bad aspects of both cops and gangsters. How corrupt the cops/detectives actions are, is probably the most shocking part of this movie, and helps ties the two different story threads together.
Who was suppose to be watching the guys that were watching us anyway?
You can write James Harper at movielover77061@yahoo.com. |
