Review: American Gangster: Who Doesn't Love a Drug Dealer?

As suggested by the title of the movie about him, Frank Lucas was the most American of gangsters. A poor black kid from North Carolina, he worked his way to the top of the New York City drug world in the early 1970s all by himself, taking full, perverse advantage of the American ideals of self-reliance and capitalism. Like the figures in The Godfather -- a movie that was popular when Lucas was making it big and a film which American Gangster resembles in many ways -- Lucas was living the American dream.Directed with dazzling energy by Ridley Scott, American Gangster stars Denzel Washington as Lucas and Russell Crowe as Richie Roberts, the Brooklyn narcotics officer striving to bring him down. They do not meet until well into the lengthy (but not overlong) film, and for much of the time Roberts doesn't know that it's Lucas, specifically, that he's after. So Scott, with a screenplay by Steven Zaillian (Gangs of New York), has plenty of time to establish the alpha males' characters separately. They're both so vivid that if it weren't for the title, you wouldn't be able to say that either man was the "main" character.

Lucas and Roberts have stories that run sometimes parallel, sometimes perpendicular. Lucas is a cold-blooded killer, a ruthless businessman, and an unrepentant peddler of heroin to a generation of junkies. He's also, however, a family man, faithful to his beautiful wife Eva (Lymari Nadal) and kind to his mother (Ruby Dee). The first thing he does when he gets rich is to move everyone up from North Carolina and give them a mansion to live in. It's no accident that the Thanksgiving scene at Lucas' house looks exactly like the Norman Rockwell painting.

Roberts, meanwhile, is perhaps the last honest cop left in an increasingly crooked police force. He is ethical to the letter, an unwavering and dogmatic defender of the law. He is also, however, a divorced father with a penchant for womanizing and some lowlife friends left over from his childhood.

When we first meet Lucas, he is the driver for renowned Harlem gangster and Robin Hood figure Bumpy Johnson. Upon Bumpy's death, Lucas appoints himself his successor and quickly finds a way to make inroads into the heroin marketplace. The way it's been working is that the crooked cops make drug busts, keep the heroin, dilute it with baby powder, then sell it back to the dealers to put on the streets. Lucas circumvents that by having bribe-receptive servicemen smuggle pure, unfiltered heroin back from Vietnam, which he can sell at a lower price than his competitors -- and it's better stuff, too. He even gives it a brand name, Blue Magic, and gets angry when one of his sellers waters it down but keeps the name. He wants the Blue Magic label to MEAN something, dammit!

Lucas' system puts him at odds with more or less everyone. The bad cops are angry because they've been cut out of the loop. The Italian crime families are upset that someone has become a success without being part of their organization. The other dealers don't appreciate Lucas creating a de facto monopoly in the heroin industry. No one has ever made it this big before without the backing of a syndicate. It's like a mom-and-pop store suddenly overwhelming Wal-Mart.

The situation is so unusual that it's a while before Roberts and his team figure out that Lucas isn't working for anyone; he's the big fish they're after. But establishing a case against him isn't easy even after Lucas is identified as the target. His operation is impeccable. Business students should study him.

Lucas and Roberts are both richly portrayed in performances that are big and dynamic without going over the top. Washington gives Lucas calm but fierce menace, always sharply dressed and elegantly mannered, his smile belying the fact that he is capable of the rankest evil. Crowe, meanwhile, remains doggedly affixed to his task, increasingly disheveled in appearance as Roberts gradually comes to terms with his disastrous personal life. Both men come across as likable, flawed heroes, which is a bit alarming, considering one of them is a murdering drug dealer.

Late in the film there's a raid on a drug-processing lab that is cringe-inducingly graphic, full of gunshot wounds, nudity, and clouds of heroin floating in the air. It's a perfect storm of adult content that serves to remind us of us just how sordid the whole thing is -- you know, just in case we were getting too caught up in the entertainment value of such a crackling good story about two such fascinating men.

As I mentioned at the top, there are shades of The Godfather in Scott's approach to the material, including a climax that parallels the baptism scene. The film is based on a true story, though it's unlikely that things really happened quite as dramatically as they do here. It makes you stop and reflect a minute. We Americans do revere our gangsters, don't we? What's up with that?

Source: www.cinema-pedia.com

Review: Gangster Familiar but Solid

So perhaps "American Gangster," Ridley Scott's much-anticipated mobster epic, doesn't have a single original idea in its head, with its unshakable shades of "Scarface" and "Serpico" and "Superfly." And maybe it's a half-hour too long this time of year, what film with awards ambitions isn't?

But it's exceptionally crafted and superbly acted, with the on-screen combo of Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe unsurprisingly proving impossible to resist, even though it takes about two hours for their paths to cross.

That's one of the more compelling elements of the film, written by veteran Steven Zaillian ("Schindler's List") and based on a New York magazine article by Mark Jacobson. Washington, as real-life heroin kingpin Frank Lucas, and Crowe, as detective Richie Roberts, are on a collision course with one another that's bursting with the gritty period atmosphere of 1970s Harlem.

(Cinematographer Harris Savides, who has provided dreamlike imagery in the Gus Van Sant films "Gerry," "Elephant" and "Last Days," here creates the faded, intimate look of a movie that truly could have been made 35 years ago, adding to its authenticity.)

Washington simply radiates as Frank, returning comfortably to the charismatic bad-guy territory that earned him an Academy Award in "Training Day." And Crowe, who earlier this year was the one playing the stylish villain you love to root for in the remake of "3:10 to Yuma," is just as powerful as the bulldog on the right side of the law. (Crowe's third teaming with Scott, following his Oscar-winning turn in "Gladiator" and the romantic comedy "A Good Year," further demonstrates the extremes of his versatility.)

That their characters' personalities are such complete opposites may be a bit too obvious, as is the fact that they clearly share a rigid moral code. Both men inhabit their roles so fully, though, they make such shortcomings easy to overlook.

After toiling loyally for years as the driver to distinguished gang lord Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson, Frank steps in and takes over the neighborhood after the old man's death. A North Carolina native, he is nattily attired and exceedingly polite, even as he shoots a rival in the head on the sidewalk in broad daylight, but he's also given to flashes of rage in the face of impropriety. That personalized sense of right and wrong, coupled with his Southern-boy charm, serve him well as he builds his own unique empire.

Tired of relying on Mafia middle men to help him import the drugs he will eventually sell on the street, he just flies to Thailand and finds a way to bring back the heroin on his own. He then cuts it twice as strong for half the price, names it Blue Magic and earns both a rabid following and the envy of his competition. That includes the corrupt New York cops who are accustomed to taking their slice of the pie, led by a swaggering, perfectly cast Josh Brolin. (Not everyone could wear that mustache and get away with it.)

That he's made himself a millionaire through the destruction of his own people, urban blacks, doesn't seem to faze Frank. He becomes a fixture on the nightlife circuit with his effortless smile. He buys a mansion for his mother (the formidable Ruby Dee), employs his brothers and marries a former Miss Puerto Rico (the luscious Lymari Nadal). But Scott doesn't let him off the hook he's unflinching in showing us the squalor, the decay, the death that result from Frank's business acumen.

At the same time, Richie can't seem to do anything right. He finds sacks full of money stashed in the trunk of a car clearly another cop's ill-gotten gains and turns them in, knowing that doing so will make him a pariah among his peers. He focuses intensely on his job as a narcotics detective and ends up driving away his ex-wife and young son.

But he works relentlessly, hungrily, and this is a trait that will serve him well even before he realizes he's looking for Frank. All he knows at first is that his partner has died of an overdose, and he's curious about the source of the drugs. And he begins asking around about this mysterious community leader in Harlem, this Robin Hood in a fur coat. (Richie's eventual pairing with Frank at the film's conclusion happens so quickly, it almost feels tacked on, and it seems especially jarring given the elaborate buildup that preceded it.)

Reveling in wretched excess is, of course, one of the main points of a film like "American Gangster" the clothes, the homes, the naked women cutting up mounds of powder surrounded by stacks of cash but so is the down-and-dirty thrill of the hunt. Scott steadily propels both men's stories toward one another until the tantalizing moment when they finally meet. Then all falls silent and still. It's a breathtaking scene but it's also one of the few you're likely to remember in a film that can otherwise be so derivative.

"American Gangster," a Universal Pictures release, is rated R for violence, pervasive drug content and language, nudity and sexuality. Running time: 157 minutes. Three stars out of four.

Source: www.cinema-pedia.com