Denzel Washington, returning to "bad guy" mode for the first time since his Oscar winning performance in Training Day is Frank Lucas, the driver/understudy of a black crime boss who rules Harlem. When his boss dies, Lucas takes over the empire and expands it beyond what anyone believed a black man working alone could do. In fact, Lucas cuts out the middle man on his heroin business, taking advantage of an American tragedy (the Vietnam War) to smuggle pure heroin from Southeast Asia into America by an ingenious, disturbing means and selling his "Blue Magic" dope on the streets. Frank's a true entrepreneur and businessman (and sees himself as a great American), selling the highest quality heroin at half the price of his competitor's watered down dope.
On his trail is the dogged, brutally honest detective Richie Roberts. In fact, he's so honest that his fellow cops hate him. Early in the film, he finds almost one million bucks in unmarked bills in a dope dealer's car -- and turns it ALL in. This at a time when (at least according to the film) a large number of the Big Apple's law enforcement officers were skimming a little cash on the side.
American Gangster, with a finely tuned screenplay by Steven Zaillian (based on Mark Jacobson's 2000 New York Magazine, "The Return of Superfly"), follows the parallel stories of these two men as their fates slowly intertwine and head toward the final face-off (Washington and Crowe don't even share the screen until the last 30 minutes of the film). One of the fascinating aspects of the story is the differences in the two men.
Lucas is a miserable human being, but a great family man and philanthropist (though the latter is more PR than true concern). He buys his mom a mansion, gives out Thanksgiving turkeys to his community and employes a gaggle of family members (portrayed by, among others, the superb Ruby Dee and always-great Chiwetel Ejiofo) from his native stomping grounds of North Carolina. Some of the best, most jolting scenes in American Gangster contrast the contrasting sides of Lucas. In one scene, he's setting a man on fire, then pumping him full of lead. Then he's giving out the aforementioned Thanksgiving turkeys. In one scene, he shoots a man point blank in the head. In another, he's accompanying his momma to church.
On the other hand, Roberts is a lousy family man. He's a womanizer whose police works leads him to ignore his young son and tears apart his family. Washington's Lucas is a brutal animal hiding behind a veneer of charisma, civility and fine trappings. Roberts (whose character is studying to be a lawyer) is a cerebral caveman, a soft-spoken, well-meaning, flawed man who's decidedly uncharismatic (compare Crowe's performance here with his can't-take-your-eyes-off-him outlaw in 3:10 to Yuma).
Director Ridley Scott (back with Crowe after the great Gladiator and the disappointing A Good Year) keeps the two-hour plus film zipping along with little fat to bog down the terse script. Cinematographer Harris Savides does a great job of capturing a decades worth of decadent New York locales, while editor Pietro Scalia seamlessly connects the intercutting scenes of the elaborate story.
American Gangster is filled with other fine performances beyond those mentioned above, including Josh Brolin as a uncover cop on the take, Cuba Gooding Jr. in a long-overdue fine role as a flashy competitor of Lucas' and Armand Assante as a sleezy mob boss in a three-piece suit. It also has some unexpected, but appropriate flashes of humor. When a rival dope dealer starts labeling his inferior dope as Blue Magic, Lucas accuses him of trademark infringement. And the American gangster's downfall begins the one time he does what he says to never do: go out in public with bling bling that practically shouts "Look at me."
Those expecting an explosive climax of gunfights and car cashes will be disappointed. In fact, the ending would be positively anticlimactic if it weren't based on fact. But there's enough heat in the big (emotional) showdown between Washington and Crowe to make up for the lack of fireworks otherwise.
Also, a note of trivia: this is the two actors' second film together. The first was 1995's underachieving, disappointing science fiction thriller, Virtuosity, which I find interesting mainly for the fact that it shows that even Crowe can give a bad performance. On the other hand, it's the only really disappointing turn I've seen from him (A Good Year wasn't very good, but Crowe himself wasn't too bad).
American Gangster is rated R for violence, pervasive drug content and language, nudity and sexuality.. Running time: 157 minutes. Macsimum rating: 8 out of 10. You can check out the films' trailers on the [url=http://www.apple.com/trailers/]QuickTime movie trailer site[/url].
