If there is one movie genre that I love more than zombies and sci-fi, it is a good mob movie. And if there are two actors that I had to say are my favorites of all time, on a given day you probably would hear me annoint Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington. So needless to say, I was super hyped when I first saw the cutouts for American Gangster at the movie theaters last year. I never made it to the theater to see it, but it finally came out on video this last week.
The movie is based on the real life story of Frank Lucas (played by Washington), a Harlem crime lord that smuggles heroin from Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War in the coffins of dead service men. Crowe plays cop Richie Roberts who makes a name for himself as a good cop in a corrupt New York City police force.
I was really hoping to see some fireworks as the colossal actors faced off, but there is surprisingly little screen time when the two are together - it only happens in the last 10 minutes of the film. Don't get me wrong, the acting was superb, as you would expect, but it didn't quite live up to what I had imagined in my mind. Overall the movie was good, but I can't shake this nagging feeling that it could have been truly great. I give it a qualified recommend - as with Scarface, Blow, and any of those other unknown-ambitious-ruthless-dude-makes-it-big-in-the-drug-business type of movies, there is a lot of language, drugs, and sex, so the sensitive should beware.
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