American Gangster
Studio: Universal Pictures
Rated: R
Cast: Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe
Director: Ridley Scott
WorkNameSort: American Gangster
Our Rating: 4.50
Everything about American Gangster screams “epic.” A swaggering, burly, overstuffed entertainment with aspirations of greatness, American Gangster wants desperately to be a new Godfather, but feels more like a pulpy mash-up of Serpico and Black Caesar — and there ain’t nothing wrong with that. The film is a gritty throwback to the bad old days when urban decay was turning the Big Apple into “an open sewer” and a flashback to the good old days of ’70s filmmaking, when nuance, texture and substance weren’t dirty words in Hollywood. Dueling story arcs follow the slowly converging career paths of New York kingpin Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) and downtrodden but upwardly mobile New Jersey narc Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe).
This article appears in Nov 14-20, 2007.