Not-So-Original Gangster

American Gangster is a bit like a toddler drowning in his father’s suit - sure, it doesn't fit, but it’s still entertaining. In other words, it’s a good movie that fails to live up to it’s potential the way its classic counterparts, The Godfather and Serpico - even Scarface - have, but all-in-all, is still a substantially well-made film worth seeing.

Set it 1970s New York, the film follows the rise of organized crime boss Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington), whose brilliant idea to buy pure heroin direct from Thailand and sell it for half the price in Harlem, made him a wealthy mob monopoly king. Russell Crowe appears as Richie Roberts, the sickeningly good cop/attorney who sets out to take down, and eventually defend, Lucas. The script was adapted by Steven Zaillian (writer of "Schindler's List" and “Gangs of New York”) from a piece in New York Magazine by Mark Jacobson. It’s because of this credibility that one would be so disheartened by an alarmingly uninspired film that clearly follows the beaten path to gangster film legend without ever thinking outside the box.

Director Ridley Scott portrays Roberts and Lucas as blatant foils - good and evil, poor and rich, stumbling and sociable. Although Crowe and Washington could not have been better cast, its the film’s bumbling attempt at making these characters complex that falls short. Sure, Lucas is a twisted and evil drug dealer who has torn thousands of families apart and killed even more firsthand, but he’s a charismatic family man - an affable mama’s boy who remains loyal to his Puerto Rican beauty queen wife. Taken under the wing of his equally twisted grandfather Bumpy and motivated by a lynching he witnessed as a young boy growing up in North Carolina, Lucas utilizes what he’s good at - crime and manipulation - to overcome racial limitations in a country at war with itself and Vietnam.

Roberts, on the other hand, is so morally pure that he becomes the city’s running joke when he returns a trunk full of money instead of splitting it with his corrupt, heroin-addicted detective sidekick. Roberts, a womanizing lotharios who never makes time to see his son on weekends, is so busy trying to follow a path of righteousness that he ends up leaving a trail of immorality behind him.

So the characters are flawed, but are still stock in an old-fashioned film sort-of-way. It’s Scott’s unabashedly subtle technique paired with modern and flashy camera work that redeem these character flaws and allow them to shine, only failing at Washington’s repetitively self-parodic “My man!” (This is something we let slide - it’s Denzel we’re talking about here.) Unfortunately, he’s surrounded by a less impressive cast of starving drama-geek extras who make sweeping generalizations about how the Italian mafia should look and act. Case in point: stereotypical villain Josh Brolin's Detective Trupo who is too David Caruso to actually be taken seriously and Cuba Gooding Jr.’s character, a nightclub owner, who’s so coked out he throws a tantrum and nearly demands Lucas to “show him the money” - probably so he can afford his groovy paisley leisure suits.

These were also details I was able to overlook. Come climax, I was pleasantly rewarded by Lucas’ and Roberts’ encounter and eventual tête-à-tête in an interrogation room. Gangster proves to be a raw, unwavering portrayal of drug use and corruption. Scott did a phenomenal job of depicting drug’s effect on men, women, their families, politics, soldiers, and the American junta. At times slow, but ultimately satisfying, American Gangster is a layered and vibrant thriller that manages to be provoking, yet remain so straightforward that you can invite your girlfriend/movie-talker-friend to come along without having to hear “What’s going on?” every five minutes.