A decent movie

Rating: 6/10 (3 November 2007)

I've been looking forward to this movie for a long time. I love gangster films (mainly Scorsese's films) so I couldn't wait to see this. It was nice to see Russel Crowe as the good guy considering in 3:10 to Yuma he was the bad guy. Now the strangest role was the fact our hero Denzel Washington was playing the bad guy. The movie was long but it was a fun and enjoyable ride.
Russel Crowe plays Richie Roberts who takes pride in what he does. He's not a dirty cop (you learn quick that pretty much everyone else is) and he does pretty much everything by the book (kind of like Simon Pegg's character in Hot Fuzz). In fact, very early in the movie, he finds almost 1,000,000$ in unmarked cash and still turns it in even though he almost new that the other cops would take it. His character was very well developed as we learn that constantly doing good wrecks his family life as he goes through a divorce at the same time in the movie.
Denzel Washington plays Frank Lucas who deals heroin from South America (if my memory serves me right) and quickly becomes the biggest drug-lord in the city. He's a smooth talker and pretty much has no competition. In fact, he brings his whole entire extended family into the mix as they live in his big mansion.
You already should know the plot so I won't do much explaining. It's a cat and mouse movie (even though the leads only have about 5 minutes together in the whole movie) and it is a fun one. I do have to tell you though, I felt the length of the movie was a good half an hour too long. There were plenty of unneeded scenes so the movie didn't flow as well as it should of. The character development was good but this movie could have been so much more. I did find that the ending was rewarding and you learn a lot of interesting facts about Lucas and Roberts that will probably make you gasp in amazement.
It was well directed for the most part. Perhaps a few shots lingered too long but overall Ridley Scott did a good job. There are some bits of humor in the film. My favorite part was (thanks giving or Christmas day - can't remember) when a dirty cop finds heroin on Lucas and he promptly says in a caring voice, "No need to start anything, why don't we go home and have pumpkin pie and warm apple cider." (something like that). He then gets in his car and beats the hell out of his brother. I really like Washington in this role. Sure he's just like he is in most of his other movies but we routed for him just like how we routed for Al Pacino in Scarface. In fact, Peter Travers calls this movie the black Scarface. I do agree. Russel Crowe Was great like usual as we also routed for him. To me, the biggest enemies were the dirty cops.
I wasn't at all blown away but it was worth the tickets and the wait in the long line. 6.5/10 is my verdict.