Well made, but too familiar

Rating: 7/10 (4 November 2007)

Ridley Scott is one of those directors who has built up a lot of good will from audiences, including myself, over the years. But as each successive film of his is released, I find myself wondering why that is. Two of his movies, Alien and Blade Runner, are arguably masterpieces. Does he have more than maybe a couple more that are even good? Granted, I've missed a couple of well-liked works, notably Black Hawk Down, but the guy also has made Kingdom of Heaven, Hannibal and A Good Year. He's incredibly uneven. His newest film is a gangster epic. It's good, very classically made, respectable, entertaining enough. But it's nothing special. There is not even one moment in it where I was thinking "wow". Its best sequence, the raid on the drug lab, is easily topped by the similar scene in We Own the Night, which opened last month. Denzel Washington's performance isn't anything we haven't seen him give before, and Russell Crowe's is too methody to be considered very good (he was better in 3:10 to Yuma, but he was methody there, too). And it's a huge sin to waste Chiwetel Ejiofor this badly. The story is your basic criminal rise and fall, with a side story of the hard-working, honest cop. The film offers no insight into the situation. There are about seven montage sequences set to era-appropriate pop music. The honest truth is, I barely remembered I saw this movie four hours after it ended. If you've seen The Godfather or Goodfellas, you don't need to see it. On the other hand, if your options are this, Scarface or Blow, you'd be best off with this. Just don't pay too much for it. A rental, at best.