Dumb and derivative

Rating: Null/10 (9 September 2010)

Like Martin Scorsese's "crime epics", Ridley Scott's "American Gangster" fakes insights into the world of crime. Mistaking "autobiography" for depth, and even truth, Scott's film is mostly a stylistic exercises, a vapid film cobbled together from, bits and pieces of other films.
Indeed, in our post "The Wire" world, virtually all postmodern "gangster flicks" reveal themselves to be, not only entirely vacuous, but without any real world relevance. Most would be far more honest had they embraced the dishonesty of, say, Tarantino's "Pulp Fiction".
So while Scorsese cribbed from the machine gun operas of the 1930s and 40s, Scott steals from the blaxploitation and rugged antihero crime movies of the 1970s. The result is a slick but soulless copy of such crime films as "Super Fly", "Across 110th Street", "Black Caesar", "Serpico", "French Connection", "Crime Story" and "Prince of the City".
Not only is "American Gangster" wholly derivative, but it is about as edgy as a Walt Disney fairy tale. Denzel Washington, who plays crime lord Frank Lucas, tries desperately to create an iconic character, but a poor script ensures that he embodies nothing but clichés. Every line of dialogue, every decision, every gesture he commits, oozes derivation. Spouting lines like "Either you're somebody or you ain't nobody!", "This is my home. This is America!", "The most important thing in business is honesty, integrity, hard-work and family!", the too-suave-to-be-a-thug Denzel Washington comes across as a back-to-front amalgamation of Don Corleone and Tony Montana, dumb wisdom and genteel thuggery wrapped up in chocolate frosting.
But then, every character in this film has been cynically designed by committee. We have Russel Crowe (doing a bad "Starsky and Hutch" impersonation) as the typical "good cop with a messed up family life", on the hunt of Washington's Frank Lucas, a gangster (and family man!) who goes through the motions and adheres to familiar gangster trajectories. "Character development" in both cases simply constitutes revealing both characters to be womanizers, as if this somehow "greys" them, makes them more nuanced.
Scott's films rarely say anything, but this one is particularly dumb. We get the typical "crime doesn't pay" message and the lip service to unattainability of the American Dream, whilst the one interesting theme of the film – the delayed victory of black capitalism – is quickly jettisoned. Better to treat Lucas' life as satire, a grotesque parody of market warfare, or take things seriously and examine why his rise coincided with the 1960s or how his cartel affected the black community. Heck, why not glorify the guy and treat his life as a viable and morally defensible career opportunity? Faced with the choice of either going to Vietnam and fighting for Uncle Sam or staying at home and selling cocaine, cocaine seems like a far better option. There are so many interesting avenues you can take this material, but Scott has always been devoid of any kind of world view.
But even as mindless entertainment, the film fails. Scott's "violent scenes" are supremely self-conscious, cynically injected into the film solely to titillate. This is calculated violence, rarely flowing organically from the film's plot. Similarly, the film's "cat and mouse" plot never ignites, its urban aesthetic can't touch Lumet, Frankenheimer, Ray, Mann or Friedkin, and the script never surprises.
The early 1990s offered a boom in "black gangster" flicks, films like "New Jack City", "Tales From The Hood", "Straight Out of Brooklyn", "Dead Presidents", "Juice", "Clockers", "Boys In The Hood", "Menace 2 Society" all popping up on cinema screens. None of these films are great, but they're all better than Scott's glitzy junk.
4/10 – With his distinct visual style, director Ridley Scott has spent his career conning people into mistaking his auterism for artistry. You want 70s grit done today, watch "Harsh Times" or "Street Kings". Otherwise, steal a "The Wire" box-set. Worth one viewing.