What a delightful surprise!

Rating: 9/10 (6 January 2004)

Denzel Washington's Oscar winning performance made me want to see this movie, or otherwise I would have never ever watched this movie because normally I don't watch "ghetto, gangster, set in present day, with rappers in it, movies" like this. But the movie turned out to be way better than expected and it's arguably one of the best movie of 2001.
The movie has an amazing pace that covers one of the days in the life of rookie narcotic officer Hoyt (Ethan Hawke) and rouge LAPD veteran Harris (Denzel Washington) on their first (and only?) day together on the job. The movie gets nowhere boring or slow and has tons of surprising plot twist that make the story very interesting and even tense multiple times throughout the movie.
The power of the movie is in Denzel Washington's Oscar worthy performance and the chemistry between the two main characters. Denzel Washington is perfect as "bad guy" and delivers his lines in a most amazing way. His lines sometimes seem to come straight out of a Quentin Tarantino movie. Also notable is Scott Glenn in his role as a rotten old drugs lord.
The atmosphere and style of the movie feels very realistic mainly thanks to the cinematography, nice fast editing, script and the performance's by the cast.
Way better than you would expect it to be, give it a chance!
9/10
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