Another Cop Flick....

Rating: 6/10 (13 June 2002)

Okay, so after Denzel Washington won the Oscar for Best Actor for this flick, I thought it would be worth my while to watch it and see if it was deserved. In my humble opinion, I believe that the Oscar was awarded to the WRONG man that night.
The story revolved around Alonzo (Washington), head of the narc unit of LAPD, who take on a rookie, Jake Hoyt (Ethan Hawke) who wants to be part of the unit. This day in the life of movie takes them to neighbourhoods of LA and Hoyt, who has great respect for the narcs and Alonzo finds himself in the middle of a corrupt system he doesn't want to believe.

The performances are alright. Hawke is pretty good as the naive, new cop. Washington is believable as the expert, rough around the edges with a quick wit. But I don't think it's an Oscar winning performance. I do believe Russell Crowes performance in "A Beautiful Mind" was much stronger and deserving. No, I'm not biased because I'm an Aussie, but I think politics and personal feelings got in the way of the voting. I mean, "Training Day" was at the cinemas here for what, two weeks? Didn't even make the top ten here. When Washington won the Oscar, they brought it back to the cinemas. Luckily I work at a video store, so nothing but 2 hours of my time was wasted in watching this movie
4/10