A character driven

Rating: 6/10 (9 November 2005)

Training Day sees Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke at full supremacy, both so brilliantly in command of there roles that they compensate for this action thriller's decorous screenplay and lack of ideas. If this film is about corruption, greed, narcotics and violence, by the end it becomes a one on one show between Washington and Hawke's character. What we care for, what entertains us through out the film is not its conventional themes expressed without conviction, but the squabbles between the two morally distinct characters as they visit the most corrupt places with the most corrupt people on the streets.
Ethan Hawke plays Jack Hoyt (in a performance equally as brilliant as Denzel's), a man whose dream is to belong to the elite Narc squad. For him, it is an opportunity to fight true crime, the one that matters, to save the world of drugs. But before he can even dream of belonging to the Narc squad, he's got to pass a test and this film is precisely about that Training Day where Alonzo Harris (Denzel Washington) will be his instructor, a day in which Hoyt will see that nothing in the city of Los Angeles is as it seems, and we realise the unsettling boundaries of corruption.
Alonzo Harris, in an inspired and over the top performance by Denzel, is a charismatic individual convinced by his own methods. He believes that giving out street justice is what justice is all about, that the enemy is in the streets, outside the law and he has got to be hunted like a wolf hunting another wolf. Alonzo is clearly corrupt and does not go by the law, he is a liar and may be worse than the criminals themselves since he has power and they don't. The contrast between Hoyt, a man who goes by the law but has little experience in enforcing it and a man who doesn't go by the law but has a lot of experience in enforcing it is the movie's key appeal.The film does a good job of reflecting Hoyt's initial and later feeling about Alonzo's actions on us. Firstly we feel that this guy may actually just be a cop trying to fight crime in his own way but there comes a point when we grow to dislike him.
The final moments of the film are the weakest point of the film. You see, what happens at Alozno seems collected out of a container since the only clue we are given for the possibility is shown a little past half way in the film. It feels like the director didn't know how to end the film and found a far fetched way during shooting. Having said that, I like the way the director handles the very last scene: it doesn't force any unnecessary action but ends as it should. This is a film worth watching only to see the character conflict.