"American Gangster"

Denzel Washington plays a ruthless drug kingpin and Russell Crowe the cop who wants to nail him in this jagged, messy movie.

By Stephanie Zacharek

Read more: Stephanie Zacharek, Movies, Movie Reviews, Arts & Entertainment, Reviews

Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington in "American Gangster."

Nov. 2, 2007 | At the beginning of Ridley Scott's "American Gangster," Denzel Washington, as '70s-era New York drug kingpin Frank Lucas, empties a loaded gun into the body of a man who's begging for his life. The act may seem casual and impulsive, but it's as resolute and professional as the flourishing of a business card, a flashy introduction along the lines of "Pleased to meet you, won't you guess my name?" This character, a guy we know we shouldn't trust, is being played by one of the most charismatic actors in the movies: Whatever he's selling, there's going to be a part of us that wants to buy it, even against our better judgment. In those early minutes of "American Gangster," Washington offers a promise of salesmanship and showmanship that's irresistible.

But barely a half-hour into "American Gangster" -- which is based on the true story of how detective-turned-lawyer Richie Roberts took down (and, incidentally, later defended) Frank Lucas, an entrepreneur who got rich by finding ways to bring purer heroin to the masses for less -- I began to wonder if Ridley Scott was even aware that there were actors in his movie. In addition to Washington, he's got some fine ones to work with: Chiwetel Ejiofor is Frank's brother, Huey; Ruby Dee appears as the no-nonsense matriarch, Mama Lucas; and, most significantly, he's got Russell Crowe playing Richie Roberts.

But "American Gangster" offers only the stingiest platform for its actors, and as a piece of storytelling -- built on the foundation of a great story -- it's an epic that's been sliced and diced into so many little morsels that almost nothing in it has any weight. The script, adapted from a New York magazine piece by Mark Jacobson, is by Steven Zaillian, writer of "Schindler's List" and "Gangs of New York," and, more recently, the director of the deadly, prestige-bloated "All the King's Men." Zaillian's credit is supposedly one of the movie's big selling points, but the picture comes together as an abstract clutch of scenes rather than a fluid whole, or even a jagged one. Its serrated, corroded edge never cuts clean.

Because of the story's structure, Crowe and Washington don't have any scenes together until the very end. Until then, the picture crisscrosses and intercuts their stories, supposedly heightening their similarities and differences: Roberts is a scrupulously honest cop who chases any skirt that passes by; Lucas is a guy whose product destroys lives, but he's apparently loyal to one woman (a Puerto Rican beauty queen, Eva, played by Lymari Nadal). But as two intertwining character studies, "American Gangster" never goes much deeper than that.

Lucas gets his start as a driver, bodyguard and "collector" for a Harlem figurehead named Bumpy, the sort of complicated, fascinating character who earns respect in his community by looking after the regular folk even as he mows down anyone who stands in the way of his ambitions. It's Bumpy who teaches Lucas the fundamentals of American business, the importance of serving the customer's needs and also of refusing to let anyone undermine you. And so Lucas becomes the kind of guy who rises at 5 a.m. to begin his workday, dresses in tasteful, impeccably tailored suits (bad stuff happens the one time he wears a flashy gangsta fur), and on Sundays, escorts his elderly mother to church. Lucas runs his business by the sound principles Bumpy taught him: "My company sells a product that's better than the competition, at a price that's better than the competition," he says with pride. His business just happens to be importing, processing and selling heroin, which he sources in Vietnam: Sometimes it's carried back by returning soldiers; other times it enters the country more ghoulishly, in servicemen's coffins that have been appropriated specifically for the purpose.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the law, Roberts conducts his professional life with the same degree of scrupulousness. When he finds a case full of drug money, he turns it in instead of keeping it, an act of trusting honesty that turns him into the punch line of a lifelong joke. While working as a detective, he's also studying to be a lawyer. (When he gets the news that he's passed the New Jersey bar, he scrutinizes the letter with obvious, if subdued, pleasure, and then sets it aside for later -- he's got work to finish as a cop first.) Roberts has seen firsthand what drug use does to people, including cops, and he's even more attuned to what corruption does to people, especially cops. His dual enemies are drug traffickers (Lucas is so canny and elusive that for most of the movie, Roberts has no idea who he's really looking for) and the crooked cops who are more concerned with making money off those traffickers than with catching them (personified by Josh Brolin's Detective Trupo, a heavy ordered up straight from central casting, in a slick black leather jacket and a nail-brush mustache).

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