American Gangster DVD Review
Ridley Scott Directs the Story of Gangster Frank Lucas
Scott grabs the audience and holds it there whilst he recounts the story of drugs overlord Frank Lucas in this solid film.
American Gangster (dir, Ridley Scott, 2007)
American Gangster is a film that grabs the audience around the jugular and barely loosens its grip from beginning to end. The opening scene introduces Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) standing in front of a man tied to a chair outside the back of a restaurant. The man is beaten and bloody. Petrol is being poured over him. Lucas casually lights a cigar and throws the lighter on the bleeding man. Flames and screams erupt and then Lucas draws his handgun and shoots the man dead. This is the American Gangster.
Scott is a director who has a beautiful eye for visuals and knows how to make a film look good. Blade Runner (1982) and Gladiator (2000) are prime examples of the British director's visual finesse. Even the mediocre Hannibal is beautifully shot. Scott's weakness as a director can be his inability to hold dramatic, realistic tension and a film such as American Gangster needs this element to be spot on. The opening scene is promising and suggests Scott understands his source material.
Washington is Charismatic
The films follows the stories of Frank Lucas, an African American drugs overlord and recounts the true story of his monopolisation of the drugs trade in New York. Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe) is the policeman who eventually caught Lucas. It is an intriguing tale, with Lucas's cold blooded boldness contrasted with his passion for family values. Lucas reveres family life and does everything to keep a sense of unity in family life. The paradox this creates is most stark when he is sitting with his brothers and nephews explaining the importance of family and subsequently shoots a gangster in the street. After indifferently killing the gangster, Lucas sits back down with his family and carries on talking about family as if nothing has happened. What is portrayed though, is not a sociopath, but a man who is able to separate 'business' from 'pleasure'. He does not realise how blurred those edges really are.
Scott Solidly Directs Gangster
The film is Washington's show and his charismatic performance means Crowe is good, but always in the shadows. In a sense, that is more how it should be, as Crowe's character Roberts works hard to bring Lucas down, never bending the rules and paying the price for that in a corrupt police department. Roberts sifts through the shadows and eventually topples Lucas's empire and this being a greater irony as the audience learns of Lucas's careful operations.
Scott solidly directs and sustains a dramatic grip on the audience. Washington's performance is electric and the story is compelling. Scott has not created a masterpiece in the gangster genre, but very few films make it to that mark. The production values are excellent, with the cinematography not failing Scott's fine eye. It slots into another Scott film that ensures his mark on Hollywood has not finished yet.
