American Gangster - Review

Director: Ridley Scott
Writer: Steven Zaillian
Starring: Russell Crowe/Denzel Washington
Runtime: 2 hr 37 minutes

American Gangster could have been called New American Gangster. Denzel Washington stars as the title character, Frank Lucas, a real-life heavy that controlled the New York heroin scene in the '70s. As the film tells us, Lucas was black, in a time before blacks were regarded as sophisticated criminals. The mantle of Crime Lord in 1970s New York went to the Italians, while blacks were considered petty crooks. Lucas changed that.

It's a dubious honor. John Gotti (life), Michael Corleone (film), Bugsy Segal (life and film), they are all legendary figures. What separates them from the regular losers is the memory of their lifestyles and the amount of dead bodies they managed to stack up. Joseph Stalin, history's most successful gangster, said that one death is a tragedy, while a million is a statistic. Crime Lords are cut from Stalin's cloth, and they follow the same rule: a thug that shoots someone is a murderer. A thug that executes dozens of people and pollutes a city with drugs is a lord, a crime figure that has a career.

Lucas was a thug. There is no denying that. He shot people, burned them with gasoline, and executed them on the street. So a thug, yes, but a smart one, which makes his career worth filming. At the start of his career, he was no better than any hustler on the street. As he progressed, he took over the NY drug trade by cutting out the middle man. Rather than buying heroin from domestic suppliers, he flew himself to Bangkok and went to the source. Using US servicemen in Vietnam, Lucas smuggled 100% pure heroin into the United States. Then he cut it up, downgrading its quality somewhat, but still keeping its purity higher than any other dealer's in the city. Because he wasn't using any middlemen, Lucas could afford to the sell his product for less than his opponents could sell theirs. Better heroin, and at a cheaper price? Gold mine.

Ridley Scott directing
The film doesn't glorify Lucas. Steve Zaillian wrote the script and kept it on target: the story of a thug that hits it big. Though Lucas is sometimes seen in fancy clothes and lives in a nice house, we are never allowed to forget what he is doing and who he is: a drug dealer. Director Ridley Scott shows flashes of people using the drugs, getting high, falling over, looking stupid. At other times, he shows flashes of people scratching their arms and dying for their fix.

I was glad the film didn't glorify the pusher, as some crime stories do. Heroin inflicts massive anguish upon a person and a community. The heroin pusher is the scourge of the inner city. Denzel Washington, while likable in parts, plays the role well. Lucas is affable, charming, smart...and a thug.

Russell Crowe is Detective Richie Roberts. He's a clean cop who doesn't take money, and the other cops distrust him for it. In one scene, he has the chance to pocket close to a million dollars from a crook's car. Though he knows he will be ridiculed and hated by fellow detectives, he turns the money in to the evidence room.

Roberts gets on to Lucas after seeing him hobnobbing with various crime lords at a boxing match. Already curious about the "Blue Magic" heroin that is making the rounds in NY and Jersey, Roberts begins investigating Lucas and develops a theory that Lucas is the mastermind of the drug ring.

His fellow policemen are skeptical and hostile. They don't believe that any black man could be a crime boss in New York, and they don't trust a cop that doesn't take bribes. If this seems odd, you should revisit Serpico, starring Al Pacino. It's another film about the systemic police corruption in New York during the 70s. Forty years ago, you would have had a hard time finding a cop in New York City that either wasn't on the take or didn't look the other way.

The film is a tad long, as Roberts develops his case against Lucas, and Lucas goes about his business of killing and dealing. As a period piece, it stands up pretty well. The cars and sets are well used, and you will be reminded of what a pain in the ass it was to find a pay phone every time you had something important to tell someone. Cell phones have made drug dealing and police work a lot easier than it was in the old days.

The Vietnam War is used very well as a backdrop, and it is appropriate. We catch newscasters on the TV in the corner of a room, telling us that the war is going badly, then worse, then worse, then the fall of Saigon, so forth. All of this is very meaningful to Lucas: if the Americans leave Saigon, his pipeline of pure heroin is going to go down the toilet. How he gets over this hurdle is as insipid as it is clever. But, as with a lot of clever plans, you have to be careful with them. In the end, this final ruse is what leads to Lucas circling the wagons.

I enjoyed this film as a crime story and a period piece. It wasn't great, but I don't think it tried to reach for greatness, either, which is strange for a movie that runs over two hours. When a movie starts getting long, you know that the filmmakers are trying for an epic. They didn't here, and they're better for it.