+ Best Gangster Movie of the Year + Best Epic Movie of the Year + Best New York Movie of the Year
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| Black, white, and a line of blood are the sole colors on the classic poster for Ridley Scott's American Gangster |
American Gangster is English master filmmaker Ridley Scott's (Gladiator (2000) best movie since Black Hawk Down (2001). It is written by Steven Zaillian (Moneyball (2011)), based on Mark Jacobson's 2000 New York magazine article The Return of Superfly. It is Scott's 17th feature.
Frank Lucas from North Carolina is a central gangster in late 1960s Harlem, New York, where he rises to be the top dog, responsible for vast heroin smuggling, extortion and violence, among other crimes, - but detective Richard Roberts is on his heels.
Goodwill and excellent craftsmanship is put into American Gangster from several sides: The recreation of 1970s Manhattan is impressive (production design by Arthur Max (Robin Hood (2010))), and the funky, eclectic music (original tracks and the score by Marc Streitenfeld (Poltergeist (2015)) are mixed effectively) works perfectly in getting us into this other time and place. There's top-shelf acting from Denzel Washington (Flight (2012)), Russell Crowe (The Mummy (2017)), and Ruby Dee (Cool Red (1976)) as Mama Lucas. - All of it is a joy for the movie-lover.
SPOILER Great, memorable scenes in the film include the one where Lucas is arrested by Roberts outside of the church to the sounds of Amazing Grace, as well as the final scene, in which he is let out of prison to a changed city to the tunes of Public Enemy.
Despite the depiction of its its real-life characters' actual actions in the film being greatly contested, American Gangster is a great film and a riveting piece of American history.
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Cost: 100 mil. $
Box office: 266.4 mil. $
= Box office success (returned 2.66 times its cost)
[American Gangster premiered 19 October (Harlem, New York) and runs 158 minutes. Universal bought the rights to the New York magazine article in 2000, and Scott circled the project, which eventually began development with Antoine Fuqua directing and Washington and Benicio Del Toro starring. Concerns about direction and budget led to Fuqua's getting fired in 2004 and the production cancellation, which initially cost the studio 30 mil. $ of which 20 mil. were for Washington and 5 mil. for Del Toro, who had so-called 'pay-or-play' contracts, securing them payment in case of cancellation. Will Smith was in talks to star, until Scott returned to the project and re-teamed Washington and Crowe, who had starred together previously in Brett Leonard's Virtuosity (1995). Washington and Crowe both met with the real people their characters are based on prior to filming, which took place in New York and Chiang Mai, Thailand from July - November 2006. The film opened #1 to a 43.5 mil. $ first weekend in North America, the biggest opening up to that point in Washington and Crowe's careers. It stayed in the top 5 for another 2 weeks (#2; #3) and grossed 130.1 mil. $ (48.8 % of the total gross) domestically. The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 19.8 mil. $ (7.4 %) and Italy with 15 mil. $ (5.6 %). It was the 19th highest-grossing film of the year domestically and worldwide. Roger Ebert gave it a 4/4 star review, translating to a notch higher than this one. Both Lucas, Roberts and other central people who were involved with the actions shown in the film have commented that the film makes up a lot for dramatic effect, and two former DEA agents sued Universal Pictures for defamation, which was eventually dismissed by a US district judge. The film was nominated for 2 Oscars: Best Supporting Actress (Dee), lost to Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton, and Art Direction, lost to Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. It was also nominated for 3 Golden Globes, 5 BAFTAs, a Grammy and many other awards. It topped the home video and rentals charts and was the 14th best-selling DVD of 2008 in North America, though its gross here is unreported. Scott returned with Body of Lies (2008). Washington returned in The Great Debaters (2007), Crowe in Body of Lies. American Gangster is certified fresh at 80 % with a 6.99/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]
What do you think of American Gangster?
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