'Gangster' nothing new

By Dan Moore

Published Nov. 6, 2007

There's a scene in "American Gangster" in which the eponymous gangster, cool and collected, sits with his mother at church as a hymn plays and detectives surround the building. Grab a pencil and some paper, clear your head — try sitting in a church and looking cool — and list all of the movies with this exact scene. That's the main problem with "American Gangster," a well-made underachiever of an epic; it's shockingly derivative.

The subject matter is part of the problem. "Gangster" is the story of a drug boss named Frank Lucas (Denzel Washington) who cut out the middleman and overtook the mafia in 1970s New York. He's tailed by a womanizing, honest cop (Russell Crowe) who isn't sure that there are any other honest cops in New York. Interesting as this story is, there's no more overused setting for would-be gritty and real movies than 1970s New York. As if he were afraid of being original, director Ridley Scott even turned down a possible Jay-Z soundtrack (out today) in favor of a mish-mash of every bad song ever used to lazily indicate a movie is set in the 1970s; by the end I was ready for "Car Wash" to come on during a murder scene.

This unoriginal crime story is very well executed, but it comes at the expense of the movie's unique elements. We first see Lucas with his beloved boss, a kingpin named Bumpy Johnson, as they walk through a brand-new discount store. Even as Bumpy bemoans these classless, untraditional newcomers who've cut out the middleman, Lucas realizes it's the future of their business. Later on we see snippets of Lucas's dealings with the class-oriented, ultra-traditional mafia. But because the movie's always cutting between its leads, that subplot never builds to a reasonable conclusion. Interesting subplots, in general, are never safe in this movie; the movie is so devoted to the words "based on a true story" that it fills the frame with interesting characters and ideas seen once and then forgotten.

There are a number of interesting movies that could be built from Frank Lucas's life and times, but Scott and screenwriter Steve Zaillian have chosen a story that glosses over the most interesting parts in favor of a familiar plot. In this arbitrary frame, parts of this 157-minute film feel rushed. For instance, it makes no effort to make Frank Lucas human; he's supposed to be sympathetic, as far as gangsters go, but he kills ruthlessly throughout the movie without seeming at all contrite. Scott buries Washington's scenes in gangster film shorthand — he loves his mama, he hates crooked cops, he had a rough childhood — but it all seems tacked on. The main focus seems to have been making him seem cool; believable was an afterthought.

"American Gangster" isn't a bad movie, but the more gangster movies you've seen the worse it gets. I would suggest you consult that list of movies very carefully.