American Gangster is a 2007 American biographical crime film directed and produced by Ridley Scott and written by Steven Zaillian. The film is fictionally based on the criminal career of Frank Lucas, a gangster from La Grange, North Carolina who smuggled heroin into the United States on American service planes returning from the Vietnam War, before being detained by a task force led by Newark Detective Richie Roberts. The film stars Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe with co-stars Ted Levine, John Ortiz, Josh Brolin, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Ruby Dee, Lymari Nadal and Cuba Gooding Jr.
Development for the film initially began in 2000, when Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment purchased the rights to a New York magazine story about the rise and fall of Lucas. Two years later, screenwriter Steven Zaillian introduced a 170-page scriptment to Scott. Original production plans were to commence in Toronto for budget purposes; however, production eventually relocated permanently to New York City. Because of the film's rising budget Universal canceled production in 2004. After negotiations with Terry George, it was later revived with Scott at the helm in March 2005. Principal photography commenced over a period of five months from July to December 2006; filming took place throughout New York City and concluded in Thailand.
Gangster Story
American Gangster premiered in New York on October 20, 2007, and was released in the United States and Canada on November 2. The film was well received by most film critics, and grossed over US$266.5 million worldwide, with domestic grosses standing at $130.1 million. Many of the people portrayed, including Roberts and Lucas, have stated that the film took much creative license with the story, and three former DEA agents sued Universal claiming the agency's portrayal was demoralizing. American Gangster was nominated for twenty-one awards, including two Oscar nominations for Best Art Direction and Best Supporting Actress (Ruby Dee), and won three including a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Supporting Role for Dee.
Frank's heroin racket prospers; he eventually sells Blue Magic wholesale to many dealers in the New York Tri-State Area and expands his distribution through other criminal organisations. With this monopoly, Frank becomes Harlem's top crime lord, opening legitimate business fronts and maintaining a low profile, while befriending politicians and famous celebrities (such as Joe Louis). He buys a mansion for his mother and recruits his five brothers as his lieutenants. Frank eventually falls in love with and marries Eva, a Puerto Rican beauty queen. He attends the Fight of the Century with her, where Roberts spots Frank, notices he has better seats than the Italian mobsters, and begins investigating him. Frank also comes to odds with competing local gangster Nicky Barnes; corrupt NYPD detective Nick Trupo, who is among many people Frank is forced to bribe; and the Corsican mafia, who unsuccessfully attempt to assassinate Frank and his wife for putting them out of business.
In 2000, Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment purchased the rights to "The Return of Superfly", by Mark Jacobson, an article published in New York magazine story about the rise and fall of the 1970s heroin kingpin Frank Lucas.[3] In 2002, screenwriter Steven Zaillian brought a 170-page script to director Ridley Scott, who expressed interest in making two films from it. However, Scott did not immediately pursue the project, choosing to make Kingdom of Heaven instead. In November 2003, Universal and Imagine entered negotiations with Brian De Palma to direct Tru Blu, with a script by Zaillian based on the life of Frank Lucas.[4][5] Zaillian interpreted the account as one of "American business and race", focusing the script thematically on corporate business.[6] Production was initially slated for a spring 2004 start.[4]
Scott chose to direct American Gangster by highlighting the paradoxical values of Frank Lucas and Richie Roberts. The film somewhat focuses on the comparatively ethical business practices of the "wicked gangster" and the womanizing and failed marriage of the "do-gooder" police detective. Washington, who was not normally a fan of gangster films, chose to portray Lucas when he saw "the arc of the character", which ended by showing the prices that Lucas paid for his actions.[3]
Using his experience from visiting New York in the same time period in which the film's story took place, Scott sought to downplay a "Beatles" atmosphere to the film and to instead create a shabbier atmosphere, saying that "Harlem was really, really shabby, beautiful brownstones falling apart."[21] Production and costume design was emphasized, transforming the location into the rundown streets of upper Manhattan from the late 1960s and early 1970s. Denzel Washington, as Frank Lucas, had 64 costume changes.[25]
Denzel Washington pressed Grazer into inviting rapper Jay-Z to write the film's score, but the producer "just didn't think there'd be enough for Jay-Z to do" given the intentions to do a soundtrack filled with 1970s music.[22] The film's trailer had already used Jay-Z's "Heart of the City (Ain't No Love)", and the rapper was invited to an advanced screening. The film had a profound resonance on the musician, who decided to create a concept album, also entitled American Gangster.[23] The rapper recorded tracks that were prompted by specific scenes in the film. It was speculated that the album's release in conjunction with the film would attract a young audience and help Universal Pictures generate profits to recover from the film's troubled development history.[22] According to Jay-Z:
"It was like I was watching the film, and putting it on pause, and giving a back story to the story. It immediately clicked with me. Like Scarface or any one of those films, you take the good out of it, and you can see it as an inspiring film."[22]
Review aggregate Rotten Tomatoes reports that 81% of critics have given the film a positive review based on 216 reviews, with a rating average of 7.00/10, with the consensus being: "American Gangster is a gritty and entertaining throwback to classic gangster films, with its lead performers firing on all cylinders."[49] On Metacritic, which assigns a weighted mean score out of 100 to reviews from film critics, the film has a score of 76 based on 38 reviews.[50]
"Like many moviemakers [...], Mr. Scott loves his bad guy too much. And by turning Lucas into a figure who seduces instead of repels, an object of directorial fetishism and a token of black resistance, however hollow, he encourages us to submit as well. Part of this is structural and economic: blood and nihilism are always better sells than misery and hopelessness. Yet there's also a historical dimension because when Lucas strolls down a fast-emptying Harlem street after putting a bullet into another man's head and the camera pulls back for the long view, you are transported into the realm of myth. Once, another gunman, or the director, might have taken direct aim at Lucas. But the world belongs to gangsters now, not cowboys."
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a perfect four-star rating and opined, "This is an engrossing story, told smoothly and well." Ebert also praised Crowe's performance, saying that his contribution to the storytelling was "enormous".[52] Paul Byrnes of The Sydney Morning Herald felt that American Gangster was "one of the most intelligent gangster films in years" and expressed that the film offers "the spectacle of grand themes and two bigger-than-life characters played by two of the best actors in cinema." Concluding his review, Byrnes gave the film four out of four stars.[53]
Many of Lucas' other claims, as presented in the film, have also been called into question, such as being the right-hand man of Bumpy Johnson, rising above the power of the Mafia and Nicky Barnes, and that he was the mastermind behind the Golden Triangle heroin connection of the 1970s. Ron Chepesiuk, a biographer of Frank Lucas, deemed the story a myth. Associated Press entertainment writer Frank Coyle noted that "this mess happened partly because journalists have been relying on secondary sources removed from the actual events."[67]
Walter Matthau plays an unlucky criminal who runs out of money and is in need of a big heist - so he robs a bank, which catches the attention of the law and rival gangsters. On the run, he meets up with a librarian and they fall in love. After being accosted by a rival gangster, Jack Martin (Walter Matthau) is forced to take a job with the rival gangsters to settle his debt. But once the librarian discovers he's actually a wanted man, she is stuck between staying with the man she fell in love with five minutes after meeting - or leaving him.
A homicidal bank robber pulls pretty clever heist (if you don't think it over too hard). But it turns out he did the job in the territory of a big-time gangster. Pursued by the gangster's henchmen, he ducks into a library, and is befriended (for no visible reason? love at first sight?) by a librarian who hires him to work in her...citrus grove?
It's a crazy story and the romance half is underwritten and unsatisfactory, but it worked on me. Walter Matthau is good as the bank robber: a crazy con man who is still oddly charming and plays people like a fiddle. (Matthau directed too.)
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