The inspiration for Denzel Washington’s drug-dealing mogul in the 2007 film American Gangster has died. Frank Lucas was 88 and died while being transported to a New Jersey hospital.
Lucas and his wife, Julianna Farrait-Rodriguez, were once referred to as the black Bonnie & Clyde for their close alliance. She was portrayed as “Eva” by Lymari Nadal in American Gangster and was also a drug dealer, being jailed for five years in 2010 for trying to sell cocaine to a government informant in Puerto Rico. At the time she was 65 and Lucas was 81.
During the 1960s and 1970s, Lucas was the chief purveyor in New York City of a type of heroin called Blue Magic, a concoction which was 10 percent pure compared to the standard 5 percent of the day. His clientele allegedly included celebrities, top business people and politicians.
Lucas typically began his dealing around 4 Pm, a time when the police had a two-hour shift switch.
Lucas and his wife, Julianna Farrait-Rodriguez, were once referred to as the black Bonnie & Clyde for their close alliance. She was portrayed as “Eva” by Lymari Nadal in American Gangster and was also a drug dealer, being jailed for five years in 2010 for trying to sell cocaine to a government informant in Puerto Rico. At the time she was 65 and Lucas was 81.
During the 1960s and 1970s, Lucas was the chief purveyor in New York City of a type of heroin called Blue Magic, a concoction which was 10 percent pure compared to the standard 5 percent of the day. His clientele allegedly included celebrities, top business people and politicians.
Lucas typically began his dealing around 4 Pm, a time when the police had a two-hour shift switch.
- 6/1/2019
- by Bruce Haring
- Deadline Film + TV
Looking back on this still-young century makes clear that 2007 was a major time for cinematic happenings — and, on the basis of this retrospective, one we’re not quite through with ten years on. One’s mind might quickly flash to a few big titles that will be represented, but it is the plurality of both festival and theatrical premieres that truly surprises: late works from old masters, debuts from filmmakers who’ve since become some of our most-respected artists, and mid-career turning points that didn’t necessarily announce themselves as such at the time. Join us as an assembled team, many of whom were coming of age that year, takes on their favorites.
There are at least two Ridley Scotts working in Hollywood. Ridley Scott, auteur — the man who revolutionized science fiction and horror cinema at the same time with Alien, who single-handedly resurrected the swords-and-sandals epic with Gladiator, who...
There are at least two Ridley Scotts working in Hollywood. Ridley Scott, auteur — the man who revolutionized science fiction and horror cinema at the same time with Alien, who single-handedly resurrected the swords-and-sandals epic with Gladiator, who...
- 11/9/2017
- by The Film Stage
- The Film Stage
Tagline: "Darkness descends." Lightning Entertainment will distribute the post-apocalyptic thriller The Blackout. This film, from director Louis Mandylor, involves a small town and a world-wide cataclysm. Raiders come to prey on the local townsfolk as resources dwindle to nothing. This title stars Abraham Benrubi (U Turn), Lymari Nadal (American Gangster) and Costas Mandylor. And, an extended trailer for the film is hosted here. From the synopsis, the story focuses on Martin (Jordan Marder) and his pregnant wife. They are looking for relaxation, in Martin's hometown. But, the lights go off and the locals panic. Then, survivors come looking for food, water, shelter and victims. Martin might lose everything he has, unless he fights back, against impossible odds. The extended trailer, courtesy of Lightning Entertainment, shows many of the film's main characters. The clip also gives away a few major plot points, including a central character's death. So, fans might want to skim through.
- 11/18/2014
- by noreply@blogger.com (Michael Allen)
- 28 Days Later Analysis
Lightning Entertainment has bulked up its Afm war chest and will introduce buyers to The Blackout and Brookstreet Pictures’ horror-thriller GirlHouse.
Louis Mandylor directs The Blackout from a screenplay by Steve C Yoon and Jordan Marder about a power shortage in a small town that forces residents to fight for their lives.
Lymari Nadal, Costas Mandylor, Jordan Marder and Ronnie Gene Blevins star.
GirlHouse by Trevor Matthews and Jon Knautz is based on Nick Gordon’s script about a cash-strapped woman who joins an online sex service in a secure building with other models when they come under attack from a psychopathic client. Ali Cobrin stars alongside Slaine and Adam Dimarco.
Acquisitions and sales consultant Richard S Guardian and Lightning svp Joseph Dickstein negotiated the deal to handle international sales rights forThe Blackout with executive producer and attorney Mark Halloran and for GirlHouse with Jay Cohen of Gersh.
Lightning Entertainment evp and general manager Ken DuBow announced...
Louis Mandylor directs The Blackout from a screenplay by Steve C Yoon and Jordan Marder about a power shortage in a small town that forces residents to fight for their lives.
Lymari Nadal, Costas Mandylor, Jordan Marder and Ronnie Gene Blevins star.
GirlHouse by Trevor Matthews and Jon Knautz is based on Nick Gordon’s script about a cash-strapped woman who joins an online sex service in a secure building with other models when they come under attack from a psychopathic client. Ali Cobrin stars alongside Slaine and Adam Dimarco.
Acquisitions and sales consultant Richard S Guardian and Lightning svp Joseph Dickstein negotiated the deal to handle international sales rights forThe Blackout with executive producer and attorney Mark Halloran and for GirlHouse with Jay Cohen of Gersh.
Lightning Entertainment evp and general manager Ken DuBow announced...
- 11/4/2014
- by jeremykay67@gmail.com (Jeremy Kay)
- ScreenDaily
More out of the American Film Market on the eve of its start here in Los Angeles... Lightning Entertainment is taking out The Blackout and GirlHouse, two new titles to land on our radar. These are films that are merely looking for distribution right now. They'll be touted and looking for a home at Afm.
The former is by Louis Mandylor, while GirlHouse comes courtesy of Trevor Matthews and Jon Knautz (Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer).
The Blackout stars Lymari Nadal, Costas Mandylor, Jordan Marder, Ronnie Gene Blevins, Bill Sage, Abe Benrubi, and Grant Harvey.
The post Lightning to Bring GirlHouse & The Blackout to Afm appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.
The former is by Louis Mandylor, while GirlHouse comes courtesy of Trevor Matthews and Jon Knautz (Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer).
The Blackout stars Lymari Nadal, Costas Mandylor, Jordan Marder, Ronnie Gene Blevins, Bill Sage, Abe Benrubi, and Grant Harvey.
The post Lightning to Bring GirlHouse & The Blackout to Afm appeared first on Shock Till You Drop.
- 11/4/2014
- by Ryan Turek
- shocktillyoudrop.com
Mac (Gary Sinise) bleeding from a wound to his arm, chases a man to a deserted building. He raises his gun and fires at Mac. This chase scene was reminiscent of the one he had in season 4 Doa for a Day, when he cornered the serial killer, Suspect X, in the building and also shot and killed her too. 12 Hours Earlier Mac is called to a Cs at a hotel, where a Db has been discovered impaled on the spike of an awning (and still they persist in having these dangerous spikes everywhere.) He is identified as Panthro Torres (Eddie Fernandez) from the El Puno gang. Flack (Eddie Cahill) believes it to be a hit from a rival gang. The room is in shambles, Flack: "This is why they take your credit card when you check in." He was shot twice and fell back through the window, or as Flack more poetically puts it,...
- 2/3/2011
- by mhasan@corp.popstar.com (Mila Hasan)
- PopStar
The ex-wife of the notorious American Gangster drug king portrayed by Denzel Washington in the Ridley Scott movie is negotiating a plea deal, after allegedly selling cocaine to undercover drug agents.
Former Mrs. Frank Lucas, Juliana Farrait-Rodriguez, the inspiration for actress Lymari Nadal's character Eva in the 2007 film, was reportedly caught in a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) sting operation in Puerto Rico in May.
The jailed 63 year old's lawyer, Hugo Harmatz, appeared in Manhattan federal court on Monday to address claims his client sold two kilos of cocaine to authorities.
Harmatz won a 60-day delay in the case to continue talks with prosecutors, reports the New York Post.
In the Hollywood movie, Washington played Lucas, who married the former Puerto Rican beauty queen after meeting her in a nightclub.
The king pin's massive drug-dealing operation collapsed in 1975, when he was sentenced to 40 years in prison. He was released in 1991 and Farrait-Rodriguez served five years after she became embroiled in that case.
Former Mrs. Frank Lucas, Juliana Farrait-Rodriguez, the inspiration for actress Lymari Nadal's character Eva in the 2007 film, was reportedly caught in a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) sting operation in Puerto Rico in May.
The jailed 63 year old's lawyer, Hugo Harmatz, appeared in Manhattan federal court on Monday to address claims his client sold two kilos of cocaine to authorities.
Harmatz won a 60-day delay in the case to continue talks with prosecutors, reports the New York Post.
In the Hollywood movie, Washington played Lucas, who married the former Puerto Rican beauty queen after meeting her in a nightclub.
The king pin's massive drug-dealing operation collapsed in 1975, when he was sentenced to 40 years in prison. He was released in 1991 and Farrait-Rodriguez served five years after she became embroiled in that case.
- 8/10/2010
- WENN
Chicago – The Blu-Ray Round Up is back with two HD music releases, a beloved holiday movie from a director with a new comedy on the horizon (Richard Curtis, “Pirate Radio”), and a release that’s a must-own for fans of one of the most popular shows of the ’00s. This informative column is designed to let you know synopsis, technical specs, and features for titles that may have slipped under your radar. Pick your favorite.
“Nickelback: Live at Sturgis 2009” and “Rob Thomas: Something To Be Tour Live At Red Rocks” were released on October 13th, 2009.
“Battlestar Galactica: The Plan” was released on October 27th, 2009.
“Love Actually” was released on November 3rd, 2009.
“Battlestar Galactica: The Plan”
Photo credit: Universal
Synopsis: “The Cylons began as humanity’s robot servants. They rebelled and evolved and now they look like us. Their plan is simple: destroy the race that enslaved them. But when...
“Nickelback: Live at Sturgis 2009” and “Rob Thomas: Something To Be Tour Live At Red Rocks” were released on October 13th, 2009.
“Battlestar Galactica: The Plan” was released on October 27th, 2009.
“Love Actually” was released on November 3rd, 2009.
“Battlestar Galactica: The Plan”
Photo credit: Universal
Synopsis: “The Cylons began as humanity’s robot servants. They rebelled and evolved and now they look like us. Their plan is simple: destroy the race that enslaved them. But when...
- 11/5/2009
- by adam@hollywoodchicago.com (Adam Fendelman)
- HollywoodChicago.com
This review was written for the theatrical release of "American Gangster".The title is catchy but misleading. Frank Lucas was less an "American Gangster" than an original Old Gangster in sable, a caricature in the tradition of '70s blaxploitation flicks.
He is in fact a real-life character, an apparently highly attractive person -- likable even -- who made millions by killing people and ruining lives with the powdered death of heroin. Going up against this all-powerful yet ghostly figure who operates outside the old Mafia networks, is Richie Roberts, an incorruptible cop from the street who is determined put him in prison. Director Ridley Scott takes on these familiar subjects, themes and characters with a keen eye for the social fabric, false assumptions, suffocating corruption and vivid personalities that make such a story worth retelling.
So this is a gangster movie focused on character rather than action and on the intricacies of people's backgrounds, strategies and motivations. Whether it means to, the film plays off a clutch of old movies, from "The Godfather" and "Serpico" to "Superfly" and "Shaft". But Scott and writer Steven Zaillian make certain their Old Gangster is original and true to himself and his times rather than a concoction of movie fiction. Consequently, the movie is smooth and smart enough to attract a significant audience beyond the considerable fan base of its stars, Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.
You do sense in this movie that its principals are returning to safe harbor. After a discouraging foray into feeble comedy by Scott and Crowe ("A Good Year") and Gothic Southern melodrama for Zaillian ("All the King's Men"), these artists scramble back to an emotional naturalism more aligned to their sensibilities. Even for Washington, who seldom makes a false step careerwise, the film represents a welcome return to the larger-than-life villainy he performed so well in 2001's "Training Day".
Zaillian, working from Mark Jacobson's magazine portrait of Lucas -- a heroin kingpin of Harlem in the late '60s and early '70s -- sets two men on a collision course. Lucas (Washington), a country lad from North Carolina, is the nearly invisible driver and right-hand man to Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson, the most famous of Harlem gangsters. (So famous that this is his fourth movie reincarnation. Moses Gunn played him in "Shaft", and Lawrence Fishburne twice in "The Cotton Club" and "Hoodlum".) When Bumpy dies in his arms, Frank moves into the vacuum caused by his death with ruthless guile and a friendly personality.
Meanwhile, Richie Roberts (Crowe), a street-smart drug cop in New Jersey, is Frank's opposite: He can't help alienating everyone who crosses his path. His wife wants a divorce, insisting he leads a life entirely unsuitable to the welfare of their only child. Fellow cops shun him from the moment he brings in nearly a million dollars of recovered drug money. No one can understand why he didn't keep it, which says a lot about the state of policing in the New York/New Jersey area in 1968.
Frank's stroke of genius in the drug trade is to cut out the middleman. He flies to Thailand, takes a boat up the river in the Golden Triangle, makes a deal with a Chinese general, then arranges through an in-law to ship the kilos to New York in military planes coming back from Vietnam. His heroin, branded Blue Magic, hits the street twice as good and half as much as the competition.
It is so pure that dead junkies turn up all over New York. The police are baffled but look in all the wrong places. It never occurs to them that a black man is behind the scheme. Richie, whose whacked-out partner is one of Blue Magic's victims, is given his own task force. He finally targets Frank, but no one will believe him.
Frank flies under the radar. He hires only relatives -- a veritable army of brothers like Huey Lucas (Chiwetel Ejiofor) as well as cousins -- whom he sets up with storefront businesses that function as drug-distribution centers. He maintains a low profile and adheres to a rigid code of conduct. His major weekly outings are to church with his mother (the inestimable Ruby Dee) or to his nightclub with wife Eva (Lymari Nadal), a former Miss Puerto Rico.
Richie's major opposition comes from within. New York's anti-drug task force, the Special Investigations Unit, is rife with corruption. As personified by Detective Trupo (a strutting Josh Brolin), the SIU takes its cut right off the top.
In a story that ranges from the jungles of Harlem and Thailand to North Carolina backwoods, Scott is both hurried and leisurely. He covers a lot of territory, often in low-light levels and with the Vietnam War playing on background TV sets, soaking up the sordid atmosphere, including naked, surgically masked women cutting the dope -- so no one will steal anything -- and celebrities like Joe Lewis cheerfully slumming with the gangsters. The scruffiness of Richie's world makes a brilliant contrast to Frank's penthouse. Yet both worlds teem with moral ambiguity.
If there are no false steps here, there are few highlights either. Such films as "The Godfather" and "Serpico" contain iconic scenes and sequences. "American Gangster" contributes little. It's workmanlike and engrossing, but what sticks in the mind are Frank and Richie, not what anybody does.
The film concocts a final sequence in which the two finally meet and do a deal, the deal that apparently sprung Frank from prison to enjoy his old age: Frank rats out the SIU cops who shook him down, resulting in most of the unit going to prison. Richie ends up leaving the force to become a lawyer and eventually represents Frank. So "American Gangster" finally shows its true colors: It's really a buddy movie.
AMERICAN GANGSTER
Universal
Imagine Entertainment presents a Relativity Media/Scott Free Prods. production
Credits:
Director: Ridley Scott
Screenwriter: Steven Zaillian
Based on an article by: Mark Jacobson
Producers: Brian Grazer, Ridley Scott
Executive producers: Nicholas Pileggi, Steven Zaillian, Branko Lustig, Jim Whitaker, Michael Costigan
Director of photography: Harris Savides
Production designer: Arthur Max
Music: Marc Streitenfeld
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Editor: Pietro Scalia
Cast:
Frank Lucas: Denzel Washington
Richie Roberts: Russell Crowe
Huey Lucas: Chiwetel Ejiofor
Detective Trupo: Josh Brolin
Eva: Lymari Nadal
Lou: Ted Levine
Nate: Roger Guenveur Smith
Freddie Spearman: John Hawkes
Moses Jones: RZA
Nickey Barnes: Cuba Gooding Jr.
Dominic: Armand Assante
Mama Lucas: Rudy Dee
Running time -- 157 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
He is in fact a real-life character, an apparently highly attractive person -- likable even -- who made millions by killing people and ruining lives with the powdered death of heroin. Going up against this all-powerful yet ghostly figure who operates outside the old Mafia networks, is Richie Roberts, an incorruptible cop from the street who is determined put him in prison. Director Ridley Scott takes on these familiar subjects, themes and characters with a keen eye for the social fabric, false assumptions, suffocating corruption and vivid personalities that make such a story worth retelling.
So this is a gangster movie focused on character rather than action and on the intricacies of people's backgrounds, strategies and motivations. Whether it means to, the film plays off a clutch of old movies, from "The Godfather" and "Serpico" to "Superfly" and "Shaft". But Scott and writer Steven Zaillian make certain their Old Gangster is original and true to himself and his times rather than a concoction of movie fiction. Consequently, the movie is smooth and smart enough to attract a significant audience beyond the considerable fan base of its stars, Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.
You do sense in this movie that its principals are returning to safe harbor. After a discouraging foray into feeble comedy by Scott and Crowe ("A Good Year") and Gothic Southern melodrama for Zaillian ("All the King's Men"), these artists scramble back to an emotional naturalism more aligned to their sensibilities. Even for Washington, who seldom makes a false step careerwise, the film represents a welcome return to the larger-than-life villainy he performed so well in 2001's "Training Day".
Zaillian, working from Mark Jacobson's magazine portrait of Lucas -- a heroin kingpin of Harlem in the late '60s and early '70s -- sets two men on a collision course. Lucas (Washington), a country lad from North Carolina, is the nearly invisible driver and right-hand man to Ellsworth "Bumpy" Johnson, the most famous of Harlem gangsters. (So famous that this is his fourth movie reincarnation. Moses Gunn played him in "Shaft", and Lawrence Fishburne twice in "The Cotton Club" and "Hoodlum".) When Bumpy dies in his arms, Frank moves into the vacuum caused by his death with ruthless guile and a friendly personality.
Meanwhile, Richie Roberts (Crowe), a street-smart drug cop in New Jersey, is Frank's opposite: He can't help alienating everyone who crosses his path. His wife wants a divorce, insisting he leads a life entirely unsuitable to the welfare of their only child. Fellow cops shun him from the moment he brings in nearly a million dollars of recovered drug money. No one can understand why he didn't keep it, which says a lot about the state of policing in the New York/New Jersey area in 1968.
Frank's stroke of genius in the drug trade is to cut out the middleman. He flies to Thailand, takes a boat up the river in the Golden Triangle, makes a deal with a Chinese general, then arranges through an in-law to ship the kilos to New York in military planes coming back from Vietnam. His heroin, branded Blue Magic, hits the street twice as good and half as much as the competition.
It is so pure that dead junkies turn up all over New York. The police are baffled but look in all the wrong places. It never occurs to them that a black man is behind the scheme. Richie, whose whacked-out partner is one of Blue Magic's victims, is given his own task force. He finally targets Frank, but no one will believe him.
Frank flies under the radar. He hires only relatives -- a veritable army of brothers like Huey Lucas (Chiwetel Ejiofor) as well as cousins -- whom he sets up with storefront businesses that function as drug-distribution centers. He maintains a low profile and adheres to a rigid code of conduct. His major weekly outings are to church with his mother (the inestimable Ruby Dee) or to his nightclub with wife Eva (Lymari Nadal), a former Miss Puerto Rico.
Richie's major opposition comes from within. New York's anti-drug task force, the Special Investigations Unit, is rife with corruption. As personified by Detective Trupo (a strutting Josh Brolin), the SIU takes its cut right off the top.
In a story that ranges from the jungles of Harlem and Thailand to North Carolina backwoods, Scott is both hurried and leisurely. He covers a lot of territory, often in low-light levels and with the Vietnam War playing on background TV sets, soaking up the sordid atmosphere, including naked, surgically masked women cutting the dope -- so no one will steal anything -- and celebrities like Joe Lewis cheerfully slumming with the gangsters. The scruffiness of Richie's world makes a brilliant contrast to Frank's penthouse. Yet both worlds teem with moral ambiguity.
If there are no false steps here, there are few highlights either. Such films as "The Godfather" and "Serpico" contain iconic scenes and sequences. "American Gangster" contributes little. It's workmanlike and engrossing, but what sticks in the mind are Frank and Richie, not what anybody does.
The film concocts a final sequence in which the two finally meet and do a deal, the deal that apparently sprung Frank from prison to enjoy his old age: Frank rats out the SIU cops who shook him down, resulting in most of the unit going to prison. Richie ends up leaving the force to become a lawyer and eventually represents Frank. So "American Gangster" finally shows its true colors: It's really a buddy movie.
AMERICAN GANGSTER
Universal
Imagine Entertainment presents a Relativity Media/Scott Free Prods. production
Credits:
Director: Ridley Scott
Screenwriter: Steven Zaillian
Based on an article by: Mark Jacobson
Producers: Brian Grazer, Ridley Scott
Executive producers: Nicholas Pileggi, Steven Zaillian, Branko Lustig, Jim Whitaker, Michael Costigan
Director of photography: Harris Savides
Production designer: Arthur Max
Music: Marc Streitenfeld
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Editor: Pietro Scalia
Cast:
Frank Lucas: Denzel Washington
Richie Roberts: Russell Crowe
Huey Lucas: Chiwetel Ejiofor
Detective Trupo: Josh Brolin
Eva: Lymari Nadal
Lou: Ted Levine
Nate: Roger Guenveur Smith
Freddie Spearman: John Hawkes
Moses Jones: RZA
Nickey Barnes: Cuba Gooding Jr.
Dominic: Armand Assante
Mama Lucas: Rudy Dee
Running time -- 157 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 10/22/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
The title is catchy but misleading. Frank Lucas was less an American Gangster than an original Old Gangster in sable, a caricature in the tradition of '70s blaxploitation flicks.
He is in fact a real-life character, an apparently highly attractive person -- likable even -- who made millions by killing people and ruining lives with the powdered death of heroin. Going up against this all-powerful yet ghostly figure who operates outside the old Mafia networks, is Richie Roberts, an incorruptible cop from the street who is determined put him in prison. Director Ridley Scott takes on these familiar subjects, themes and characters with a keen eye for the social fabric, false assumptions, suffocating corruption and vivid personalities that make such a story worth retelling.
So this is a gangster movie focused on character rather than action and on the intricacies of people's backgrounds, strategies and motivations. Whether it means to, the film plays off a clutch of old movies, from The Godfather and Serpico to Superfly and Shaft. But Scott and writer Steven Zaillian make certain their Old Gangster is original and true to himself and his times rather than a concoction of movie fiction. Consequently, the movie is smooth and smart enough to attract a significant audience beyond the considerable fan base of its stars, Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.
You do sense in this movie that its principals are returning to safe harbor. After a discouraging foray into feeble comedy by Scott and Crowe (A Good Year) and Gothic Southern melodrama for Zaillian ("All the King's Men"), these artists scramble back to an emotional naturalism more aligned to their sensibilities. Even for Washington, who seldom makes a false step careerwise, the film represents a welcome return to the larger-than-life villainy he performed so well in 2001's Training Day.
Zaillian, working from Mark Jacobson's magazine portrait of Lucas -- a heroin kingpin of Harlem in the late '60s and early '70s -- sets two men on a collision course. Lucas (Washington), a country lad from North Carolina, is the nearly invisible driver and right-hand man to Ellsworth Bumpy Johnson, the most famous of Harlem gangsters. (So famous that this is his fourth movie reincarnation. Moses Gunn played him in Shaft, and Lawrence Fishburne twice in The Cotton Club and Hoodlum.) When Bumpy dies in his arms, Frank moves into the vacuum caused by his death with ruthless guile and a friendly personality.
Meanwhile, Richie Roberts (Crowe), a street-smart drug cop in New Jersey, is Frank's opposite: He can't help alienating everyone who crosses his path. His wife wants a divorce, insisting he leads a life entirely unsuitable to the welfare of their only child. Fellow cops shun him from the moment he brings in nearly a million dollars of recovered drug money. No one can understand why he didn't keep it, which says a lot about the state of policing in the New York/New Jersey area in 1968.
Frank's stroke of genius in the drug trade is to cut out the middleman. He flies to Thailand, takes a boat up the river in the Golden Triangle, makes a deal with a Chinese general, then arranges through an in-law to ship the kilos to New York in military planes coming back from Vietnam. His heroin, branded Blue Magic, hits the street twice as good and half as much as the competition.
It is so pure that dead junkies turn up all over New York. The police are baffled but look in all the wrong places. It never occurs to them that a black man is behind the scheme. Richie, whose whacked-out partner is one of Blue Magic's victims, is given his own task force. He finally targets Frank, but no one will believe him.
Frank flies under the radar. He hires only relatives -- a veritable army of brothers like Huey Lucas (Chiwetel Ejiofor) as well as cousins -- whom he sets up with storefront businesses that function as drug-distribution centers. He maintains a low profile and adheres to a rigid code of conduct. His major weekly outings are to church with his mother (the inestimable Ruby Dee) or to his nightclub with wife Eva (Lymari Nadal), a former Miss Puerto Rico.
Richie's major opposition comes from within. New York's anti-drug task force, the Special Investigations Unit, is rife with corruption. As personified by Detective Trupo (a strutting Josh Brolin), the SIU takes its cut right off the top.
In a story that ranges from the jungles of Harlem and Thailand to North Carolina backwoods, Scott is both hurried and leisurely. He covers a lot of territory, often in low-light levels and with the Vietnam War playing on background TV sets, soaking up the sordid atmosphere, including naked, surgically masked women cutting the dope -- so no one will steal anything -- and celebrities like Joe Lewis cheerfully slumming with the gangsters. The scruffiness of Richie's world makes a brilliant contrast to Frank's penthouse. Yet both worlds teem with moral ambiguity.
If there are no false steps here, there are few highlights either. Such films as The Godfather and Serpico contain iconic scenes and sequences. American Gangster contributes little. It's workmanlike and engrossing, but what sticks in the mind are Frank and Richie, not what anybody does.
The film concocts a final sequence in which the two finally meet and do a deal, the deal that apparently sprung Frank from prison to enjoy his old age: Frank rats out the SIU cops who shook him down, resulting in most of the unit going to prison. Richie ends up leaving the force to become a lawyer and eventually represents Frank. So American Gangster finally shows its true colors: It's really a buddy movie.
AMERICAN GANGSTER
Universal
Imagine Entertainment presents a Relativity Media/Scott Free Prods. production
Credits:
Director: Ridley Scott
Screenwriter: Steven Zaillian
Based on an article by: Mark Jacobson
Producers: Brian Grazer, Ridley Scott
Executive producers: Nicholas Pileggi, Steven Zaillian, Branko Lustig, Jim Whitaker, Michael Costigan
Director of photography: Harris Savides
Production designer: Arthur Max
Music: Marc Streitenfeld
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Editor: Pietro Scalia
Cast:
Frank Lucas: Denzel Washington
Richie Roberts: Russell Crowe
Huey Lucas: Chiwetel Ejiofor
Detective Trupo: Josh Brolin
Eva: Lymari Nadal
Lou: Ted Levine
Nate: Roger Guenveur Smith
Freddie Spearman: John Hawkes
Moses Jones: RZA
Nickey Barnes: Cuba Gooding Jr.
Dominic: Armand Assante
Mama Lucas: Rudy Dee
Running time -- 157 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
He is in fact a real-life character, an apparently highly attractive person -- likable even -- who made millions by killing people and ruining lives with the powdered death of heroin. Going up against this all-powerful yet ghostly figure who operates outside the old Mafia networks, is Richie Roberts, an incorruptible cop from the street who is determined put him in prison. Director Ridley Scott takes on these familiar subjects, themes and characters with a keen eye for the social fabric, false assumptions, suffocating corruption and vivid personalities that make such a story worth retelling.
So this is a gangster movie focused on character rather than action and on the intricacies of people's backgrounds, strategies and motivations. Whether it means to, the film plays off a clutch of old movies, from The Godfather and Serpico to Superfly and Shaft. But Scott and writer Steven Zaillian make certain their Old Gangster is original and true to himself and his times rather than a concoction of movie fiction. Consequently, the movie is smooth and smart enough to attract a significant audience beyond the considerable fan base of its stars, Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe.
You do sense in this movie that its principals are returning to safe harbor. After a discouraging foray into feeble comedy by Scott and Crowe (A Good Year) and Gothic Southern melodrama for Zaillian ("All the King's Men"), these artists scramble back to an emotional naturalism more aligned to their sensibilities. Even for Washington, who seldom makes a false step careerwise, the film represents a welcome return to the larger-than-life villainy he performed so well in 2001's Training Day.
Zaillian, working from Mark Jacobson's magazine portrait of Lucas -- a heroin kingpin of Harlem in the late '60s and early '70s -- sets two men on a collision course. Lucas (Washington), a country lad from North Carolina, is the nearly invisible driver and right-hand man to Ellsworth Bumpy Johnson, the most famous of Harlem gangsters. (So famous that this is his fourth movie reincarnation. Moses Gunn played him in Shaft, and Lawrence Fishburne twice in The Cotton Club and Hoodlum.) When Bumpy dies in his arms, Frank moves into the vacuum caused by his death with ruthless guile and a friendly personality.
Meanwhile, Richie Roberts (Crowe), a street-smart drug cop in New Jersey, is Frank's opposite: He can't help alienating everyone who crosses his path. His wife wants a divorce, insisting he leads a life entirely unsuitable to the welfare of their only child. Fellow cops shun him from the moment he brings in nearly a million dollars of recovered drug money. No one can understand why he didn't keep it, which says a lot about the state of policing in the New York/New Jersey area in 1968.
Frank's stroke of genius in the drug trade is to cut out the middleman. He flies to Thailand, takes a boat up the river in the Golden Triangle, makes a deal with a Chinese general, then arranges through an in-law to ship the kilos to New York in military planes coming back from Vietnam. His heroin, branded Blue Magic, hits the street twice as good and half as much as the competition.
It is so pure that dead junkies turn up all over New York. The police are baffled but look in all the wrong places. It never occurs to them that a black man is behind the scheme. Richie, whose whacked-out partner is one of Blue Magic's victims, is given his own task force. He finally targets Frank, but no one will believe him.
Frank flies under the radar. He hires only relatives -- a veritable army of brothers like Huey Lucas (Chiwetel Ejiofor) as well as cousins -- whom he sets up with storefront businesses that function as drug-distribution centers. He maintains a low profile and adheres to a rigid code of conduct. His major weekly outings are to church with his mother (the inestimable Ruby Dee) or to his nightclub with wife Eva (Lymari Nadal), a former Miss Puerto Rico.
Richie's major opposition comes from within. New York's anti-drug task force, the Special Investigations Unit, is rife with corruption. As personified by Detective Trupo (a strutting Josh Brolin), the SIU takes its cut right off the top.
In a story that ranges from the jungles of Harlem and Thailand to North Carolina backwoods, Scott is both hurried and leisurely. He covers a lot of territory, often in low-light levels and with the Vietnam War playing on background TV sets, soaking up the sordid atmosphere, including naked, surgically masked women cutting the dope -- so no one will steal anything -- and celebrities like Joe Lewis cheerfully slumming with the gangsters. The scruffiness of Richie's world makes a brilliant contrast to Frank's penthouse. Yet both worlds teem with moral ambiguity.
If there are no false steps here, there are few highlights either. Such films as The Godfather and Serpico contain iconic scenes and sequences. American Gangster contributes little. It's workmanlike and engrossing, but what sticks in the mind are Frank and Richie, not what anybody does.
The film concocts a final sequence in which the two finally meet and do a deal, the deal that apparently sprung Frank from prison to enjoy his old age: Frank rats out the SIU cops who shook him down, resulting in most of the unit going to prison. Richie ends up leaving the force to become a lawyer and eventually represents Frank. So American Gangster finally shows its true colors: It's really a buddy movie.
AMERICAN GANGSTER
Universal
Imagine Entertainment presents a Relativity Media/Scott Free Prods. production
Credits:
Director: Ridley Scott
Screenwriter: Steven Zaillian
Based on an article by: Mark Jacobson
Producers: Brian Grazer, Ridley Scott
Executive producers: Nicholas Pileggi, Steven Zaillian, Branko Lustig, Jim Whitaker, Michael Costigan
Director of photography: Harris Savides
Production designer: Arthur Max
Music: Marc Streitenfeld
Costume designer: Janty Yates
Editor: Pietro Scalia
Cast:
Frank Lucas: Denzel Washington
Richie Roberts: Russell Crowe
Huey Lucas: Chiwetel Ejiofor
Detective Trupo: Josh Brolin
Eva: Lymari Nadal
Lou: Ted Levine
Nate: Roger Guenveur Smith
Freddie Spearman: John Hawkes
Moses Jones: RZA
Nickey Barnes: Cuba Gooding Jr.
Dominic: Armand Assante
Mama Lucas: Rudy Dee
Running time -- 157 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
- 10/22/2007
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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