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Not rated. () |
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1126 |
5630 |
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(875) |
391 |
1953 |
Male |
(1649) |
735 |
3677 |
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Plot: A robbery homicide investigation triggers a series of events that will cause a corrupt LAPD officer to question his tactics.
Meet Other Fans
Recent Reviews
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MCT:May 23, 2008Really good crime movie. I can't believe those murderers killed people just like that. It looked so easy. Kurt Russell and Scott Speedman were awesome in this movie. I really wish that Bobby didn't have to be shot. The shot him like a million times, god. Those Ghetto people are so racist.
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MCT:April 16, 2008
Very cool movie. Not alot of special effects, explosions, or amazing gun sequences...but it's all made up for in twists and character development. It does have some action, but then whole movie just has a very cool feel to it. It is based off a James Ellroy novel. Ellroy is one of my favorite authors, along with Elmore Leonard. The screenplay was written by David Ayer, one of my favorite writter/directors, yet the movie was directed by Ron Shelton. The film stars Kurt Russel and Scott Speedman as partners, working for the LAPD. Brendan Gleeson plays their corupt boss, and Ving Rhames plays the Assistant Chief trying to take them down. Michael Michelle is Speedman's love interest, and Rhames' assistant. Rapper Kurupt and Dash Mihok both play petty criminals, and junkies. Lolita Davidovich is Russel's wife, and Rhames' wife is played by Khandi Alexander. Jonathan Banks is a higher-up of even Gleeson, who helps them out with information from the top. Rapper Master P plays an informer to Russel and Speedman. The music is really good and constantly keeps you on edge. It is kind of symbolic, that both Kurt Russel and Ving Rhames, both trying to make things right end up losing their wives. At the end they share a moment looking out at the city on fire, talking, and reflecting on everything.
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MCT:October 29, 2007A pretty good cop action/thriller i thought. The movie follows police corruption and gangsters on LA streets.. Kurt Russell and Ving Rhames are some of the actors and they did a good job. If u liked Narc / Training Day i bet u like this aswell.
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MCT:October 28, 2007I've got an awful lot of law enforcement related DVDs in my collection, and an awful lot of them deal with race or corruption. There are some exceptions (Bullitt, for instance) but I'd say that probably covers the majority that focus on cops in some way or other. I own chunks of some of the biggest and best law enforcement television shows (Homicide: Life on the Street, NYPD Blue, Hill Street Blues) with a definite bias toward street cops and detectives over things like CSI groups. I'm not a fan of either approach to cops, the belief that they are infallible or the belief that they are inevitably fallible. I prefer films that suggest both elements are present, or don't get into it, but as I already said, most of the ones I own do address it.
I'd say it's no real secret that this film is about corrupt cops. Kurt Russell is Eldon Perry, a veteran cop training rookie Bobby Keough (Scott Speedman) in the ways he knows from his long-time police family, which are less than orthodox and also less than legal. He works primarily through Jack Van Meter (Brendan Gleeson), head of their Special Investigations Squad (SIS) and friend to Perry's father. We open the film to footage of the Rodney King beating, establishing the tone, location and time for the film as the early 90s, in a time of extreme tension in Los Angeles. We see Perry anxious and pacing in a hotel room as the verdicts are about to come in. We then begin trading back and forth between scenes of Keough being interviewed by a shooting board to determine the legality of a shooting he participated in and the violent robbery of a Korean man's convenience store by Darryl Orchard (Kurupt) and Gary Sidwell (Dash Mihok), involving the theft of a wall safe and the cold-blooded murder of multiple bystanders.
Keough is naturally found to be within policy for the shooting (otherwise, what would he be doing through the rest of the movie?) and Perry congratulates him in a back office with the company of Van Meter and James Barcomb (Jonathan Banks, who you've probably seen before in any number of bit parts from Airplane! to Gremlins to Beverly Hills Cop, as well as plenty of television guest spots) who clearly feel the shooting--no matter what the circumstances--was the right thing to be done. Before too long, we see Van Meter visit Orchard and Sidwell (!) and demand the money they stole. Now, of course, we know that Van Meter is not acting in any interest but his own (Gleeson is altogether too good at roles like this, though he at least also has roles like Frank in 28 Days Later, though here he has restrained his natural Irish accent until he's left with just strong sibilants and pronounced d's and t's), and see a slightly different slant on things.
SIS, specifically Perry and Keough, are assigned the convenience store robbery--dubbed the "Jack of Hearts" killings--and Van Meter works to steer them away from his henchmen, but Perry is convinced he knows who the culprits are, especially after discovering through a guy on the street ("Maniac" played by the great Master P) that Henry Kim, owner of the store, has a less simple and clean background than he thought, and that the only surviving witness has identified the perpetrators as one white man and one black man.
From here we start to spiral into three intersecting stories--that of Perry and Keough's investigation, Van Meter's attempts to direct them, and the final one, as yet unmentioned: Ving Rhames is an up-and-coming assistant Chief of Police and he smells corruption in the department. As yet he has been able to do little to stop it and is disheartened but persistent. Working for him is Michael Michele (who Homicide fans may remember as Detective Sheppard--funny, because I thought "Who is that? I remember her as a cop or something before, and she is good at the part...") who is currently involved with Keough.
It felt, to me, like an amalgamation of Colors and Narc, though the team of Speedman and Russell is not near so strong as Duvall and Penn or Liotta and Patric. I wasn't disappointed with either (disappointed with Russell?! How could that happen?! Well, ok, Big Trouble in Little China disappointed me, but oh well) but it was still not up to that level. But it was a good story, with an EXTREMELY tense final half hour (and a very impressive shootout that had me thoroughly tense, a rarity these days, and an outcome that I actually was surprised at the quality of performance in) and an interesting mix of the real events surrounding the King trial and riots. The riots do look and feel pretty real and intense, which was good to see, as that is something that can easily fall apart.
Lastly, the score: it's similar, in some ways, to the very cold, bleak electronic score of Narc, though not quite as forlornly, depressingly beautiful (and the songs are the likes of NWA and Eazy-E, rather than Tricky and the Baby Namboos doing the heartbreakingly beautiful "Provoked"). It's very fitting and a good thing to have, and the gangsta rap chosen is well-chosen and well-placed. Not a disappointment at all, in my opinion, and not overly biased for or against cops as anything but humans like the rest of us. Even Perry ends up described by events as more misguided than evil, though he does show racist tendencies. -
MCT:October 26, 2007
I thought this movie was great. It was totally overlooked - everywhere. Watch for Brendan Gleeson, he shines.
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MCT:October 18, 2007
Russel shows some skill in this movie. The cinematography and the dialogue are simple and uncomplicated and it does justice to the movie. With a simple plot and major special effects, this movie shows drama and skill with it's sentimental corrupt view.
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MCT:September 4, 2007
Fine police drama of the case appears to be a typical shoot-and-lot until elite cop-unit detectives are assigned to investigate and their white boss and the city's black assistant police chief butt heads aimed a law-enforcement and judicial system teeming with corruption and bigotry.
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MCT:August 23, 2007
From the same director as Training Day, but Kurt Russell can't carry this as Denzel carried that, still an interesting look at the Rodney King riots.
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MCT:August 11, 2007
I was sort of disappointed with this one. It was OKAY, but not nearly as good as I expected from a Kurt Russel movie...
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MCT:July 23, 2007
liked this movie b/c it set in today society and the problem facing with law in forcment and the inner city
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MCT:July 20, 2007
Similar to "Training Day," this movie is also about corrupt cops and takes place around the time of the Rodney King riots. lt's hardcore and gritty, and that's what l like.
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MCT:July 6, 2007
Another suprisingly interesting cop story here. Adding the Rodney King riots element to the equation is brilliant. Kurt Russell proves again why just casting him makes the movie better.
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MCT:June 30, 2007
It might be too familiar, but the script is full of good dialogue and Kurt Russell's performance is incredible.
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MCT:May 4, 2007
Makes me sick. The lies, dishonesty and corruption. The notion that you can use people, disregarding their lifes because they are considered inferior. This movie is well done, but truly horrible
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MCT:April 27, 2007
En Serpico-light för 2000-talet.
Upplägget till Dark Blue kan få vem som helst att dra på sig skyddshandskar och vässa klingan till motorsågen. Nerdekad tuff snut spelad av medelmåttan Kurt Russell får en partner med ett bättre samvete och tvingas slåss mot korrumperade överordnade. Som regissör finner vi Ron Shelton som mest överöst oss med supersentimentala sportfilmer om baseball (Bull Durham, Drömmarnas Fält) och golf (Tin Cup), alltid med supertorrbollen Kevin Costner i huvudrollen. Lyckligtvis valde han bort honom till denna film då han ger sig in i den flerfaldigt filmade polisthrillergenren. Resultatet blir förvånande nog, med tanke på förutsättningarna, riktigt lyckat utan att för den skull vara särskilt originell. Mycket beror nog på att den hårdkokte deckarförfattaren James Ellroy legat bakom förlagan, nämnde Ellroy låg ju också bakom en av 90-talets allra bästa filmer, L.A Konfidentiellt. Dark Blue når självklart inte upp till Serpico och Prince of the citys höga nivå och inte heller är den lika angelägen och överraskande som Narc, 2000-talets bästa polisfilm hittills. Däremot ligger den strax under den nivå Copland och fjolårsaktuella Training Day uppvisade. Kurt Russell imponerar och gör troligtvis sitt livs mest minnesvärda insats, i varje fall är det hans bästa prestation på många år. Också Ving Rhames lyckas återupprätta sin status efter en hel del snedsteg. Nykomlingen Scott Speedman är mer än godkänd och veteranerna Lolita Davidovich och Brendan Gleeson gör sällan några klavertramp. Manuset innehåller en väl vässad dialog, men hade kunnat trimmats ner något, det finns en del irriterande superklyschor som passerar revy. Största besvikelsen dock i en annars väl berättad historia är avslutningen som känns både ansträngd, orealistisk, småsentimental och förutsägbar. Även Rodney King-temat känns lite slarvigt hopkastat, fungerar mest som en outnyttjad kuliss till vad som pågår i handlingens centrum. Med en mer intressant regissör än tidigare nämnda Ron Shelton hade nog slutprodukten kunnat bli en av genrens bättre, nu får den gott nöja sig med att placeras bland mittfåran. -
MCT:March 19, 2007
This was a treat. A great cop movie but not your run of the mill man in blue plot...this has bite. The title is very to the point.
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MCT:March 18, 2007
Gritty and enthralling! Kurt Russell is fantastic as this damaged cop with one last chance to put it right.
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MCT:March 16, 2007
Det. Sgt. Eldon Perry Jr.: [to Maniac] You really think this bullet gives a shit how tough you are, big guy?
This is a very decent cop movie made better by the fact that it stars Snake fucking Plisken and Marsellus Wallace.
Kurt Russell is very good as a cop who bends the rules all the time and knows it. He is a dirty cop, but does so to protect and serve and feel better about his job as well.
Ving Rhames steps in campaigning to fuck up everyone's plans and does so with authority.
There are enough good moments to make this movie work as well as some real life drama intertwined with this movie the help things play out.
The ending is also pretty neat.
Maniac: I mean he got game.
Det. Sgt. Eldon Perry Jr.: Game? Mr. Kim? What's he play, Golf? Speak fucking English! -
MCT:February 27, 2007
One of those movies nobody saw that was probably better than all but one or two of the movies out at the time.
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MCT:January 26, 2007
Not quite a 4 star film, but almost. Kurt Russell is awesome in this (He usually is awesome), as is Scott Speedman. I don't mind these types of movies, and I thought it was all very interesting. The only part I didn't much like or go for was the ending, which is why this isn't a 4 star film for me.
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MCT:December 1, 2006
A very good, very well acted, VERY well directed cop drama, set in the days leading up to the LA riots of 1992. A character driven story without a doubt. Many ppl may not like this movie bc although it is a violent film, it's not really heavy on the violence as it is much more heavy on character development.
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MCT:November 16, 2006
Great cop/crime/corruption film which slipped under the radar when it was released. Better than "Training Day" (which may not be saying much).
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