Making a good police movie is a very hard thing. Either the film is too pretentious (Pride and Glory) or it trivializes the job (Righteous Kill). Director Antoine Fuqua made the decent but trivial cop film Training Day back in 2001. He returns to that genre with Brooklyn’s Finest, and delivers a solid and intriguing film about three police officers. The police officers in question are played by Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, and Richard Gere. Each one is at a different stage of their careers, but the weight of the job is taking a toll on all of them. The film relies entirely on the characters, and thankfully the acting is superb. Watching the characters weave their way through the explosive environment of Brooklyn is fascinating to watch. It is like watching a long fuse going to a powder keg. There is going to be an explosion, but it is a matter of time. Fuqua was able to control all three story lines and make them coherent, something which when not achieved can destroy a film. The actors make each storyline supremely watchable and I was never wishing for the other story lines to be on screen. They were all equal. That being said, they all equally had problems. In Hawke’s storyline I found the motivation of providing for his family not sincere enough. In Cheadle’s his involvement with Wesley Snipes gang could have been explored more, and Gere’s relationship with a prostitute has been seen before (1990s Internal Affairs which Gere was also in). These faults are outshined by all the good parts in the film, and they are more personal problems with the story then a fair critical analysis.
A Good Banana
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