IAP Political Forum

Went to see a late show last night and probably one of the best movies of the year (with 300 and Transformers also). I won't give away much of the plot except for one tiny detail....

Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe are in it.

Oh, and I was also surprised at someone's cell phone only rang once during the whole movie.

It was a great movie...I don't think it was better than 300 though.  It was good and Denzel is my favorite actor and celebrity outside the acting set as well.  He's a class act!

I didn't get to hear as many great 1 liners from him as I would have liked, and Crows performance was solid, but not great.  THey've both made better movies. 

bottom line:  solid acting all around, GREAT story line. I give it an 8.5/10

I was wondering.  It looks good.  But it is hard for me to get around the trailers we have been seeing, when they blow up that GT350H Mustang.  I mean, how could they?

Ridley scott has now been immortalized in film by creating another timeless ganster movie. 

I thought it was amazing.  One of the best gaster movies ever made and definately is oscar worthy.

BTW, micfranklin, how does very arfully and well-done movies like American Gangster and 300 even compare to the overly marketered crap that is Transformers?

I mean I am not saying it wasn't cool and that I wasn't excited to see it, but Transformers was a crap movie.  The only reason it was remotely good was you got to see Transformers on the big screen and Meaghan Fox...who is smoking hot.  ;D

Anyways, the end to American Gangster took the cake.  It was the best ending to a movie since...oh I don't know...cabin fever!?  :laugh:

I will have to agree with Gojira. This movie blew us away. I would actually have to say that it was better as good or better than The Departed. I certainly felt more of a connection to the characters, and there was never a dull moment. This film is a classic and Ridley Scott has immortalized himself in the world of film with this one. It's not as if he didn't already, but now he's taken a true story and made a work of art out of it. No Aliens on another planet, just an actual real story.

I have to agree with the above comments. A really great film. Although with the dominating australian connection of Ridley Scott and Russel Crowe, I may be biased  ;)

The main aspect of this film that made it so encapturing, was the two separate stories in the lives of both characters, and coming together at the end. You have two completely separate characters leading totally seperate lives with separate problems, and through circumstance being forced to confront each other towards the end of the film. The scene where they first meet is amazingly eye catching.

The other good point of the film was how it catches the drug industry on film, the big players and their exuberant wealth and lifestyle, the drug addict victims who are exploited for profit, the corrupt police officials and others who set aside their morals for the almight dollar, and the whole basis of how the drug dealing business works. The drug industry is the optimum depiction of greed. You put aside your morals completely in exchange for money, and you profit from someone elses misery and ultimate death.

IMO the acting in it was great. Denzel and russel played their parts and characters well. All in all a really great film.

It kinda reminded my family, especially the older members, of how hard heroin, opium and other drugs hit the cities back then in the 70's.

Its sad to think about. Where did your family grow up MIC?

One of the things that I got out of the film was that Frank Lucas has a really struggling childhood and he see's first hand the injustices handed out to his family because of being black. But by going into the heroin trade and exploiting all those people, making so much money out of other peoples misery, he turns out to be nothing better than the people he grew up despising.

We're all Baltimoreans and they grew up in the inner city, so seeing shit happen because of people doing drugs wasn't new to them.

Then again my granddad, who served in Vietnam, says people did stuff like heroin to try and escape everything that happened there.

I saw it last night and it was very good.


*Spoiler Alert*
Twas interesting how he turned into the kind of guy his mentor despised

Didn't he turn out exactly like his mentor?

SPOILER ALERT

No. Remember in the beginning before he died he was talking about how people were cutting out the middle man and creating job loss? And how wrong it was and what right do people have to do that.That's exactly what Washington did, he went straight to the supplier.

That sounds almost like problems regarding class today.....too much in fact....hmmm

Ah, well done Totino. I had completely forgotten about that. My bad. I was thinking along the lines of his ruthlessness with non payers, and handing out the parcels to the poor, but you are quite right with what you say about cutting out the middleman.

What do you mean MIC?

Yeah. Ahh well I do what I can in terms of the small guy. I try to get my stuff from the mom and pop shops :P.

All the problems with the economy today are messing up middle and lower class people.

Mic you watch the WIRE?

I loved that show...Saw the first 3 seasons, but I don't get HBO anymore =(

Never seen the show at all. Probably should start looking for clips of it on HBO or Youtube.

The Wire is one of the best shows on television today, with a hardcore fanbase, however, not a lot of other people seem to know about it. This is the last season. The previous season was about inner city schools and this one is about the Baltimore Sun Newspaper, the season is written by a guy who worked there for years and years. The amazing thing about The Wire is about how realistic it is. This season pissed off a bunch of people at the Sun supposedly, but when they were showing special feature episodes a few people who actually work there are cast as background characters so apparently not everyone is pissed off.