Honestly, Ridley Scott spends most of this movie either ripping off better directors or jacking a Blaxploitation aesthetic at its most shallow. I admit, I'd watch a sequel of Frank Lucas the snitch, that has always seemed like the more interesting story.
Fabulous assessment. Saw it a year or so ago, and part of me was thinking, "How could I never have seen this? This is a terrific movie!" -- but a week later, I'd forgotten I'd seen it.
It's been forever since I've seen either movie but doesn't Washington's (justifiably Best Actor winning!) Training Day performance show he is capable of turning off the charm? Thus the fault of American Gangster lies with the direction?
Your post is making me wonder about the overall typography of bad guys in cinema and TV on the charisma axis. Are all the best "antiheros" (as a specific subset of villain) in the latter medium? There we can see performances toggle between charisma and repulsion for so many episodes/years so we are...(De?)sensitized to it?
Film casting regularly goes into a ditch on the similar charismatic issue of casting objectively very attractive women as a supposedly "ugly duckling" or outcast. I can suffer the conceit and understand why it happens but it's also not based on a true story.
Thank you for reading! That's certainly true about the ugly duckling: when (in 2012) I saw The Heiress on broadway (based on Henry James's Washington Square), Catherine was played by Jessica Chastain--the makeup she needed to become plain was probably the same amount needed to make Lon Chaney Jr. into the Wolf Man.
Joking aside, I think the first hour of TD is great because Denzel is so charismatic: his charisma makes Ethan Hawke (and us) excuse what we ordinarily would not; once the cat's out of the bag in the second half, it just becomes a by-the-numbers cop-corruption movie. He turns off the charm in that second half, but by then I thought all the tension was released. There's no longer any grey area. The idea of needing to be a wolf to protect the sheep is no longer an issue; the idea that one must commit small crimes to prevent bigger ones is gone. Denzel is shown to be a Very Bad Man and will pay for it because Ethan Hawke is a Very Good Man.
To me, the "fault" of AG is that Denzel's charm excuses a multitude of sins; real people like Frank Lucas are terrible. (They are fascinating nonetheless.). But I put "fault" in irony-marks because AG is still a wholly enjoyable movie--just not the one that it seems to want to be. AG could have been much more unsettling (and perhaps then not as successful) if someone less charismatic than DZ played that part. Thanks again for reading and commenting! --Dan
Charisma doesn’t have a cost. Joe Pesci has charisma. Gene Hackman had charisma. Gena Rowlands had charisma. The difference is actually a matter of vanity. Fear of alienating the “public.” Or “my audience.” A character goes into uncomfortable territory and the actor is obliged to not just go there but illuminate that territory. When they don’t, it shows.
Thanks for reading! I meant “cost” as in what’s lost in AG when Denzel is too charming by half. That’s interesting about “the public”— thinking of how tightly the studios used to control who could play what. You also made me think about Henry Fonda in Once Upon a Time in the West: he has charisma but is completely believable as the psychopathic Frank.
The cost of charisma, like the cost of living, is indefinable, but definitely real! And sometimes debilitating, such as here, where you rightly point out Denzel’s sheer inability to be the bad guy…all the time.
Like Redford, he just can’t do it, no matter how hard he tries.
I get the sense that producers want him to be a bad guy because he can pull off a stern expression and has gravitas, but I find he just can't veer into real bad guy territory. That's why the first hour of Training Day is so much better than its second.
Thank you! As Johnson said, "Depend upon it, Sir--life on Grub Street affords so few recognitions of merit that the poor wretches are oft forced to rely on hyperlinks to convey what their talent cannot articulate."
100%.
Honestly, Ridley Scott spends most of this movie either ripping off better directors or jacking a Blaxploitation aesthetic at its most shallow. I admit, I'd watch a sequel of Frank Lucas the snitch, that has always seemed like the more interesting story.
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Thanks! Yes, that would be a better story.
Fabulous assessment. Saw it a year or so ago, and part of me was thinking, "How could I never have seen this? This is a terrific movie!" -- but a week later, I'd forgotten I'd seen it.
Thank you!
It's been forever since I've seen either movie but doesn't Washington's (justifiably Best Actor winning!) Training Day performance show he is capable of turning off the charm? Thus the fault of American Gangster lies with the direction?
Your post is making me wonder about the overall typography of bad guys in cinema and TV on the charisma axis. Are all the best "antiheros" (as a specific subset of villain) in the latter medium? There we can see performances toggle between charisma and repulsion for so many episodes/years so we are...(De?)sensitized to it?
Film casting regularly goes into a ditch on the similar charismatic issue of casting objectively very attractive women as a supposedly "ugly duckling" or outcast. I can suffer the conceit and understand why it happens but it's also not based on a true story.
Thank you for reading! That's certainly true about the ugly duckling: when (in 2012) I saw The Heiress on broadway (based on Henry James's Washington Square), Catherine was played by Jessica Chastain--the makeup she needed to become plain was probably the same amount needed to make Lon Chaney Jr. into the Wolf Man.
Joking aside, I think the first hour of TD is great because Denzel is so charismatic: his charisma makes Ethan Hawke (and us) excuse what we ordinarily would not; once the cat's out of the bag in the second half, it just becomes a by-the-numbers cop-corruption movie. He turns off the charm in that second half, but by then I thought all the tension was released. There's no longer any grey area. The idea of needing to be a wolf to protect the sheep is no longer an issue; the idea that one must commit small crimes to prevent bigger ones is gone. Denzel is shown to be a Very Bad Man and will pay for it because Ethan Hawke is a Very Good Man.
To me, the "fault" of AG is that Denzel's charm excuses a multitude of sins; real people like Frank Lucas are terrible. (They are fascinating nonetheless.). But I put "fault" in irony-marks because AG is still a wholly enjoyable movie--just not the one that it seems to want to be. AG could have been much more unsettling (and perhaps then not as successful) if someone less charismatic than DZ played that part. Thanks again for reading and commenting! --Dan
Charisma doesn’t have a cost. Joe Pesci has charisma. Gene Hackman had charisma. Gena Rowlands had charisma. The difference is actually a matter of vanity. Fear of alienating the “public.” Or “my audience.” A character goes into uncomfortable territory and the actor is obliged to not just go there but illuminate that territory. When they don’t, it shows.
Thanks for reading! I meant “cost” as in what’s lost in AG when Denzel is too charming by half. That’s interesting about “the public”— thinking of how tightly the studios used to control who could play what. You also made me think about Henry Fonda in Once Upon a Time in the West: he has charisma but is completely believable as the psychopathic Frank.
Terrific piece, Daniel!
The cost of charisma, like the cost of living, is indefinable, but definitely real! And sometimes debilitating, such as here, where you rightly point out Denzel’s sheer inability to be the bad guy…all the time.
Like Redford, he just can’t do it, no matter how hard he tries.
I get the sense that producers want him to be a bad guy because he can pull off a stern expression and has gravitas, but I find he just can't veer into real bad guy territory. That's why the first hour of Training Day is so much better than its second.
Completely agree about Training Day, Daniel.
Thank you! As Johnson said, "Depend upon it, Sir--life on Grub Street affords so few recognitions of merit that the poor wretches are oft forced to rely on hyperlinks to convey what their talent cannot articulate."