If this is really 'Brooklyn's Finest,' New Yorkers should be very afraid
How does one outdo a gritty cop film like "Training Day"? Remember Denzel Washington picked up an Oscar for his efforts? In the mind of director Antoine Fuqua, why not take three Brooklyn cops in various stages of their careers, rough them up with some old-school toughness — because in order to survive the mean streets, they have to be meaner — and watch them each dance to the beat of their own drums? It could be interesting, especially when you enlist the help of Don Cheadle, Richard Gere and Ethan Hawke. But if you’re going to bring this kind of star power, it had better be something new and different that will keep an audience mesmerized for the two-plus hours. Sadly, it doesn’t happen in "Brooklyn’s Finest." More sadly, each story is as cliched as the next. First, you have veteran narcotics officer Sal (Hawke), who looks like the same character he played in "Training Day," only now he’s been doing the job a lot longer and gets what Washington was trying to teach him. He has a large family, with his poor wife (Lili Taylor) expecting twins. Plus, her asthma is made worse by their home’s wood mold. He’s desperate to find a new, bigger house, but that will require a substantial down payment he doesn’t have. Ah, but he’s surrounded by drug money in the busts they make every day. Why not just grab a bundle or two and everyone goes home happy — well, except the dead drug dealers. Second, Tango (Cheadle) has been undercover so long, he’s lost his wife, but has gained a bunch of new drug thug buddies, including crime boss Caz (Wesley Snipes), who has just been released from prison (no, not for tax evasion, smart guy). Tango wants out of the underworld, but his cop bosses and the feds want just one more big drug bust to boost their careers. Guess who they want to take down. Yep, his BFF Caz. Third, there’s Eddie (Gere), a street cop on the verge of retirement who has done his best to avoid any kind of trouble. He’s just been going through the motions the last few years, coasting until his pension kicks in. He, too, lost his family, but more than likely because he drinks too much and loves hookers. He’ll be assigned a rookie cop who pricks his conscience into remembering what it was once like to "protect and serve." All three stories are separate, but as is the fashion these days, they will intersect at a crucial moment that is way down a long and winding road. And when it gets there, all that pent-up rage and violence that Fuqua is famous for comes pouring out like a smoldering volcano turning into Mount St. Helens — only blood for ash. Again sadly, it’s all too awkward and melodramatic. Hawke does the conflicted Catholic boy routine, shaking his fist at God. Cheadle is the coolest, but his flip-out moment is almost inexplicable. And Gere’s is the toughest to swallow as he goes from "who gives a hoot" to supercop Serpico in the drop of a spent bullet casing. Overly cooked, overly long and overly familiar — "Brooklyn’s Finest" is just another dirty-cop drama that’s nothing special.
