Brooklyn's Finest (2009)

Three unconnected Brooklyn cops wind up at the same deadly location after enduring vastly different career paths.

Director:

Antoine Fuqua

Writer:

Michael C. Martin

Stars:

Richard Gere, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke

1 win & 10 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Richard Gere	...	Eddie
Don Cheadle	...	Tango
Ethan Hawke	...	Sal
Wesley Snipes	...	Caz
Will Patton	...	Lt. Bill Hobarts
Lili Taylor	...	Angela
Michael Kenneth Williams	...	Red
Brían F. O'Byrne	...	Ronny Rosario
Shannon Kane	...	Chantel
Ellen Barkin	...	Agent Smith
Vincent D'Onofrio	...	Carlo
Wass Stevens	...	Det. Patrick Leary
Armando Riesco	...	Det. George Montress
Wade Allain-Marcus	...	C-Rayz (as Wade Allain Marcus)
Logan Marshall-Green	...	Melvin Panton (as Logan Marshall Green)

Storyline

In Brooklyn, amid drug deals, violence, casual racism, poverty, housing projects, and corrupt cops, we follow three officers: Tango, African-American, working undercover, believing he's earned a promotion to a desk job but told he has to set up the bust of an ex-con who saved his life; Sal, who'll commit murder to get cash to buy a house big enough for his family; and, Eddie, the precinct's oldest beat cop, a week to go before retirement, assigned to mentor an earnest rookie. Can this end well for any of the three?

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Plot Keywords:

undercover | detective | retirement | murder | catholic | 

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Taglines:

Every man has a moment of truth.

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated R for bloody violence throughout, strong sexuality, nudity, drug content and pervasive language

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site [fr]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

5 March 2010 (USA)

Also Known As:

Los mejores de Brooklyn

Filming Locations:

Avenue R & East 14th Street, Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$25,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

£468,279 (UK) (11 June 2010)

Gross:

£1,252,604 (UK) (2 July 2010)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Millennium Films, Thunder Road Pictures, Nu Image Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

132 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital DTS SDDS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Wesley Snipes' first US theatrical film in over five years since his starring role in Blade: Trinity. In between those years, his films had either been released straight-to-DVD or suffered distribution problems (Chaos) before being released to DVD.

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Goofs

When Tango and Caz are on the roof and Tango pulls out his gun you see that he has cocked the hammer, but then you hear the gun hammer cocking again.

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Quotes

Det. Sal Procida: Change that skirt. People are gonna start to think we're Catholic only on Sundays.

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Connections

Features Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction (2005)

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Soundtracks

"Lovin' You Tonight"
(1997)
Written by The Notorious B.I.G. (as Christopher Wallace), Sean Combs (as Sean Puffy Combs), R. Kelly (as Robert Kelly) and Daron Tavaris Jones (as Daron Jones)

User Reviews

the Righter and Wronger ways of genre film-making

Antoine Fuqua aims high within the limitations he has for Brooklyn's Finest. By that I mean the film is fairly low-budget, or at least middle of the road (my guess is twenty million), and it was shot on location in Brooklyn and places around. He also has a script that has its share of clichés and potential pitfalls for cinematic treatment. It's surprising how well the film comes off with the elements, and they are ALL familiar: the cop just nearing retirement (Gere), on his way out, who has to shepherd a rookie through his first days on the; a corrupted cop (redundant mayhap) that is scrounging for any money he can on raids (Hawke) needs it for a slightly noble cause, a new house for his growing family; a cop undercover (Cheadle) has to choose promotion or loyalty with a criminal takedown on the horizon.

Three very recognizable types, and the tropes are there, at least on paper. But where Fuqua sets himself apart, as he did to a good if not great extent on Training Day, is to imbue importance (not pretentious but just enough for serious effect) in the direction of scenes, and in casting. The actors take material that could be trite and unconvincing and even stale post-Lumet-cop-movie stuff and make it their own, compelling and heartfelt, and true to the extent that the genre allows. There's real tragedy felt with Hawke's character, albeit he may overact just a bit in some scenes, since this corrupt cop wouldn't be so bad if he could get what he needs ("I don't want God's forgiveness, I want his help," he says in confession), and likewise real conflict with Cheadle's undercover, who has been embedded too long in the trenches, and wants to help the criminal who once saved his life (Wesley Snipes fantastic in an older, slightly wiser version of his character in New Jack City).

And then there's Gere. One almost forgets Gere's successes when he's starring in romantic-comedy junk like... well, what's he been in recently for starters. But then one looks at Unfaithful, Days of Heaven, The Hoax, I'm Not There, among some others, and one sees Gere is an underrated presence, a guy who when given material to shine in does very well as an everyman, more than just a typical pretty star. With his role as the on-his-way-out cop, he gives one of his best performances, worn and weary, but strong and good as a cop whenever he can see fit, who at one point makes a mistake that he won't cop to (watch Gere when he's interrogated about his rookie's mishap on a convenience store scuffle and it's something of genius work). It's intense and believable, and even tender and sorrowful work, like when Gere's character is around a prostitute he's fallen for.

Back to Fuqua though - this is a filmmaker who knows what he's working in, and wants to transcend it. Perhaps his idol for this kind of production was Sidney Lumet with his cop films: make something dramatic and tragic, and never lose the grit, but add panache with the directing. He knows the conventions and has to stick to them, sometimes for weaker or just expected effect. But watching his style in that last reel, when all three stories that have been going back and forth (ocassionally intertwined) come together at one project building. There's a scene where Hawke is personally raiding a place. Watch the camera in this scene, where it stays put in one spot for seemingly a minute. It could almost be a Tarantino move, something self-conscious but purposeful for the action, the psychology of the emotion of the scene. His work with better material would be astonishing. As it is, it's just good, inventive film-making.