Street Kings

2008-04-11
By Sergio A. Mims

CAST: Keanu Reeves, Forest Whitaker, Hugh Lurie, Common, The Game, Cedric The Entertainer, Chris Evans, Naomie Harris,Terry Crews

WRITTEN BY:  James Ellroy, Kurt Wimmer and Jamie Moss

DIRECTED BY:  David Ayer

RATED R

* *** ½ THREE AND A HALF STARS

Originally set as a film project to be directed by Spike Lee under it’s original title, The Night Watchman, Street Kings is a hyper violent, superbly made cop thriller that rises heads above its shopworn movie clichés. Playing in many ways like the final episode of the terrific FX series “The Shield” (a show that puts the overrated and underseen The Wire to shame), Kings in the hands of director David Ayer and co-writer, framed crime novelist  James Ellroy, surmounts the clichés with an electric vitality that seems almost original, which is no mean feat.

Using the well known plotline of corrupt cops battling nasty criminal elements and set in L.A. far from Rodeo Dr and Hollywood Blvd, Keanu Reeves plays Tom Ludlow, a burned out, hard drinking, crooked cop who works with an equally dirty gang of fellow policemen overseen by their captain (Whitaker) who turns a blind eye to their illegal activities. When Ludlow finds out that a former member of their team, Washington (Crews) is spilling his guts about his shady dealings and unethical practices to Internal Affairs (led by Captain Biggs (Laurie), Ludlow’s got him in his crosshairs.

Before Ludlow can get his grimy hands on him, Washington is brutally shot in a convenience store right in front of him in a hit by some unknown drug dealers. Despite Ludlow’s attempt to save
Washington’s life, he fails. Not surprisingly, Internal Affairs suspects that he was involved with the murder.

Despite his team’s relief that a potential headache is out of the way, Ludlow decides on his own to find out the truth. What he finds reveals more stinking corruption, hidden secrets and lies which lands Ludlow on the wrong end of a Glock more than once.

Director Ayer, who wrote the scripts for Training Day, U-571, S.W.A.T., The Fast and The Furious also wrote and directed one of the best and most overlooked films of 2005, Harsh Times
which contained an Oscar worthy, searing performance by Christian Bale. Ayer gives Kings an appropriately grimy look and his nerve racking, in-your-face, approach to the film’s numerous and copiouslybloody shootouts are startling.

Despite some occasional, but by no means fatal, slacking in the tension, the pace of the film and its steely, aggressive sensibility is sharp, assured and totally involving. Though one can figure out where the story is going before it gets there and the dialogue wavers between pungent and routine (no doubt due to the several screenwriters credited), the film is never boring.

Though he might seem somewhat miscast as a hardnosed cynical cop Reeve is genuinely impressive and convincing in the role of Ludlow. Using his usually placid, emotionally blank face to his advantage, Reeves gives an excellent portrayal of a desperate, emotionally shut off man who slowly begins to realize that the ugly world he’s trapped in is uglier and more corrupt than he ever imagined. It should come as no surprise that both Whitaker and TV’s Hugh Laurie (“House”) almost steal the show.

If the true sign of a terrific movie is one that makes the old, tired and familiar seem new, fresh and exciting, Street Kings is definitely one terrific movie. Film critic, lecturer and festival consultant Sergio Mims covers all things film from the city that works, Chicago. He is a regular contributor to ebonyjet.com