American Gangster on Blu-ray Disc Review
By Brandon A. DuHamel
The Film
There was certainly a lot of hype surrounding
American Gangster leading up to its release. From the anticipation and accolades that were being thrown at it pre-release, one would have thought that the film was Oscar-worthy. American Gangster doesn't reach that level of quality by any means. In fact, the film is somewhat of a letdown in comparison to the expectations, but it's not wholly unentertaining either.
Based on the true story of Frank Lucas, a self-made Harlem drug lord who would become one of the most powerful crime figures New York City has ever scene, the film is set in the waning years of the 1960's and the first half of the 1970's when the war in Vietnam was raging, inner city crime and unemployment was rampant and a heroin epidemic was sweeping through the minority population. Lucas (Denzel Washington), mentored by Bumpy Johnson (Clarence Williams III), inherits Johnson's "business", for lack of a better word, when Johnson dies and uses his street smarts and keen sense of business know-how to expand and best his competition. Hitting upon the idea of getting his heroin supply directly from the source in Vietnam, Lucas begins smuggling the purest, cheapest heroin into the US and pushes out most of the competition.
He doesn't go unnoticed, however, and New Jersey cop turned prosecutor Richie Roberts (Russell Crowe) begins to investigate Lucas' crime syndicate, but he runs into complications of his own -- corrupt New York City police, and officials who refuse to believe that a black man could have built up such a powerful and well organized crime syndicate even more successful than the Italian mafia.
Ridley Scott's direction gives the film an appropriately gritty appearance that captures the feeling of the post-hippie, Watergate-era, recession-weary 1970's by painting the landscape with a drab, muted color palette of muted earth tones and the appropriate wardrobe of the times. He doesn't shy away from the violence nor is he squeamish to show the realities of what effect heroin had on the population. Still,
American Gangster doesn't break any new ground. Watching the film, the look and feel are less like an authentic attempt at capturing an era and more a throwback to films such as
Taxi Driver or
Mean Streets with a little
Starsky & Hutch thrown in for good measure.
What ultimately carries
American Gangster are the powerful performances from the film's lead actors, Washington and Crowe (both Academy Award winners in their own right) and the knowledge that this film is indeed based on factual events. Frank Lucas was not a good man and I dare say Denzel Washington's portrayal was probably more sympathetic than it ought to have been, but both Washington and Crowe have an undeniable energy onscreen when given the proper material, and they both worked wonders with this script. They have taken a film that may have fallen by the wayside and raised it up to something above average and surprisingly entertaining.
The Picture
American Gangster is available in both the
Theatrical version and an
Unrated Extended Edition on this release. Both versions come in a 1.85:1 1080p/24 high definition VC-1 encoding. It's ultimately impossible to tell if the problems with the picture quality are due to the source itself or the VC-1 encoding, but
American Gangster appears soft and lacking in detail. The film's color palette is purposely muted with an emphasis on dull earth tones, like browns and tans, but blacks are washed out and contrast is somewhat dark. In fact, I'm astonished to say that this Blu-ray release of
American Gangster doesn't look any better than the 1080i MPEG-4 broadcast from DirecTV's Starz on Demand that I watched only a few weeks ago. In fact, that broadcast looked just a little bit sharper, which just shouldn't be.
Other than its softness, dull appearance and low contrast, the transfer doesn't display any other errors such as macroblocking or processing effects like edge enhancement, but that’s not enough to save this release from being far less than reference.
The Sound
In stark contrast to the less than spectacular picture quality,
American Gangster comes with a high quality English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless mix. Additionally, the
Theatrical version also offers a French DTS 5.1 dubbed soundtrack. The lossless soundtrack is clean and dynamic with effective use of directionality in the surround and front left and right channels. The sounds of the New York City streets fill out the surround channels with traffic and the low hum of crowd noise. The film's multitude of gunshot effects sound natural and easy on the ears with good support from the LFE. Dialogue is crisp and full, never lost in the mix even during the film's louder sequences. The mix could stand to use just bit more ambience to fill out the somewhat dry sounding dialogue, but other than that there's not much to find fault with.
The sound mix is most effective at bringing
American Gangster's retro-soul 1970's influenced soundtrack to life and that is where the use of the LFE really comes into play as the lower frequencies of in the original and classic songs are smooth, warm and solid.
The Extras
American Gangster comes with quite a bit of extras, all in standard definition, that delve into the film's production and the true events that the film is based on. Unfortunately, there is plenty of overlap in the information offered, so sitting through all of the supplements can become a bit tedious and monotonous. Anyone interested in the history of the events surrounding the
American Gangster story and Frank Lucas will find
Tru Blu: The Real Story to be the highlight offered here, but, again, much of the ground covered in this mini-documentary is gone over many more times.
The extras provided on this release are:
- Commentary with Director Ridley Scott and Writer Steven Zaillin -- This audio commentary is available only during the Theatrical version of the film and, unlike most audio commentaries, is focused far less on the particulars of the film's production than it is with going over the factual, historical details that the film is based upon.
- Deleted Scenes (1.85:1/standard definition) -- Very brief alternate and deleted scenes from the film that add nothing to the narrative:
- Alternate Opening
- Frank and Eva's Wedding
- Fallen Empire: Making American Gangster (1.78:1/standard definition) -- This is a series of four behind-the-scenes featurettes on the film's production and one mini-documentary on the real-life figures of Frank Lucas and Richie Roberts, and the 1970's drug scene on the East Coast of the United States.:
- Tru Blu: The Real Story -- This delves into the true story of Frank Lucas, Richie Robberts and the growing heroin problem on the East Coast in the 1970's.
- Killer Threads: Costumes -- Costume designer Janty Yates discusses her work designing American Gangster's 1970's style wardrobe and the differences in the style of the different characters.
- Crime War: Production -- In this segment, the evolution of the project is explored, including casting decisions, preproduction, etc. Actors and filmmakers speak in brief interview segments and the director speaks to the challenges faced filming on location in areas that have changed so dramatically from the era they were trying to capture on film.
- Into the Arena: Ali vs. Frazier -- The film crew discuss setting up filming for the Ali vs. Frazier fight scene in the movie. Interestingly, 1500 inflatable bodies were used, intermingled with live people, to fill out the crowd scenes in the backgrounds.
- Rhythm of the Street: Sound, Music, and Editing -- Music supervisor Kathy Nelson and music producer Hank Shocklee speak about putting together an authentic, 1970's soul musical soundtrack for the film and Shoklee's reworking of the 70's song "Do U Feel Me" for the film's soundtrack, which is sung by Anthony Hamilton who makes a cameo in the film to perform the song as well.
- Case Files (1.78:1/standard definition) -- Divided into three segments, "Script Meeting", "Heroin Test Show & Tell" and "Setting up the Takedown", these behind-the-scenes pieces find director Ridley Scott consulting with the police, Richie Roberts, and screenwriter Steven Zaillin to work out the factual details of historical events, the proper ways to test the purity of heroin, and to set up the films dénouement where Lucas' crime organization is taken down by the police.
- Hip-Hop Infusion featuring Common and T.I. (1.78:1/Standard definition) -- The Hip-Hop artists Common and T.I. discuss their roles in American Gangster and the film's impact in the black community.
- The BET Special: The Making of American Gangster (4:3/standard definition) -- Promotional television special from BET, featuring interview segments with the actors and director Ridley Scott.
- Dateline NBC: American Gangster First Look (4:3/standard definition) -- Another promotional television special, this time from the NBC network's Dateline, hosted by Matt Lauer. Matt interviews Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe in a sit down setting as they discuss the historical events surrounding Frank Lucas and Richie Roberts as well as their experience filming American Gangster.
- Music Videos (4:3/standard definition)
- "Do You Feel Me (Remix)" Performed by Anthony Hamilton featuring Ghostface Killah -- This music video features a slightly remixed version of the "Do You feel Me" theme song as performed by Anthony Hamilton from American Gangster.
- "Blue Magic" from Jay-Z's Album American Gangster.
- Theatrical Trailer (4:3/windowboxed/standard definition)
- U-Control -- BonusView (Pofile 1.1) picture-in-picture commentary with behind-the-scenes looks at the filming relevant to the particular scene being shown. Most of the information here can be found elsewhere in the supplements without the distraction of the huge secondary window taking up a big chunk of the screen.
Final Thoughts
Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe both put in strong performances in this gritty, well-directed drama from Ridley Scott. The fact that it is based on true events that occurred in the recession-plagued 1970's makes it even more compelling. Although this BD release offers a definite picture quality improvement over DVD and the sound quality of the lossless soundtrack is of a high quality, I recommend this release with the caveat that you may be underwhelmed by the picture in comparison to other high definition releases.
Where to Buy
Also available as part of a set:
Product Details
- Actors: Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Josh Brolin, Lymari Nadal
- Director: Ridley Scott
- Audio/Languages: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1, French DTS 5.1
- Subtitles: English SDH, French, Spanish
- Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
- Number of discs: 1
- Rating:Unrated
- Studio: Universal Studios
- Blu-ray Disc Release Date: October 14, 2008
- Run Time: 158 minutes
- List Price: $29.98
- Extras:
- U-Control
- Feature Commentary with Director Ridley Scott and Screenwriter Steven Zaillin
- Deleted Scenes Including an Alternate Ending
- Fallen Empire: Making American Gangster
- Case Files
- Hip-Hop Infusion, featuring Common and T.I.
- The BET Special:The Making of American Gangster
- Dateline NBC: American Gangster First Look
- Music Videos
