Brooklyn’s Finest

Parallel but intersecting stories, the perspective of the street and the cops, gritty realism, the presence of actors we know from their portrayals of Clay Davis, Wee-Bey and Omar… it is not hard to figure out that Brooklyn’s Finest is trying to mine the rich territory staked out in The Wire. It fails, unsurprisingly given that the bar is pretty high, but it does so predictably and disappointingly. The movie, filmed on location in Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood, follows three cops. Ethan Hawke is desperately trying to cash in on some drug raids to make a down payment on a new house for his large and expanding family (his Catholicism is referenced often). Don Cheadle is an undercover cop, who has infiltrated a drug gang (led by Wesley Snipes, in a fine performance), and feels the tug of dual loyalties. Richard Gere is a weary alcoholic, a few days from retirement, in love with a prostitute, unable to find meaning in what he does. Inevitably, these three stories converge in the final half hour.

Some of the street dialogue has echoes of The Wire, and most of the lead performances are professional, but each story arc is utterly predictable, and the movie is laden down with the search for “meaning” though what that meaning is certainly eluded me. The intrusive soundtrack, obvious menace implied in the framing of key scenes, and sheer stupidity of the roles forced on these fine actors, undermined any wider understanding of the neighborhood or the thankless task of the cops, or anything wider than the artificial, paper-thin character flaws that we are invited to watch play out over 135 minutes. Not unenjoyable, but unless you are making a much better movie than this, inviting comparisons to The Wire is a mistake.