Rated R - Running Time: 2:00 - Released 10/5/01
TRAINING DAY
Rated R - Running Time: 2:00 - Released 10/5/01
I said once that Denzel Washington was getting in a rut playing
clean-cut good guys; that it would be nice to seem him play roles
with more grit. Well, Denzel must read Film Quips, because
he seems to have taken my advice. I'll try not to let it go to
my head. In Antoine Fuqua's Training Day, Washington plays
a streetwise LAPD narcotics investigator assigned to impart his
wisdom upon a fresh new recruit played by Ethan Hawke. In this
part Washington is as gritty as it gets, and Hawke is effective
as his tough-yet-naive protégé. It is unfortunate
that the script by David Ayer is so riddled with pretense, but
Washington, Hawke, and their supporting cast do all they can to
play through. Moreover, director Fuqua, whose last effort was
the overlong and conflicted comedy/thriller Bait,
continues to work in the style he loves (big city cop stories),
but shows an improved sense of consistency, rendering a tense
if implausible story.
Training Day, which features cameos by various black
entertainers like Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre, and Macy Gray, all takes
place between morning and night on one day in Los Angeles. Jake
Hoyt (Hawke) has been given the chance to move to the big leagues
of undercover narcotics investigation if he can pass the tests
given to him by veteran Alonzo Harris (Washington). Counseling
Hoyt to "forget everything [he] learned at the academy,"
Harris shows him that to be a good narcotics cop, he must resist
the impulse to bust every small-time crook on the street and concentrate
on catching the "big fish," a practice which includes
but is not limited to taking drugs, driving under the influence,
conducting searches without a warrant, beating up suspects, and
shooting unarmed people. Which is really, if you think about it,
a much more fun way to go about law enforcement than bothering
with the boring old law. But before the day is over, Hoyt learns
that Harris himself is in trouble with some Russian government
thugs, and must use ill-gotten gains to get them off his back.
Soon (about late evening) he finds himself in an uncomfortable
situation where he must choose between his allegiance to his rogue
mentor and his integrity as one of L.A.'s finest.
It is ironic (and an unfortunate choice by the good people
at Warner Bros.) that this movie should be released now, in this
present atmosphere where police and firefighters are regularly
being talked about as heroes and the nation's citizens are generally
lining up behind them following a national tragedy. It would have
played better, say, 10 years ago, right after the Rodney King
beating (but before the O.J. verdict), when the idea of a crooked
cop, especially in L.A., was more palatable to the U.S. consciousness.
Still, mistiming aside, Training Day suffers from a few
other flaws as well, primarily in the script. While it may be
believable that some big-city narcotics agents occasionally bend
the law in order to apprehend a major criminal, this scenario
goes way over the top. Washington seems uncomfortable in this
role, probably because of the lengths to which his character must
go to move from Hoyt's trusted mentor to full-fledged villain
status. While a well-trained and talented actor can usually play
any kind of part with skill, there are certain script vs. human
nature issues at work here that can undermine even the best actor's
work. As a result, Washington's performance is overwrought, moreso
as the final reel unspools.
Hawke is adequately effective as Hoyt, having his eyes widened by all that he sees and yet learning to make his own judgments independent of what his twisted superior tells him. Overall, Training Day is sufficient entertainment for those who do not wish to think too hard. ***½