This film makes Eastern Promises look good (see my review of Eastern Promises.) I only lasted one hour into the film – if a film can’t make a compelling case for itself in one hour, forget it.

These filmmakers have no idea how to set up a movie! Ridley Scott could have learned a thing or two from (cough) Ben Afleck. Gone, Baby, Gone may not have a great set-up, but it does at least have a reasonably competent set-up. The plot is engaged within about 10 minutes, and decently written dialog tells us all kinds of information about all the characters and sets the plot in motion.

Ridley Scott’s movie, on the other hand, is a dissertation on how not to write a movie. The plot is not set in motion until 42 minutes into the movie – this is never a good sign. Those 42 minutes are wasted on badly done back-stories for the two lead characters. It is incredible how little information the filmmakers convey in that space of time. We learn almost nothing about who Denzel was or is (for a while I honestly thought he was the son of the guy he works for in the beginning,) who his family is (they pop out of the blue later) or why we should care about them, how Denzel set up his operation, how the whole import thing worked, did they hit any snags and how did he overcome them, who Russell Crowe is, why he is so pure and driven as a cop, and nothing, not a hint, about what might link these two men. All this time is spent on Crowe’s partner – why? They kill him off, and that’s it. I don’t even know his name!

Scene structure in the film is pathetic. Take the scene where Denzel sits down with his brothers in the restaurant, which should have covered all kinds of ground about his operation, who he was or had become, who each of them were (if that was important,) and set up the narrative to come in an interesting and compelling way. Instead, the scene basically exists in the movie exactly as it sat in the preview: after uttering some quotable line that was specifically crafted for a preview, he gets up, walks out of the restaurant, shoots someone, comes back and calmly says “now, what was I saying.” So all we learn is that he is kind of nuts. We don’t even get an unambiguous reaction from the brothers, as they watch their sweet little brother blow some guy’s brains out seemingly for nothing, and a scene or two later, they are all partying with Denzel happily.

Similarly, the scene where Russell Crowe sits down with his new team to discuss what they will be doing should have been riveting! It should have communicated the character traits of all the men and their interrelationships, established dramatic anticipation of what was to come, and could even have been your first view of what really makes Crowe’s character tick. Instead, what do we get? A retread of the “I heard you found a million dollars and gave it back – what’s wrong with you?” storyline, which was already covered, boringly, with about 10-15 minutes of earlier film. So the scene simply falls flat – no interest is generated, no information communicated.

It’s like film-making for retards. They keep repeating these painfully basic facts: “twice as good for half the money,” “gave back a million dollars”, etc. Absolutely painful. Then we have the “fuck me like a cop, not like a lawyer” scene, just to wake everybody up. What does Crowe’s womanizing have to do with anything in the film? So why is there a scene about it?

To add boredom to injury, the film is visually uninteresting, and completely fails to capture new York in the 1970s, either the look or the vibe. Academy Award nomination for art direction? You have to be joking! Watch the street scenes near the opening of Fame, or watch Marathon Man, and see for yourself how close they got to the real thing.

That’s enough time wasted on this piece of rubbish. Go watch The French Connection to see just how well the whole “cops and drugs in 1970s New York” thing can be done.