An ordinary and sordid movie.
Training Day (2001)
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Reviews Counted:152
Fresh:109
Rotten:43
Average Rating:6.5/10
Consensus: The ending may be less than satisfying, but Denzel Washington reminds us why he's such a great actor in this taut and brutal police drama.
Rated: R [See Full Rating] for brutal violence, pervasive language, drug content and brief nudity
Runtime: 2 hrs 2 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Theatrical Release:Oct 5, 2001 Wide
Box Office: $76,074,739
Synopsis: Every day, there is a war being waged on America’s inner city streets – a war between residents, drug dealers and the people sworn to protect one from the other. This war has its casualties, none... Every day, there is a war being waged on America’s inner city streets – a war between residents, drug dealers and the people sworn to protect one from the other. This war has its casualties, none greater than L.A.P.D. Detective Sergeant Alonzo Harris (DENZEL WASHINGTON), a 13-year veteran narcotics officer whose questionable methodology blurs the line between legality and corruption. His optimism has long since been chipped away by his tour of duty in the streets, where fighting crime by the book can get you killed, and getting the job done often requires Alonzo and his colleagues to break the laws they are empowered to enforce. A gritty, realistic drama set in the morally ambiguous world of undercover police investigation, Training Day shadows Alonzo as he tests the resolve of idealistic rookie Jake Hoyt (ETHAN HAWKE), who has one day and one day only to prove himself to his fiercely charismatic superior. Over the next 24 hours, Jake will be pulled deeper and deeper into the ethical mire of Alonzo’s logic as both men put their lives and careers on the line to serve their conflicting notions of justice. Training Day is a blistering action drama that asks the audience to decide what is necessary, what is heroic and what crosses the line in the harrowing gray zone of fighting urban crime. Does law-abiding law enforcement come at the expense of justice and public safety? If so, do we demand safe streets at any cost? Or do we risk our security by insisting that those empowered to protect us do so within the boundaries of the law? At a time when police across the nation are battling a public image of rampant corruption, narcotics use, planting evidence and excess brutality while patrolling the meanest streets of America, Training Day paints a gripping and realistic portrait of the war taking place on the urban front lines – and just how high the costs of this battle can be. -- © Warner Bros. [More]
Starring: Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke, Scott Glenn, Tom Berenger
Starring: Denzel Washington, Ethan Hawke, Scott Glenn, Tom Berenger, Snoop Doggy Dogg, Eva Mendes, Dr. Dre, Raymond J. Barry, Will Foster Stewart, Harris Yulin, Macy Gray
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Director: Antoine Fuqua
Screenwriter: David Ayer
Producer: Jeffrey Silver, Robert Newmyer
Composer: Mark Mancina
Studio: Warner Bros.
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Reviews for Training Day
Denzel Washington just keeps on getting better -- and he's positively riveting in Training Day.
Denzel Washington plays a villain for the first time ever, and his electrifying performance is the film's most powerful element.
Even though Training Day doesn't resolve itself as well as it deserves and ends strictly cops-and-robbers style, it's given us some great acting and something to ponder.
The last 30 minutes or so land squarely in eye-rolling country. But Washington's performance is enough to put Training Day over the top.
Ayer has woven a complicated plot in which even the seemingly most insignificant event will impact on the film's harrowing climax.
Training Day is explosive action, and all that stuff, and it's a shame that the front and back halves of the movie don't match up.
All you're left with are the messages that -- surprise -- crime hurts everyone, and life sucks. You could buy a DMX CD and hear the same rap -- at least it would rhyme.
Director Antoine Fuqua, whose credits include the unimpressive The Replacement Killers, keeps a kinetic pace with visually exciting immediacy.
Here's a cop drama with some brutal smarts, rather than dumb brutality and smart-alecky one-liners.
To create a meaningful scenario, you must have a credible balance between good and evil. Training Day self-destructs on its cavalier failure to honor that axiom.
Benefits from the best screen performance since Glory by the mighty, mercurial Denzel Washington.
Works best as a one-on-one contest between two quality actors playing characters with opposing points of view.
Alonzo Harris ultimately is a character whose plausibility can't withstand our scrutiny, but Washington's turn as him is a wicked performance to relish.
Director Fuqua, Mr. Washington, Mr. Hawke and the rest prove that there's nothing wrong with the urban-crime genre that a little energy can't cure.
Washington's performance is that rarest kind of tour-de-force showboat.
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