DARK BLUE - Blu-Ray

Rating 2.5 out of 5

Every writer has that one film or genre they are best known for, and for David Ayer that genre is the crime genre, largely due to two of his earliest films became smash hits: The Fast and the Furious, which spawned a multi-billion dollar franchise for Universal Pictures, and Training Day, which earned Denzel Washington his second Academy Award (this time in the best actor category). With two impressive films so early in his career, expectations were set for the next film he wrote: Ron Shelton’s LA crime drama Dark Blue set against the Rodney King riots, in which Ayer rewrote the original script that novelist and screenwriter James Ellroy had penned back in 1993. While there is no denying that Kurt Russell gives a good performance in the lead role of Eldon Perry, there are too many moving parts that simultaneously are underdeveloped and take too long to come together to create a gripping drama.

Corruption within a police department, bent cops making big money, an idealist trying to bring it all down aided by the legal department, and a young cop caught in the midst of it all. The screenplay that Ayer weaves within Dark Blue feels familiar to so many other crime dramas, which in of itself is not a negative, but his writing never truly develops it into something great. Set against the backdrop of the Rodney King Riots of Los Angeles in 1992, which apart from becoming a set piece for the film’s big final act action sequence is never truly utilized for any significant effect, your typical crime drama unfolds. For the first hour, the screenplay constantly jumps around between different characters while it sets up various subplots that seem unrelated, but any smart viewer knows that will become intertwined in the second half. From the personal life of Russell’s Eldon Perry falling apart as he is tasked with finding the “individuals” responsible for a shooting that everyone knows was committed corrupt cops that the police commissioner doesn’t want exposed, Scott Speedman’s young Bobby Keough finding himself being brought within the inner circle of his police department despite having moral conflict over what he is being asked to do, to Ving Rhames and Michael Michele’s Arthur and Beth trying to clean up the department, there are interesting ideas at play, but Ayer’s writing never makes any of them particularly compelling. It’s surprising given his track record up to this point in his career, and with what he would go on to do, but the first act lacks any sense of intrigue or urgency, which ultimately sets the second half of the film up for disappointment as the groundwork is not properly laid out to make the intersection of all these storylines a gripping culmination of the story. 

What the film does have going for it is the performances, particularly that of Russell. In every scene, Russell perfectly embodies Eldon Perry, bringing a grit and ruthlessness to this cop who has always lived in the grey, whether it be his treatment of perps on the job or the self-implosion of his marriage that he has caused. In a role that was specifically written for Russell by Ellroy when he penned the first draft of the script, Russell shines from start to finish, especially in the film’s final scene where Perry is forced to come to terms with his actions in a powerful monologue. Speedman is dependable as Bobby, the young cop finding himself in a complex situation that forces him to pick a side, using his teen heartthrob stays to disarm, Rhames and Michele are both good despite not having much screen time, and while Brendan Gleason nails the wickedness and corruption of Jack van Meter, his heavy Irish accent that constantly breaks through hinders his performance. 

Very much a product of the crime dramas of the late 1990s and early 2000s, Dark Blue is best viewed through a nostalgia lens as to what this genre offered at that time in terms of storytelling, not in comparison to what audiences are used to two decades after its release. With the strong performance of Kurt Russell leading the film and a solid supporting cast, there is without question an entertaining watch within the writing of David Ayer despite its narrative shortcomings, making Dark Blue an interesting but ultimately forgettable crime drama.