Home :: DVD :: Mystery & Suspense :: Thrillers  

Blackmail, Murder & Mayhem
British Mystery Theater
Classics
Crime
Detectives
Film Noir
General
Mystery
Mystery & Suspense Masters
Neo-Noir
Series & Sequels
Suspense
Thrillers

Training Day

Training Day

List Price: $14.96
Your Price: $11.22
Product Info Reviews

<< 1 2 3 4 5 6 .. 45 >>

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Felipe Sahurie says "Training Day needs to Step Away"
Review: Obviously Denzels worst.I don't know what all the fuss is about.You can see clearly that this movie is pointless in all different kind of ways.I don't recommend this movie to ANYONE.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Denzel is the Best
Review: Traning Day is the greatest movie ever. Once again Denzel proves why he is the greatest actor in hollywood. He was so bad which was so good!!!! You have to purchase this movie to see a true master at work.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Denzel in his most surprising and twisted role yet
Review: Denzel Washington has played many brilliant characters in the past, most notably Malcolm X and The Hurricane, Rubin Carter. Unlike those real life characters, Alonzo Harris has no ties with reality, thank God. This character is a cop who has been in the streets for too long dealing with scum that eventually his mind and morale went crooked. Trust me, we do not want these kind of characters wandering our streets! Denzel nails the part with extreme professionalism which earned him an Academy award for Best Actor.

Ethan Hawke, who plays rookie cop Jake Hoyt, is excited and yet very unlucky to be assigned to Harris for a his first day, training day. What Hoyt is about to experience is a day that he will be looking back at not as a day of his training to be a cop, but as a day he chose the moral path he would stick to for the rest of his life.

Antoine Fuqua's direction brings the realism of the streets and smoothens the atmosphere for his characters to express themselves freely, especially Washington who seems to steal every scene he's in with the dialogue that he conveys like a pro and its Ethan Hawke who does a wonderful job of staying one step behind Washington making the characters interactions one on one an interesting viewing.

The DVD features several bonuses including a behind the scenes segment, an alternate ending and a couple music videos.

Recommended

A-

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A Must See!
Review: As a huge Denzel fan, I kept hoping that his character would do something to redeem himself, while hating his character more and more in each scene. The fact that you are totally convinced of what a terrible person his character is just proves what a great actor Denzel is...and Ethan Hawke is pretty good as well. While I personally believe Denzel should have won the Oscar for Malcolm X, I definitely understand why he got it for this one! The movie is incredible.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: The Cop who crossed the Line!!
Review: This movie is AWESOME!!! It has non-stop action from start to finish! Denzel Washington's role is superb and he won an academy award for it! I am pleased to say that this movie is one of my favorites! Very action packed, a non-stop thrill ride, and knockout entertaiment!
There is a very good plot and Ethan Hawke did a fantastic performance as well. This movie keeps your undivided attention throughout the entire thing. You do not want to leave your seat for fear of missing any of the action! Excellent buy and an entising experience!! :)

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Silly
Review: Training Day is visually superb, well directed, usually well acted, and masterfully edited. The one and only problem with it is the story, a story which gets progressively more and more ridiculous to the point of being laughable. Washington and Hawke play off each other very well, but I had to suspend a tremendous amount of disbelief just to endure the idiotic plot. I found Training Day quaint and fairly entertaining, but overall a silly endeavor.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Drugs And Money
Review: This may be the best drug movie I've seen! There's two guys, who try to prevent the drug dealers to deliver drugs. The other has been in this business long time but the other is just starting. There's tough things, the beginner has to decide what to do: be a normal cop or make the things as the older one says. Eventually, the younger one is so pi**ed off that he decided to make an end for it! A brilliant movie! Defintely not boring! There's also two good rap videos in extras!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Gravital Constant; G= 6,67x10(-8)cm36m(-1)Sec(-2).
Review: Well, some police action with a twisted Cop as the main bad guy inter forcing with a young Detective wannabe, somewhere between a Gangster story and a Police Urban flick. Training Day is about the thin line between the good protocol deed and the confusing brutal police methods in the every day patrolling Black and Latin ghettos, either you are a sheep or a wolf, and so, the young trainee (Ethan Hawk) has a full day to become a wolf, at the end, a wolf is needed to catch another wolf, and in this story, its about a big bad wolf with some Russian problems. Denzel Washington portraits Alonzo Harris, disguised as an efficient police effective famously known by his unorthodox techniques, who underneath is one of the most meticulously malignant guys in the hood, masterfully planning the only one move that can saves his a... The poor Rookie enters the masquerade foolishly thinking he is in a one in a life time shot to become a Wolf among Wolves, but is all about mind games.
The greatest quality of Training Day is its two main characters; the story is constructed upon an ambiguous Police detective, Denzel Washington does a wonderful and strong profile of the corrupted Alonzo Harris (this is the one role that is away from those alike idealistic and moral characters Denzel is used to portrait), his always imposing presence and sharp skills are a perfect match for the character, and Denzel expresses every glimpse and words with a totally confusing and frightening tone, exactly what was required for this role that has the whole movie in his backs. Ethan Hawk does an equally fine job as the young but smart Rookie, (without this character there will be no plot), the strange thing is that both actors appears the same amount of time on the story and are equally important, so the Academy's decision to split Washington as Best actor and Hawk as Best Supporting Actor, is not accurate, any way, this is the way it was done. The film goes strong and intensive until the end, the story should have ended when the Rookie catches Alonzo at his lovers apartment, but Alonzo's death is to much stretched out and turn both silly and un-believable (from the story's point of view), slowing the pace and breaking all roughness of the concept, a very unfortunately decision that turns Training Day in another movie with a good beginning and a bad ending. If the decision was taken because of the Studio, feeling that the story needed to enhanced the ending by making it more unexpected (they thought), or because Washington put hand to save some of his more histrionic moments, it doesn't mattered (neither the alternated ending), because, this was decided to be the definitive Cut (that's why the other ending is labeled as Alternated), and so, all the carefully constructed psychological atmosphere of Aggressive against the Public Enemy, falls down heavily, and you no longer feel seduced by the plot (maybe I am wrong, and this was the director's idea). Another thing is that the Alonzo character needed some more ambiguity as the story develops, but that's a little something.
Antoine Fuqua sustains his good direction towards the ending, where it falls down by the oppression of whatever situation with the Big shots, (remember, most Producers and Studio Executive, are nothing more than Bankers), no Pink Wallet saved the situation, and so, Alonzo Harris falls down by his own WEIGHT for all the bad deeds he made, at the end, they felt heavily on his shoulders, gravity is something terrible.
A very smart blend between the original score and the songs (mostly Gangster's Rap) fulfills the shocking action and still moments. Nice photography and perfect settings does some more goods for the film. What ever the film is a realistic portrait of Police Corruption or a blown up idea of the Truth because of its action possibilities and appealing, well, only an L.A. Cop knows for sure, but the film is close enough to the real thing with some commercial inserts in it, but it can't be taken as a lesson or as an important film in that matter, nothing more than a nice action movie with something more to it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Alonzo's Philosophy vs. His Actions
Review: Denzel was incredible. I've always liked him, but he truly startled me in this movie. "This is chess, it ain't checkers!" his character declares at one point.

Of course, upon repeated viewings, Alonzo comes off as more of a slimebag than urban philosopher. Note his words on the cell phone upon exiting a house where he has murdered a man in cold blood ("make sure the tub is clean"). Thus, his entire speech to Hoyt (including the "chess" remark) was entirely two-faced. He had already arranged Hoyt's murder at that point. A deleted scene reveals he'd planned to murder Hoyt's wife and child as well, along with burning down Hoyt's house, all to make an example of him. Of course, this makes me wonder (why didn't he let Dre kill the guy?).

I don't know if I like Hoyt, but at least he stood for something when most of us would have folded. I can almost understand Alonzo's point of view, and that scares me. I suppose that's the point of the movie, though. If we had just looked at the philosophy that Alonzo spouted, we could perhaps ride along.

But it's his willingness to murder a fellow officer to keep him "out of the way" that shows us who Alonzo truly is: someone who lives by the street rules of "look out for Number One." His loyalty is only to himself and, to a limited degree, the people on his team that are just like him (as long as they assist him and go along with it). He's not loyal to Hoyt, a fellow officer, to his wife, to his numerous illegitimate children, or to the welfare of others. I don't know if he saw that girl being attacked by those crackheads, but I do know he felt it was a waste of time and resources to stop to help her.

This movie has its heaviest impact in the first viewing, before Alonzo's flaws become apparent enough to discount his vocalized philosophies about the street. After the first viewing, he looks more and more like a manipulative hypocrite, hard-talkin' but with no loyalty to others.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Denzel says, "You trust me? Well, watch this..."
Review: Denzel burns up the screen in one of the smartest bad guy roles ever played. Ethan Hawke is surprisingly talented as a young rookie looking to do the right thing and make a name for himself. The plot is terrific. Macy Gray makes a short appearance and steals the scene--nice surprise there. Every little bit of film is put to use in this movie. NOt a single thing happens that you can't pay attention to. nothing extraneous here. It's all important... details, details... It all comes to fruition, you must only watch.


<< 1 2 3 4 5 6 .. 45 >>

© 2004, ReviewFocus or its affiliates