Review of Training Day (2001) by Anirudh R — 16 Jul 2011

"I'm the police, I run shit around here. You just live here. Yeah, that's right, you better walk away. Go on and walk away... 'cause I'm gonna' burn this motherfucker down. King Kong ain't got shit on me.".

I can't believe it's been out for 10 years and I've only just got to watching this, really this is a fantastic piece of cinema. Denzel puts in a monster performance as a cop gone not just bad but damn near evil, it's no wonder he won the oscar. Ethan Hawke was great as well but when standing next to someone who's shining so bright it's hard to stand out.

Throughout the film as the day unfolds Denzel's character subjects Hoyt to more and more shit that it's hard to believe that he'll make it to the end of the day, then the big reveal comes and it fucking mindbending that what you've been watching has been planned to the letter from the start. I liked all the cameos from music stars, none of which are terrible, and the fact that they used real gang locations and actual gang members from those areas.

The fact that Denzel's character is such a cliche in ways of a dirty cop to begin with but as it goes on it becomes more apparent that he is the only cliche in the film and the way he views the gangs and the criminals is far from how it really is, the fact that they hate him because he hasn't earned respect and isn't honest about what he does but they are and respect Ethan Hawke's good cop character was one of the better parts of the whole film for me. Really really loved this.