hyped garbage

The first must-see film of the year.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. The characters are quickly built due to great casting & acting performances all round. A harrowing journey into the mindset of a complex and reckless cop while he's encountering a downward spiral in his life. The journey showcases the loneliness of the main character 'Dave' and his attempts to obtain an equilibrium. his recklessness is rather exciting viewing, and each day that he sets off - the viewer is in suspense as to what is ahead, on any given day. The film is 50/50 focusing on his life off duty and on duty which I found interesting in its direction, as it meets an overall viewer objective - which for me, was a show of a Cop lost in the LA noise. I wasn't expecting much from this film which is why I think I enjoyed it so much. If you liked 'Leaving Las Vegas' 'Raging Bull' 'Training Day' Crash - then i'm sure you will enjoy this, an easy to watch film with an out of this world cast of best supporting actors.

(18%) One of those rare movies that has some really good aspects, the main one being Woody Harrelson's very strong central performance, but overall this is frustrating misfire. By the 30th or so minutes in this feels like it's padding itself out without giving anything in return in terms of real substance, it's all just bits and pieces spoon fed every so often. This does eventually get itself going, but again it's very much one step forward one step back as it just doesn't go that one step further needed to make this a worthy film. It is almost as if Harrelson and the director are both trying to whip up some much needed energy, but they can only go so far with it before hitting a brick wall. The supporting cast is more distracting than impressive with famous faces popping up and quickly going away again, almost as if they all had a gap between projects so agreed to appear in this for a few days pay because there's no real reason why such big name stars would play such minor roles in a police drama. This, like the similar "End of watch" is a well acted, but pitifully low content failure of a movie that proves a good central performance isn't enough to make a good movie.

If you are going to produce a film about the Rampart scandal (and dedicate the film to the "victims of Rampart") then you better make a film that accurately reflects the day to day existence of the cops you are targeting.Rampart's main character, Woody Harrelson, is a mess, like this movie. The standard-bearer for unrealistic LAPD movies is clearly "Training Day", but Rampart is not far behind. I'd even take the movie "SWAT" over those two, as it doesn't pretend to be that realistic.The problems are immediate: "Date rape" is a completely impractical movie nickname for a cop in LAPD, especially if it's because Harrelson allegedly killed such a suspect. Wouldn't the suspect get that nickname???? C'mon! The whole "date rape murder" back story is weak.Then there's the Ned Beatty back story of a retired cop advising "Date Rape" on his situation and providing a tip for an off-duty gambling take down scheme where "Date Rape" kills a man while in uniform. This case is so poorly investigated it is unbelievable. "Date Rape" then feels the retired cop and friend of his father set him up which results in a weird gun confrontation in broad daylight, apparently unwitnessed by anyone at the beach near LAX.Harrelson is a 24-year patrol cop with LAPD, with FTO (Field Training Officer) status who appears to work by himself some days, then afternoons with a female trainee, and other times late-nights, again by himself. At one point he shows up in uniform on his day off to participate in a gambling hall take-down, by himself.Even after a "big-time use of force" which is captured on video, he is allowed to continue driving around in uniform on patrol! Folks, things like this did not happen in the LAPD, as bad as things may have been in the 90's at Rampart. Nor do officers meet with the DA alone to discuss their pending investigations, nor meet with DA investigators off-duty, nor meet with command staff/City Legal team without representation. Harrelson carries on like a like a teenager, popping off in clichés and exaggerated legalese in several instances with prosecutors and investigators,which is ridiculous for the public to see. It's waay over the top. The script is full of LA Police clichés: "I told you never go east of La Brea", "I'm not a racist, I hate everyone", Harrelson bringing a box of donuts to his captains office, Harrelson drinking a pint of booze repeatedly in uniform in his police car during a time when he knows he is under observation by Internal Affairs for use of force violations . . . The bottom line? Cops like "Date Rape", behaving recklessly as he does in this movie, do not last 24 years in LAPD patrol! There were other more serious problems with Rampart in the 90's that this movie could have addressed and the producers missed the chance.Vietnam comes up again and again . . . Harrelson's character supposedly served a good period in this war, yet he has 24 years on the department in 1999 meaning he served in Vietnam in 1975? How much of an influence could that have had? He's only in his late 40's in the film!Then there is the bizarre personal story of Harrelson marrying sisters and fathering a daughter by each of them, getting divorced by one, yet continuing to live in the same house and move back and forth between the two sisters who have homes adjacent to one another!!!This movie could have been written much better with some sort of department advisers------- like real cops from that era. Like "Training Day", the writers chose to present an image that they thought the public would enjoy, rather than an accurate portrayal of a bad cop.If you want to see a bad cop, then the "Bad Lieutenant" is the movie, not "Rampart" which can't decide what it wants to portray----- a bad cliché of a burnout cop, or the policies and procedures of an entire department which led to wholesale criminal justice corruption.

This is a culture clash between the Vietnam generation, represented by Officer Brown, and the times that followed. Officer Brown has clung to the values that he idealized as a young man - sacrifice, valor, honor, duty - and has never managed to adapt them to the soft-focus atmosphere of the loose and drifting civilian world he sees around him. His violent responses to what he sees as evil are derived from the black and white view of us vs. them. He does not do nuance, in the famous words of George W. Bush. Relationships with women, including his wives and daughters, are painfully ambushed by his own intense desire for having it his way. The film is brilliantly directed to convey the serious dissonance Officer Brown experiences. Loved the indirect camera angles, heightening suspense and uncertainty, like jungle ambushes. Sometimes his vitriol against the system is carried too far, and his descent into debauch of LA night life is right out of mythology, but we are left with empathy for a man who sees his dignity diluted and his values debased.