Street Kings 2008

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: In Ellroy's original scenario Street Kings was a period piece, set in the 1990s just after the Rodney King riots. I wonder if it would've made more sense that way. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: Another 'roid-raging dirty cop drama from David Ayer. Read more

Mark Rahner, Seattle Times: The potential match made in crime heaven has some admirably gritty action but suffers from first-degree obviousness and some bad dialogue that's especially painful when it comes out of Keanu Reeves. Read more

Christy Lemire, Associated Press: The cliches and laughably hammy dialogue are scattered about just as liberally as the spent bullet casings in Street Kings. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: Working from an original story by [James] Ellroy, [David] Ayer's overwrought Kings splashes around in the slop, but its conclusions seem a little rote from these two, who have both expressed their bottomless cynicism more effectively in the past. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: James Ellroy wrote the script; he also wrote the novel on which L.A. Confidential was based. If you're hoping for a similar intelligence, you're out of luck. Read more

Wesley Morris, Boston Globe: [Director] Ayer appears to like the thrill of violence more than its philosophical underpinnings, so the movie is caught between the silly and the profound. Read more

Tom Charity, CNN.com: Keanu Reeves' bad-boy cop Tom Ludlow may not play by the rules, but the film sure does. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Street Kings has hints of Training Day and the subtle aroma of L.A. Confidential, two movies concerned with the moral ambiguity and compromised honor of L.A.'s finest. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: If you've seen Training Day, you've seen Street Kings done better. Read more

Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: The structure is in place -- the latticework of corruption -- only there are so many scurrilous men pulling strings that we might be watching a parade of nasty puppets, with Keanu as the chief wooden devil doll. Read more

Stephen Cole, Globe and Mail: That Ellroy delivers a crude, undistinguished script here is a pity. Read more

Chris Vognar, Dallas Morning News: Street Kings is the cinematic equivalent of solid crime-genre fiction. It keeps the visual pages turning for a couple hours and navigates the dark corners of corruption and dishonor among men. Read more

Amy Nicholson, I.E. Weekly: By the gripping finale, it's clear that Street Kings is implausible in its practicalities, if not in its grand concept Read more

Rene Rodriguez, Miami Herald: The picture may feel more than a little familiar, but [director] Ayer knows how to cook up intense setpieces, and Reeves keeps getting better at the weary hero role he continually gravitates toward. Read more

Rafer Guzman, Newsday: David Ayer, who wrote Training Day, directs with enough flash to keep the action crisp and nasty. But he can't swagger his way through Ellroy's swampy storyline, which traps its characters in cynicism and amorality. Read more

Stephen Whitty, Newark Star-Ledger: [James Ellroy] writes Calvinist screeds against sin; filmmakers turn them into shoot-em-up thrillers. Read more

Bob Mondello, NPR.org: Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: After its cliched first scene Street Kings becomes an enjoyably tough, blood-splattered action drama that revolves around the one good cop at its center. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Like director David Ayer's previous movies (he wrote Training Day), Street Kings is about the joy of badass coppery. Read more

Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Keanu Reeves tries his best to channel Denzel and Clint in Street Kings, a wild and woolly if also slack and silly bad-cops-kill-other-bad-cops thriller. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Much of the casting is dead-on, from Cedric the Entertainer as a street dealer to Jay Mohr as a slimy cop and Chris Evans as an earnest rookie who saddles up with Reeves' Ludlow for an ill-fated ride. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: Despite the predictability of the overall story arc, there's suspense and tension to be found between the credit sequences, but the movie is saddled with an ending that is both improbable and borderline insulting. Read more

Jim Emerson, Chicago Sun-Times: An anemic attempt to evoke the big, shiny action pictures of the late '80s and early '90s, the heyday of Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger, when Timothy Dalton was 007 and Clint Eastwood had fewer wrinkles and bigger hair. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: There's a lot to appreciate in Street Kings, a tight, propulsive action thriller, but there's one thing to marvel at, and that's James Ellroy's command of story. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: There's something cynical about Ayers' attempt to preserve Ludlow as a hero after scene upon scene meant to show, with heavy irony, how lawlessly he enforced the law. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Street Kings wobbles increasingly as it runs along, beginning well, growing so-so and culminating in a preposterous here's-what-it-all-means confession by the main villain. Read more

St. Louis Post-Dispatch: Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: The movie belongs to Reeves, who at 43 is finally starting to look like an adult, with greater heft all round. He does Clint proud. Read more

Hank Sartin, Time Out: A police thriller that's desperate to be gritty, Street Kings boasts a protagonist so dumb it takes him an hour of screen time to realize a 'plot twist' we assumed was a given. Read more

Time Out: What could have been endearingly daft remains merely forgettable. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: Street Kings wastes a moderately intriguing premise by filling it with laughably cliched dialogue, one-dimensional characters and implausible turns of events. Read more

Peter Debruge, Variety: Pic itself is similarly conflicted, glamorizing gunslinging while crying foul over unnecessary force. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: We see the big picture way before the characters do, and that pushes us right out of the movie and back into our seats -- the last place we want to be. Read more