A superbly acted movie based in a time when gangsters really were gangsters and when cops were really bribed, power-hungry, dumb thugs. In a time when the LAPD wasn't known for race beatings - a time when they didn't care about your race, your gender, your religous affiliations, your sexual preference - they just beat you anyway. Now, perhaps I'm biased.... I love these kinds of movies.... Early-century, amazingly acted and casted, as well as great costumes. Baby, baby, baby, baby, lemme see Kevin Spacey and Russell Crowe in those suits every day and I will be a very happy straight woman for the rest of my life....

Kevin Spacey in this movie is a mildly corrupt cop who takes payoffs from Danny DeVito's mainly voice-over character, a writer for a gossip magazine. DeVito gives the color in the movie, certainly, though he appears in only a few scenes, his voice-overs are well-placed. Spacey is smooth, (when ISN'T he smooth?) and confident, almost more like a Goodfella than a cop, imo.

And Russell Crowe, who I had only seen before in Virtuosity, is your standard, I'll-beat-everybody-up, but-I've-a-soft-heart-for-women cop. He starts out the movie as just another cop thug who beats up whoever the police Chief tells him to, but ends up not being such a bad guy, which, I will admit, surprised me quite immensely. One question, though: Russell Crowe only has one expression, so how can he manage to portray emotion so well??? The man moves his eyes like 8 degrees and goes from furious to tender. Mr. Crowe has a huge future, imo.

The worst part of this movie - Kim Basinger, but that's personal bias..... Non-personal worst part of this movie - the length. It is a very long story with many interlaced parts. If you have any attention span problems, you may not like this movie, but if it's a rainy night and you like cop stories, settle down with a bag of very fattening, well-buttered microwave popcorn (as popcorn should be) and watch it!!!!

Breathe in, breathe out, move on.