For rookie cop, it’s the big uneasy
There are those of you, like me, who wonder, “Why doesn’t Naomie Harris get more starring roles?” Good news: “Black and Blue” is here.
This is not a hardhitting look at racial relations between police and African Americans, as the title might indicate. Instead it’s an unapologetic piece of genre filmmaking in which Harris is caught between bad cops and a bad neighborhood. She is backed by a steady supporting performance by Tyrese Gibson; efficient, nononsense direction by Deon Taylor; and gunmetal gray cinematography by Hollywood veteran Dante Spinotti.
The Britishborn Harris — best known as Moneypenny in the Daniel Craig Bond films and excellent as Winnie Mandela in “Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom” as well as the mother in “Moonlight” — is Alicia West, a rookie New Orleans cop fresh off two tours in Afghanistan. Little does she know she is operating in another war zone in the very neighborhood where she grew up, an impoverished section of New Orleans in which cops are the enemy.
Just three weeks into the job, she stumbles upon three cops executing a drug dealer. She thinks she’s providing backup, but when they see her, they turn their guns on her. Her bodycam captures the footage, and she gets away. Soon she’s the most wanted person in the city — by the bad cops who want both the bodycam footage and her death, and by the drug kingpin (Mike Colter, a.k.a. Luke Cage) who thinks she was the one who executed one of his own.
Alicia enlists the begrudging help of a childhood friend, Milo (Gibson, of the “Fast and Furious” franchise), who has avoided gang life by working at a convenience store and minding his own business.
Sure, “Black and Blue” is a minor film, but it’s irresistible. In the 1950s, this would have been a lowbudget, gritty American noir, or a French
policier. In the 1970s, it might have been a blaxploitation flick. Instead, it adds to the growing genre credentials of Taylor.
This is the director’s third suspense film released in the past 18 months — after “Traffik” and “The Intruder” — and he’s getting pretty good at it. After roughly a halfhour of setup, the 108minute “Black and Blue” is 75 minutes of impressively sustained tension. It’s all anchored by a magnetic Harris, who gets more sweaty, bruised, bloody and raspyvoiced as she prepares for a bonecrunching finale.
So Craig is leaving the Bond films after “No Time to Die” in April. Might I suggest Moneypenny take over the franchise? There’s a convincing audition tape opening on American movie screens this week.