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Has great cast and what should have been a great movie, well wasn't. Felt forced and nothing really surprising. 3 teenagers who were arrested are set free and become cops. There was nothing unique about this movie. Cop turns bad who gets worse who wants to redeem his life.

50 cent plays the main character who is a criminal on the outside with a honest person trying to get out. Seems every step forward requires him to take 2 steps to the wrong side of the law of which he is more then willing to do. I guess they were hoping 50 cent would help this film, but to me he just doesn't have it and looks like a fish out of water still.

Not the worst movie I have seen.

OK, I recognized a few names in this movie: Robert De Niro, Forrest Whittaker, Dana Delaney, and 50 Cent. Based on the aforementioned names, I rented this movie. The bottom line is I got duped. The movie is below-average in every aspect:screenplay, acting,and directing. Basically, the whole film feels generic and half-assed. What is surprising is that the characters are all superficial and one-dimensional. This is to be expected from the likes of 50 Cent and some of the supporting characters, but from Robert De Niro and even Forrest Whittaker, it is incomprehensible.

In the past, the name Robert De Niro would have conjured up memories of incredible movies from the 70's and 80's such as Taxi Driver, Goodfellas, Godfather 2,Mean Streets, The Deer Hunter, etc. However, Robert De Niro has not made a quality film in almost a decade. What happened? Has wealth and fame completely enervated his passion for acting?

Very Disappointing.

In all fairness and truth, I was quite liking the movie at first. By all means this should had been one that would had been bad to watch from start to finish and one that I should have hated watching, since it stars Oscar winning actors Robert De Niro and Forest Whitaker opposite 50 Cent and Vinnie Jones. All alarm bells should go off when you hear this, especially when you learn that 50 Cent is playing the lead role. But in fact, the movie isn't being all that bad to watch and its first half especially makes this a decent enough, little, genre movie.

The first half of the movie is basically one about rookie training, in which rookie cops, one of them played by 50 Cent, get teamed up with an older and more experienced cop, who starts learning them the tricks and ropes. It all sounds very familiar, I know but it does work out interesting and entertaining enough and I was ready to really start liking this movie.

But then its horrible second half came along. Half way through it suddenly becomes a far more standard crime movie and not a very good one I'm sad to say. About half way through, exactly, there is a certain scene in the movie after which the movie starts to take a turn for the worse. The scene in itself already is being something ridicules and out of tone for this movie but everything that follows after that is about just as bad and silly. Suddenly 50 Cent and friends become hardcore crime fighters, trying to solve a case, which also involves dirty cops, while before that they were being naive and timid young cops, afraid of their superiors. It doesn't quite click all and the second half almost entirely ruined the movie for me.

It might seem strange to you, seeing 50 Cent playing a cop in this but it in fact is not a movie that glorifies the police corps at all. On the contrary really, since the cops are the biggest bad guys in this, who also form the biggest danger, do most of the drugs and have sex with prostitutes, whenever given the opportunity, all while being on duty. No, I don't think the makers of this movie have a lot of love for the police man and woman out there and 50 Cent also quickly finds an excuse in this movie to take off his uniform. It's a bit too over-the-top all at times, which obviously doesn't make this the most convincing and realistic genre movie out there.

I have always thought that 50 Cent is an horrible actor. He's even terrible in his own music videos! Now, I'm not talking about him as a performer of course but he, out of all rappers, always seemed to be the most unlikely one to ever have a decent acting career some day. Guess movies like this won't really help his acting career forward, since he also really isn't being all that impressive in this. He especially has some real difficulties in the scenes in which his character was supposed to show his emotions. And watching him sitting across Robert De Niro, having dialog with him, feels just wrong! They are not remotely in the same league and I was also quite surprised to see the likes of De Niro and Whitaker in this.

It's definitely not the worst movie you'll ever see but it's not one to get very excited about either.

5/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

The strength of this film is found in the secondary cast who support a film with pretentions but whose main weakness is the lack of charm and dramatic capacity of Curtis Jackson. When someone is good at something they will always be and that is perfectly visible in people like Whitaker, De Niro or Pedro Armendáriz Jr. Who had his swan song in this film. With tense and well-directed moments, the film's tone tends to fade at the end, where the entire weight of the film falls on Jackson, who is very limited to carry out a script that he could and should have been better. If it weren't for the secondaries it would be a bad movie.

Without any real success or box office backing Curtis "50" Cent Jackson has still managed to churn out a film career, with most of in straight to video action films. This time though he has aligned himself with some big star power in the form of Robert DeNiro and Forest Whitaker, but is it enough to deliver that extra punch to step this cop thriller or will it just be another forgettable addition to the genre?

Freelancers follow a young cop who joins in with a group of rogue cops led by his father's ex-partner. When the truth about his father's death is revealed it pushes him to finally make sure justice is served. This isn't a bad movie, but it isn't anything different than every other cop movie that has come along over the years. Jackson does a decent job here, but just doesn't have the chops to really sell the emotional aspect of the character. He works well for the action, but as soon as he has to deliver some sort of emotion it just comes off non-existent. Whitaker and DeNiro both pretty much phone this one in, but thanks to their amazing talent still manage to deliver some interesting characters. The story is pretty straight forward, but wants to try and deliver twists and turns where it is pretty obvious as to where it is all headed. In addition there are some aspects of the story that just come off a bit unbelievable in the system. There's some decent action moments here but nothing that really stands out to help push this along.

Overall this is a pretty generic delivery into the cop thriller, but thanks to the star power behind it at least feels a bit bigger than the straight to video release it got. If you are a fan of this genre or any of those involved give it a try, just don't expect anything all that new or original.

http://www.examiner.com/movie-in-dallas/bobby-blakey