Empire Review
Overreaching from its title onward, Empire has a lot more ambition than ability to deliver on it. The film borrows liberally, though not skillfully, from Martin_Scorsese's template for crime drama, and it owes a specific debt to Brian_De_Palma's Carlito's_Way, with John_Leguizamo substituting for Al_Pacino as the Latino gangster trying to get out. To be fair, Empire does flirt with big ideas, and has real desire to give the mob movie a 21st century urban makeover. Its distinct chapters give it that epic quality, as the plot starts with the intense cauldron of gangland politics, then pulls off a radical shift in tone to the gangster's movements within yuppie society. Empire conjures both ends of Leguizamo's criminal spectrum with credibility, from legit street characters to a smartly seductive white savior (Peter_Sarsgaard) dangling the carrot Leguizamo can't resist. The film even has the odd good sense to cast Isabella_Rossellini as a matronly drug lord with acid in her veins -- one of several inspired supporting performances. It's Leguizamo, himself usually a supporting actor, who weakens under the weight of the movie, much as he did trying to carry Spike_Lee's sprawling Summer of Sam. But he can't be blamed for the movie's hasty third-act collapse, which shrinks director Franc_Reyes' deliberate build-up into a scant, single-scene payoff. The climactic clash between the financial world and the underworld -- a focal point of the film's ad campaign -- gets swept under the rug, and a stillborn epic whimpers to a finish at a miniscule 85 minutes. Derek Armstrong, Rovi
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