Training Day

Training Day is a 2001 crime-drama starring Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke. The film is loosely based on the story real life corrupt L.A.P.D. Narcotics Squad officer Rafael Perez. The film co-stars Scott Glenn, Snoop Dogg, Dr. Dre and Tom Berenger in small roles. The film was written by David Ayer and was directed by Antoine Fuqua.

Plot
Rookie narcotics officer Jake Hoyt (Ethan Hawke is supervised by thirteen year Los Angeles Narcotics officer Alonzo Harris (Denzel Washington) and learns about the life of being a narcotics officer. Jake later finds out that Alonzo not only has a history of preventing crime, but is a criminal himself.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Incredible acting, especially from Denzel Washington as Alonzo Harris and Ethan Hawke as Jake Hoyt, both giving their characters new dimensions to their personalities and great amounts of believability (the former winning an oscar).
 * 2) The environment that's set for the premise is appropriate, showing a realistic depiction of L.A.'s dark underbelly full of gangs, drugs, and so on.
 * 3) Jake Hoyt is an interesting protagonist, being more morally straight than Alonzo and though he has to get rough at times, he sees hypocrisy in Alonzo's ideals and is able to do his duty honestly
 * 4) The storyline is interesting and well written.
 * 5) Some quotes are pretty amusing, despite the film’s serious subject matter, including Alonzo's first discussion with Jake.
 * 6) The death of Alonzo was well thought of, coming out of seemingly nowhere despite the buildup that came into it, and is a nice catharsis for everything he did throughout.
 * 7) Many intense moments, like when Jake is told to shoot a man, but only thinks it's a joke until someone else actually does it, and leads to a very intense confrontation with the killers.

Reception
Training Day was released on October 5, 2001 with positive reviews from critics and audiences alike, who praised Washington and Hawke's performances but were divided on the screenplay. On review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating 73% based on 161 reviews, with an average rating of 6.50/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "The ending may be less than satisfying, but Denzel Washington reminds us why he's such a great actor in this taut and brutal police drama.". On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 69 out of 100, based on 35 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.

Roger Ebert of The Chicago Sun-Times awarded the film a three out of four stars and stated in his review "For its kinetic energy and acting zeal, I enjoyed the movie. I like it when actors go for broke." Kenneth Turan of The Los Angeles Times awarded the film a 3.5 out of 5 and stated "Even though Training Day doesn't resolve itself as well as it deserves and ends strictly cops-and-robbers style, it's given us some great acting and something to ponder."

Box Office
Training Day opened up at #1 on its opening weekend with a domestic gross of $22,550,788. It would later make a domestic gross of $76,631,907. In overseas markets, it made $28,244,326. Overall, it made $104,876,233 worldwide against its $75 million budget.

Awards and nominations
The film won one Academy Award for Denzel Washington for Best Actor in a Leading Role. Ethan Hawke was nominated for Best Supporting Actor. The film also won an AFI Award for Best Actor for Denzel Washington. The film also won an ALMA Award for Best Makeup. The film won three Black Reel Awards including Best Film.

Trivia

 * This film marked Denzel Washington's first role as a villain.
 * Denzel won many awards for his role as Alonzo Harris.
 * As mentioned earlier, Denzel's character is loosely based on a real narcotics officer that was also a criminal.
 * Real gangs were used in the film and former gang member turned anti-gang activist Cle "Bone" Sloan was the technical adviser for the various gangs that were featured in the film, he also made an appearance in the film as well.
 * There was a TV series loosely based on the film, but it ran for only one season and was cancelled following the death of actor Bill Paxton, who was one of the stars of the show.
 * Bruce Willis and Gary Sinise were the original picks to star as Alonzo, but both actors turned down the role.