Gangsters and ghouls

Ridley Scott's career has been a series of peaks (Alien, Bladerunner, Thelma & Louise, Gladiator, Black Hawk Down, Hannibal), punctuated by just as many troughs (Legend, Black Rain, 1492, G.I Jane and A Good Year), so it's nice to see his latest American Gangster become another high.

Based on a true story the movie documents the rise and fall of the notorious drug dealer, Frank Lucas (played by Denzel Washington) who flooded the streets of Harlem with cheap heroin in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. On the case is Russell Crowe's uncertain but honest detective Richie Roberts, his investigation hindered by Josh Brolin's bent cop. A sometimes violent affair, American Gangster is a sprawling, in-depth character exploration that moves with lightning pace despite its two-and-a-half hour plus running time. Lucas is pulled back from the brink of complete monstrosity, as script writer Steve Zaillan (Schindler's List) employs a sneaky Heat tactic: by showing Lucas' quaint home life he's given a human façade that blurs the lines between good and evil. Crowe, too, is reserved; his cop is more a pro-active John Nash from A Beautiful Mind than the man's man we're used to.

Paddy Breathnach knows all about peaks and troughs. After his brilliant I Went Down, Paddy hit a low with Blow Dry but returned to some kind of form with 2004's Man About Dog. Shrooms, is a psychological horror that sees six American students sample Ireland's fungi in an isolated wood before been set upon by the ghostly figures who inhabit it. Although Shrooms is let down by its formulaic approach and sometimes dodgy dialogue, the snazzy visual style marks it out from what we usually expect from an Irish film. A major step forward.

GAVIN BURKE