Director: S. Craig Zahler
Writer: S. Craig Zahler

This is what I like to call a film of convergence. We’re introduced to two separate storylines, with the knowledge that at some point, those lines are going to meet, and—in this case—bad things are going to happen. The first storyline has to do with two cops, Ridgeman (Mel Gibson) and Lurasetti (Vince Vaughn) who get caught on camera roughing up a drug dealer and get suspended without pay. They both need money, so they decide to rob another drug dealer, an “out-of-towner.” Needless to say, in this genre of film, things don’t always go as planned. The second storyline introduces us to Henry Johns (Tory Kittles), a smart, small-time crook who just got out of prison to find his mom working as a prostitute to support herself and his wheelchair-bound little brother, Ethan. Also needing money, he lets an old neighborhood friend, Biscuit (Michael Jai White) talk him into signing on with a gang of psychotics looking to steal a bunch of gold.

I loved Zahler’s two earlier films, Bone Tomahawk and Brawl in Cell Block 99. Much like those two, this film is a slow burn. That seems to be his MO—contemplative, slow builds punctuated by blunt violence. Here, the burn is a little slower than it should be, however. (We watch Vaughn eat an entire sandwich as the two sit wordlessly in the car on a stakeout, for example.) I never found it boring, but I do think Zahler could have removed a pretty sizeable chunk without too much of an effect. And yet…I also just watched 1917, in which the main character was always moving, always dealing with something, and that got a little dull at times. In this film, that downtime, where “nothing happens” (that seemed to be a constant complaint by those who didn’t like it) is when we get a glimpse at who these three men are. I found it interesting. Others won’t. I get it.

The film has taken a lot of heat because of the characters’ irredeemable natures. Zahler plays with our moral bounderies a little. Or at least makes us question where we stand. Here, it’s Henry, the ex-con, who seems to be the more moral, more sympathetic character at times. And although we should rightly be outraged at the excessive force Ridgeman uses on the Latino suspect in the beginning of the film, the guy is a drug dealer who sells heroin to kids. It’s hard to feel sorry for him. I think those reviewers who focus on the first part of that and ignore the second, and then accuse Zahler of having similar personal views are a) not looking at the scene objectively, but rather through the prism of their own preconceived ideas, and b) are forgetting that depiction doesn’t mean endorsement. But make no mistake, there really aren’t any good guys here. There’s a line in American Sniper that classifies the world into three categories: sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs. All three are here, but at times, there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of difference between them. The latter two, at least, for sure.

The acting is top-notch. Because of his fucked-up personal life, it’s easy to forget just how good an actor Mel Gibson can be. And he’s better here than he’s been in a long time. It’s not the wise-cracking early Gibson of the Lethal Weapon series, and it’s not the dogged, no-nonsense, bull-in-a-china-shop Gibson of Payback. This guy is weary and cynical. He tells his partner, “I don’t politic, and I don’t change with the times, and it turns out that that shit’s more important than good, honest work.” And he’s angry. His wife, an ex-cop, has MS, and his daughter gets bullied and attacked on her way home. He wants to move his family out of their current neighborhood. That six-week suspension is enough to force his hand. Tory Kittles is great here, too. He has to be the best of a bad bunch and make us feel enough for him that we end up wanting him to succeed. He certainly accomplishes that. Vince Vaughn is a bit of a wild card though. The way Vaughn plays Anthony Lurasetti had me intrigued. He makes bad racist jokes, for example, but they’re so bad, that I believe that Vaughn’s playing it as though Tony feels like he needs to make those kinds of jokes to fit in with his “old-school” partner and boss (Don Johnson), even though he doesn’t really believe what he’s saying. After all, he’s all set to propose to his girlfriend, a successful, African-American businesswoman (Tattiawna Jones), which would seem to be at least somewhat in conflict with his racist language. And in many other ways, Tony is the moral compass of the film, perhaps even more so than Henry. He hasn’t developed Ridgeman’s cynicism yet. Throw in very short but powerful performances by Don Johnson, Jennifer Carpenter, and Laurie Holden, and you’ve got a great ensemble.

Dragged Across Concrete is not a film for everyone. Just one look at the reviews on IMDb makes it clear it’s a love it or hate it film: the scores are either 9s and 10s or 1s and 2s. I’m in the “love it” camp. I thought it was a simmering, character-developing 70s style crime thriller. If you have the patience (and the stomach) for it, I think you’ll enjoy it. IMDb gives it an even 7.0. I liked it a little better than that, so I’m going with an even 8. A bit of a warning, though. Although there isn’t a lot of it, the scenes of violence, as they were in his other two films, are pretty gruesome. But I think the intriguing world that Zahler has painted for us outweighs those two or three scenes. (running time 2:39)