American Gangster is based on the true story of real-life drug kingpin Frank Lucas, who, by the 1960s, constructed an international drug ring that spanned from New York to Southeast Asia. The film features Denzel Washington as Lucas and a New York City cop (Russell Crowe) who busted a big-time heroin ring.
I have a love-hate relationship with this movie. I love the many lessons the movie provides but dislike how the message can be perceived. The movie can easily cause young people to admire drug dealing. Frank takes care of his family, runs the show, and even works with the cop to lessen his sentence at the end.
However, if we can get past the drug part, there are many good and bad lessons throughout the film. A young person with the proper guidance can also easily see how this life only leads to one of three places: Death, jail, or that old drunk on the corner at fifty telling the teenagers how you used to run the block as you beg them for some change. There is no in-between. Drug dealers don’t get pensions.
Lesson #1: Influence Can Be Good and Bad
“I want what you got Uncle Frank. I wanna be you.”
In the film, Frank’s nephew, Stevie Lucas, is an excellent baseball player who has played since childhood. Now, at the prominent financial level to do so, Frank schedules a meeting for his nephew Stevie (T.I.) with the Dodgers. This is an amazing opportunity for Stevie to fulfill his dream of playing baseball, but he does not show up for the meeting. Even worse, he doesn’t want to play baseball anymore. Now that he is a part of his Uncle’s multimillion-dollar drug enterprise, he desires to be a drug kingpin just like Frank.
In an age where people can choose to become social media influencers, it often gets underscored that being influential is not only about persuading people to do the right things. Being an influencer can also mean influencing people to do wrong morally or in a way that dramatically changes their lives for the worse. Influence is also not only verbal. You don’t have to say a word to influence someone to do something; your actions alone are enough.
“You know Frank, quitting while you are ahead is not the same as quitting.”
Another example of using influence negatively is Frank moving his entire family to New York to participate in his drug enterprise.
Social influence occurs when someone’s emotions, opinions, or behaviors are affected by others.
Frank played a significant role in his brothers lives. You can tell (at least in the movie) that they looked up to him and already admired him. Frank did not have to travel to North Carolina and recruit them into his drug empire. He already had their love. However, Frank used his influence to charm his country family to come to the city and become part of his drug business, directly or indirectly. Frank is responsible for his part in taking advantage of his brother’s innocence. Even his mother in the film said: “If you were a preacher, they would have all been preachers.” They would have followed their big brother anywhere. We all have people who watch and look up to us, even if we don’t know it. Frank could have used his money to invest in legitimate companies for his brothers, leaving them out of his shenanigans and out of jail.
Lesson #2: Say Less and Follow Your Own Advice
“The loudest one in the room, is the weakest one in the room.”
Nicky Barnes, one of the biggest heroin dealers, was known by the New York Times as “Mister Untouchable” because the cops couldn’t touch him. He was also known for his arrogant demeanor and flashy dress. When Frank’s brother Huey adopts the same colorful look, Frank gives his brother some critical advice: “The loudest one in the room is the weakest one in the room.”
The quote is self-explanatory and goes hand in hand with other quotes like, “The more you talk, the less you know.” It speaks to how, when people talk a lot, it is usually nothing but talk.
However, another lesson the movie shows from the quote is how we should follow our advice. Later in the film, when his wife buys him expensive fur, Frank wears it to the Ali/Fraizer fight, causing him to stick out like a sore thumb among his peers, many of them fellow drug kingpins and some cops.
The same “clown suit” he warned his brother not to wear he was now symbolically wearing with that loud fur coat. It is the same coat that made the police take notice and pay attention to him. From this one mistake, they learned of Frank’s every move.
Lesson #3: Be the CEO of Your Life / The Business Mind
“Nobody owns me though. That’s ’cause I own my own company and my company sells a product that’s better than the competition, at a price that’s lower than the competition.”
We have already established that selling drugs only leads to a future of death and despair, so this point doesn’t justify Lucas’s actions. However, despite the kind of business he ran, people with a business mind can still learn from the movie. You can learn a lesson from anything if you pay enough attention to it.
One of Frank’s many experiences had to do with launching a new product that was cheap but still held quality. In the 1970s, heroin was often diluted with sugars, chalk, flour, or powdered milk to stretch it so addicts understood that the drug would have a lower potency. Frank stepped outside of this established heroin supply chain by cutting out the middleman and not diluting the heroine.
To create his one-of-a-kind product, Frank went directly to the source, a heroin producer in Saigon, Vietnam. In the movie, Frank didn’t dilute his heroin, which made it more potent. He also sold the undiluted, more powerful drug at a lower price.
The lesson is not that you should run your own drug empire. The lesson is that when building a business, you sometimes have to step outside your comfort zone and take risks to reach new levels. It also speaks to the power of authenticity. You don’t have to dilute your self-worth to be accepted. Give people the raw, unadulterated you; it will be more powerful than any filter you could have come up with.
Lesson #4: Not Everything Is As It Seems
Finally, I learned not to believe everything I see. Upon researching the film, I learned that much of the movie is made up to achieve the dramatic effect that movies do. Denzel is an even more exaggerated version of what the real Frank Lucas was like.
In real life, Frank Lucas was also not Bumpy Johnson’s driver for fifteen years, and he was not with Bumpy when he died. The real Frank also diluted his heroin, though not as much as other dealers. Frank also collected numerous mink and chinchillas aside from the one his wife bought him and was just as flashy as Nicky Barnes. This is partly why undercover cops could catch him with the fur on because he wore them. Denzel Washington’s version in the movie is also much wiser and more strategic than Frank, who is rumored to have been illiterate.
The persona of the cop, Richie Roberts, was also exaggerated in the movie. Roberts did not have a child and was not in a custody battle with his ex-wife. He also had a much smaller role in capturing Frank Lucas.
As I’ve said since starting this post, selling drugs is never something to aspire to, and the lessons I learned in the movie should not be perceived as implying that I advocate selling drugs. This last lesson proves that what young people see on TV is not always true. People are looking up to a Frank Lucas who did not exist in the same way he is portrayed on film.
The movie’s role is to entertain, even if that means embellishing a character’s role. If you are a young person reading this, don’t believe everything you see. Even salt looks like sugar, and spoiled milk is still white.
The PBS Blog 