Empire

A man who has made good in an illegal business discovers going straight is a more complicated matter than he imagined in this urban drama. Victor Rosa (John Leguizamo) is a drug dealer who has made a small fortune selling a heroin-based drug cocktail he's concocted called "Empire." Victor doesn't ...more

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 ...more