By Jalen Maki
Many actors have a role that is synonymous with their name. No conversation about Marlon Brando is complete without mentioning his performance as Don Corleone in The Godfather; the first character that comes to mind when discussing Carrie Fisher is Star Wars’ Princess Leia Organa; and anyone who can fog a mirror can tell you that in The Silence of the Lambs, Dr. Hannibal Lecter was played by the one and only Sir Anthony Hopkins.
The great Denzel Washington’s got a few of these characters, and one of them, indisputably, is Alonzo Harris in Training Day, Antoine Fuqua’s 2001 crime thriller. In the film, Washington delivers a singularly electric performance that earned him his second Academy Award, with his first being for the 1989 Civil War flick Glory.
We’ll circle back Denzel in a minute, but first, the setup: Training Day focuses on Los Angeles narcotics officer Jake Hoyt (Ethan Hawke). Jake’s got integrity, and he’s looking to use a potential promotion do some good on the streets of his home city. Enter Alonzo (Washington), the narcotics detective Jake’s assigned to ride along with for a day of training – a training day, if you will. Alonzo’s tasked with showing Jake the ropes and seeing if Jake’s got what it takes to join his elite narco unit.
Jake and Alonzo don’t exactly start out their day together on the right foot. When the two first meet up at a diner, Jake immediately annoys Alonzo by repeatedly trying to make conversation while Alonzo’s reading the morning paper. In the context of the events that follow, it’s funny to imagine that this is the specific moment Alonzo decides to make this the worst day of Jake’s existence. “Here I am, minding my own business, just trying to see how the Dodgers did yesterday, and this dude won’t shut up. You know what? Screw it. I am going to completely destroy this man’s life today.”
The two leave the diner, jump in Alonzo’s absolutely sick Monte Carlo, and proceed to cruise around L.A. in search of drug-related crime. What follows is Alonzo putting Jake through series of events that range from making him mildly uncomfortable to completely shaking him to his core. On top of this, Jake learns that Alonzo is corrupt, as are the other cops in Alonzo’s unit, and Jake’s put in what could be described as a tough spot: either join Alonzo’s unit and take part in its Not Above-Board At All tactics, or die. Talk about a rock and a hard place, eh? But, as previously mentioned, Jake’s an honest, upstanding cop, and he’s not about to just passively accept this ultimatum. Later that night, after narrowly escaping a dangerous situation in which Alonzo purposely left him hanging out to dry, Jake decides he’s had enough, and it all comes to a head in the form of a showdown between Jake and Alonzo (and some neighborhood bystanders). In the scene, Denzel throws nothing but straight gas, just 101-mile-per-hour heaters for several sustained minutes. It is a marvel to watch, and it culminates with Denzel, the legend that he is, ad-libbing a line so incredibly awesome that it should be etched into his tombstone someday.
A quick side note: Sometimes, when I’m having a rough go of it, I say to myself, “Hey – at least I’m not Ethan Hawke in Training Day.” For my money, no one in the history of film has gone through the ringer, at least in a professional capacity, quite like Hawke’s character does. I won’t spoil any specific details about the numerous harrowing ordeals this dude endures, but folks, I can tell you that they’re bad, and also not good! The movie really puts into perspective how some work problems – a pen out of ink, a jammed printer, how Dennis in Accounting always microwaves leftover fish in the break room, etc. – might not be so horrible in the grand scheme of things.
Now, back to Denzel. As Alonzo, he is pure swagger, and from start to finish, he exudes confidence at a level maybe never matched in the history of film. Alonzo is unsettlingly intense at times, yet somehow also charming. He’s also unbelievably charismatic and the kind of person you’d desperately want to think you’re cool. Yet beneath it all, there’s a deeper sense of danger and unpredictability that makes you want to run in the opposite direction as fast as you can. Denzel’s skill in fusing his magnetic, larger-than-life presence with mysterious internal darkness and disquieting menace is second-to-none, and he’s never done it better than in Training Day.
I gotta say, we’re pretty lucky to have a guy like Denzel Washington. He’s knocked out a movie every few years since the late ‘80s, and most of the time, they’ve been good, if not great. He’s never phoned in a performance, and more than once he’s turned in the best work in a given year, even if he doesn’t have an Oscar on his mantle to prove it (it is objectively insane that he was snubbed for 1992’s Malcolm X). Denzel’s tackled a variety of characters over the years – a cop, a high school football coach, a journalist, a lawyer, a pilot, a Navy officer, and a boxer, to name a few – and he’s brought his trademark cool steadiness to each role. But it’s in Training Day that we see Denzel at the peak of his powers, identifying the myriad qualities that make him one of the best actors of the last 35 years and cranking them to 11. He’s proved time and time again that he’s one of the greats, and not only can he go toe-to-toe with any actor, he can blow them off the screen anytime he wants to. He’s an absolute titan of cinema. Simply put, no one – not even King Kong – has got anything on Denzel Washington.
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