When you check out who is making American Gangster it’ll quickly become a holy shit moment. Not only do you have two great actors in Denzel Washington and Russell Crowe – you’ve also got Ridley Scott directing a script by Steven Zaillian. Yeah, it’s kind of filled with some names.

Gangster is definitely on my must see list, unfortunately the film doesn’t arrive until November. So while we’re forced to wait to see this great onscreen pairing, you can see the first official image from the movie below. As usual you can click on the image for a high-resolution version.  

And below the image is the synopsis of the movie. As you'll read the film takes place in Harlem in the 1970’s so I can’t wait to see some of the clothes and hair styles that will be on screen.

Obviously as more information gets out I’ll be on it. Look for some more upcoming images this weekend.

American Gangster

Release Date: November 2, 2007
Genre: Drama
Cast: Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Cuba Gooding, Jr., Josh Brolin, Ted Levine, Armand Assante, John Ortiz, John Hawkes, RZA
Directed by: Ridley Scott

Writer: Steven Zaillian
Producer: Brian Grazer
Executive Producers: Nicholas Pileggi, Steve Zaillian, Branko Lustig, Karen Kehela Sherwood, James Whitaker, Michael Costigan

Denzel Washington, Russell Crowe, Brian Grazer and Ridley Scott team to tell the true juggernaut success story of a cult figure from the streets of 1970s Harlem in American Gangster.

Nobody used to notice Frank Lucas (Oscar winner Washington), the quiet driver to one of the inner city's leading black crime bosses. But when his boss suddenly dies, Frank exploits the opening in the power structure to build his own empire and create his own version of the American Dream. Through ingenuity and a strict business ethic, he comes to rule the inner-city drug trade, flooding the streets with a purer product at a better price. Lucas outplays all of the leading crime syndicates and becomes not only one of the city's mainline corrupters, but part of its circle of legit civic superstars.

Richie Roberts (Oscar winner Crowe) is an outcast cop close enough to the streets to feel a shift of control in the drug underworld. Roberts believes someone is climbing the rungs above the known Mafia families and starts to suspect that a black power player has come from nowhere to dominate the scene. Both Lucas and Roberts share a rigorous ethical code that sets them apart from their own colleagues, making them lone figures on opposite sides of the law. The destinies of these two men will become intertwined as they approach a confrontation where only one of them can come out on top.

Washington (Training Day) and Crowe (Gladiator) lead a spectacular cast of accomplished and rising stars--iChiwetel Ejiofor, Cuba Gooding, Jr., Josh Brolin, Ted Levine, Armand Assante, John Ortiz, John Hawkes and RZA--in this blistering tale of a true American entrepreneur directed by Oscar nominee Ridley Scott (Gladiator) and produced by Academy Award winner Brian Grazer (A Beautiful Mind) and Scott from a screenplay by Academy Award winner Steve Zaillian (Schindler's List).