Title: Elite Squad: The Enemy Within

Running Time: 115 minutes, Rated R, Also available on Blu-ray, Digital and Video On-Demand

It’s been a really long time since America has made a great crime drama. It really seems like most great crime genre films I see are foreign. There are movies like Miss Bala (Mexico), Bullhead (Belgium) and Snowtown (Australia) that take more of a deeper look of their characters while at the same time delivering mind-blowing action and excitement. But taking this approach isn’t the only way to do the crime genre correctly. There are movies like Hard Boiled and Infernal Affairs (Hong Kong) that show the life of dirty cops in a corrupt city. The new film from José Padilha, “Elite Squad: The Enemy Within,” shows the corruption of the police force, government officials and drug dealers in Rio de Janeiro.

“Elite Squad: The Enemy Within” is a sequel to José Padilha’s 2007 film, “Elite Squad,” but the filmmaking is so clean, tight and well constructed that an audience doesn’t have to watch the first film to appreciate and get drawn into the sequel. I didn’t watch the first “Elite Squad” movie before watching “Elite Squad: The Enemy Within” and I had no trouble following what was going on or who the characters were. It feels like a standalone movie, which is really refreshing to see in a sequel. The film follows Lt. Colonel Nascimento (Wagner Moura) as he recounts his involvement in trying to investigate and take down the corruption in his precinct, while trying to be a strong father to his son, Rafael (Pedro Van-Held).

The film starts with a siege of a prison by a drug cartel from within. A police squad is called in to isolate the problem but things start to get out of hand when Captain André Matias (André Ramiro) takes actions into his own hands to end the conflict. Social and political issues arise when his actions are questioned. The film spends a lot of its time exploring the rise of power of the corruption of the police which led to the conflict. This was probably the best use of jumping back and forth in time to show how things are what they are, that I’ve seen in a long time. This shown in the backdrop of the gritty urban slums of Rio de Janeiro. I found this very engaging and thrilling as I usually don’t see this level of detail in many American crime genre films.

The heart of this film lay in the family drama with Lt. Colonel Nascimento. His son, Rafael, is set between Nascimento and his mother (they are no longer together) but interestingly the film doesn’t devolve into cliché when it easily could’ve. Director José Padilha takes his time with this storyline and feels as integral to the overall film as the corruption and crime elements. Giving an audience to live with the characters is key to the success of the film as it serves as a reminder that these people are not faceless, but are actual people, or characters.

The DVD is pretty barebones, only included with a 45-minute “making of” featurette, which was appreciated but for my money, a trailer would’ve been nice. But getting a chance to see this film is worth the price and really should not be missed, especially for people who like crime genre films. “Elite Squad: The Enemy Within” delivers that in spades.

Technical: B

Overall: B-

by @Rudie_Obias