Buddies Mike and Jim raise hell in the days leading up to Jim's assignment with the DEA in Columbia.
(20 votes)
2.
Christian Bale (BATMAN RETURNS) and Freddy Rodriguez (SIX FEET UNDER) play best friends in this action flick, with Bale's character slipping dangerously close to the abyss as he enters a life of crime.
(17 votes)
3.
Haunted by nightmares from his murderous military past, the honorably discharged Jim (Christian Bale) spends his time between his impoverished fiancee in rural Mexico and cruising the streets of east L.A., knocking back beers and smoking joints with his buddy Mike (Freddy Rodriguez). They also pawn a gun, run into some trouble with a jealous gangster, and fool Mike’s girlfriend (Eva Longoria) into thinking he’s actually dropping off resumes instead of getting drunk and high with his buddy. Homeland Security meanwhile wants to recruit Jim for some special ops in Central America, but first he has to pass a urine test.
This is the directorial debut of David Ayer, who wrote TRAINING DAY, which this film resembles with its smog-saturated cinematography and loving attention to the minutiae of male bonding and "homey codes" in and around L.A.'s inner-city drug culture. One never knows where the story is going, or what's around the next corner in this off-center yarn, and Ayer captures that uneasy feeling of cruising through a bad part of town in a car with someone who you slowly realize cannot be trusted. Christian Bale delivers, as usual, a towering performance: growing progressively more disturbed as the film goes on, he weeps, roars, struts, shouts and flips out, maintaining audience sympathy all the while.
(18 votes)
4.
From the creator of TRAINING DAY comes HARSH TIMES, a gritty look at friendship, loyalty and ambition set on the extremely rough streets of south central Los Angeles.
Jim Davis (Christian Bale) is an ex-Army Ranger recently discharged from the military, yet still haunted by nightmares of his former occupation. While seeking a position with the LAPD that will allow him to marry his Mexican girlfriend and bring her to the United States, Jim kills time chilling with his best friend, Mike (Freddy Rodriguez).
Mike is feeling the heat from his longtime girlfriend, Sylvia (Eva Longoria): either get a job or get out. But the love of a beautiful woman can't compare to the bonds of friendship, and Jim and Mike are soon cruising the streets of South Central, slipping back into a deceitful life of drugs, violence and petty crime, just like when they were kids. Christian Bale ("Batman Begins"), Freddy Rodriguez ("Six Feet Under") and Eva Longoria ("Desperate Housewives") star in HARSH TIMES, written and directed by David Ayer ("Training Day," "The Fast and the Furious").
Movie Database
In Theaters
