Precinct Seven Five

This real life Bad Lieutenant documentary is a fascinating watch. The thin blue line is wafer thin.

In 1993 former New York policeman Michael Dowd sat in front of a commission to confess his crimes. A policeman at the titular precinct in Brooklyn from 1982-1992, Dowd encountered everything a violent 1980s New York had to offer. Tiller Russell’s top-loads his documentary with trailer-friendly soundbites to set the scene, showing how easily a good cop can slip into crime: “The heyday of crack,” “A warzone.” This was a New York of gang shootings, cop killings, a widespread drug epidemic, and rampant police corruption. Brooklyn is painted as the Wild West and the Seven Five its Alamo.

“A crook who wore a cop’s uniform,” is how the DEA describe Michael Dowd. In a candid interview with Russell, he describes in detail his first foray into corruption, stopping a car he knows boasts either drugs or money; he tells the driver that he can face over a grand in tickets or he can buy him “a lobster dinner.” A couple of hundred dollars changes hands and Dowd’s career takes a left turn.

It’s not long before he’s informing Adam Diaz, a drug kingpin (and a willing participant in this documentary), of potential busts and helping to remove Diaz’s competition. Dowd is paired with Ken Eurell, a young naïve cop who takes convincing to join his partner in taking down scores - “They had a reputation – they were out of control” - but soon the two are a tight crew. However, when Dowd’s cocaine addiction gets the better of him he begins to take risks, which draws the attention of Internal Affairs…

Cobbling together some stirring crime photos of the era, grainy surveillance videos, talking heads (Dowd and particularly Diaz prove to be entertaining story tellers), the 1993 deposition forms the spine of Russell’s documentary. Occasionally the director goes over the top with sound effects (if Dowd talks about gunfire, we wear hear gunfire) and music (ramped up E! style as the takedowns get more tense), but Precinct Seven Five is an exhilarating affair.

Maybe Scorsese should take a look.