Rampart

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Rampart

R

2012

1h 43m

Crime

Drama

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Tomatometer

Popcornmeter

74%

Tomatometer

145 Reviews

35%

Popcornmeter

10,000+ Ratings

In 1999, Officer Dave Brown (Woody Harrelson), a 24-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department, tends to follow his own code of rough justice. A number of years earlier, he was implicated in the death of a serial rapist. Brown's violent tendencies once again land him in hot water when a video of him beating up a suspect plays all over local TV. An assistant DA (Sigourney Weaver) pressures him to retire, but Brown edges closer and closer to a meltdown.

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Critics Consensus

Rampart sends viewers plummeting into a nihilistic hell of its protagonist's creation, yet Woody Harrelson's performance in the central role is too magnetic to dismiss.

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Tom Long

Detroit News

03/09/2012

C

Where's it all go? Nowhere, really, just down a dirty, disappointing hole. Harrelson deserved better.

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Moira MacDonald

Seattle Times

03/01/2012

3.5/4

It's a remarkably compelling film.

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Bill Goodykoontz

Arizona Republic

03/01/2012

4/5

Brown is a sick man, but Harrelson makes him so interesting, so charismatic, so ... watchable, that you can't look away, even if his actions make you want to (and they will).

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D.M. Palmer

Vague Visages

11/09/2023

What really distinguishes Rampart from the standard police corruption film, and prevents it from sliding into outright misanthropy, is its focus on the emotional stakes.

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Matt Brunson

Film Frenzy

06/27/2023

3/4

Rampart is more of a character study than any sort of crime procedural, and it’s all the better for it.

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Allen Almachar

The MacGuffin

08/04/2020

C+

Officer Brown is such a terrible person that he becomes almost a caricature ... by the end of the movie, nothing about him left any kind of resonance.

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Greg C

@RT41612251 Jun 1

The character development is superb, the interactions of Dave with everyone around him feels like a grenade being passed around, and someone pulled dave's pin a lonnnggg time ago. The non ending was admirable, everything was destroyed in dave's life, a wrapped up ending was unnecessary.

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Gareth v

@geewah Aug 9

A gritty, unsettling character study that thrives on Harrelson’s presence but wanders in its storytelling.

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Stephen C

@bob25009 Jul 20

Success in 1 hours and 43 minutes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Rated R for Sexual Content, Pervasive Language and Some Violence!!!!!!!!!!!!! The USA grossed over $969,200.00!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Tom S

@RT47100268 02/14/2025

A very different style of directing & camerawork. This has thrown people off since they are so used to the standard Hollywood style. Very unnerving & brilliantly played. Not something that can be fully absorbed with just one viewing. The ending to it is that there is no ending with this sort of person, just a gradual horrifying decline.

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Jim B

@RT77206936 02/02/2025

Great acting, fantastic sets, no plot at all, movie is about 40 minutes too long.

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Martin B

@RT44235356 10/28/2024

I can see why critics would love it. It’s uniquely complex on every level from family to his cop related entanglements with no phony good guy, uplifting theme or redemption to be had. But my God it’s long, a series of unpleasant interactions punctuated with violence with nothing to show for it at the end except perhaps reality I suppose or at least the critics thought that. For movie watchers it’s more a test of will to see if you can get through a marathon of dysfunction and people constantly on defense with not an aspiration to be found anywhere. Particularly annoying is the fixation on smoking. Another reality I suppose but so distractingly annoying via repetition.

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Synopsis

In 1999, Officer Dave Brown (Woody Harrelson), a 24-year veteran of the Los Angeles Police Department, tends to follow his own code of rough justice. A number of years earlier, he was implicated in the death of a serial rapist. Brown's violent tendencies once again land him in hot water when a video of him beating up a suspect plays all over local TV. An assistant DA (Sigourney Weaver) pressures him to retire, but Brown edges closer and closer to a meltdown.

Director: Oren Moverman
Producer: Ben Foster, Lawrence Inglee, Ken Kao, Clark Peterson
Screenwriter: Oren Moverman, James Ellroy
Distributor: Millennium Films
Production Co: Waypoint Entertainment, Lightstream Entertainment, Amalgam Features, Third Mind Pictures
Rating: R (Sexual Content|Pervasive Language|Some Violence)
Genre: Crime, Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Feb 10, 2012, Limited
Release Date (Streaming): Dec 8, 2015
Box Office (Gross USA): $969.2K
Runtime: 1h 43m