Colors (film)

Colors is a 1988 police procedural crime film starring Sean Penn and Robert Duvall and directed by Dennis Hopper. The story takes place in South Central Los Angeles, and is about Bob Hodges (Duvall), an experienced LAPD Community Resources Against Street Hoodlums Police Officer III, and his rookie partner, Danny McGavin (Penn) who try to mitigate the gang violence between the Bloods and Crips. It relaunched Hopper as a director 18 years after Easy Rider and stirred some controversy over its depiction of gang life and gang violence.

Plot

Danny McGavin (Sean Penn) is an officer who has just transferred to LAPD's C.R.A.S.H. unit from patrol. Teamed with 19-year veteran Bob Hodges (Robert Duvall), he is a volatile adrenaline junkie, much to Hodges' chagrin. McGavin allows no challenge to his authority.

The older cop is diplomatic on the surface, preaching "rapport" to gang members to encourage them to offer help when it is truly needed, and recognizes that every action cops take is scrutinized by the people they are trying to help. These lessons are lost on McGavin, and his actions bring him quick notoriety that affects Hodges.

Amidst this, a murder of a Bloods gang member leads to a series of escalations between two other street gangs, a relentless intertwining of seemingly random incidents that culminates in a gang war that finds the two partners in the middle of the Crips,...
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