Hollywood and LAPD: A Romance on the Rocks : Movies: As the world’s picture of the LAPD has changed in the past 4 1/2 years, so has the studios’ depiction of the once-fabled department. The gloves are off.

If current events aren’t enough of a hint, two recent films and a TV series make it clear that Hollywood’s “Dragnet” mythology has been killed off for good. Onscreen, at least, this is not your father’s LAPD.

The films, “Strange Days” and “Devil in a Blue Dress,” present members of the Los Angeles Police Department engaging in a range of illegal activities, many aimed squarely at African Americans. Even “LAPD,” a new, syndicated television series made with the department’s cooperation, displays a coarseness to day-to-day police work in Los Angeles that has been historically absent from many cop shows.

And as the world’s image of the LAPD has changed in the past 4 1/2 years--an era that encompasses the Rodney G. King beating, the 1992 riots, the Christopher Commission report, the O.J. Simpson trial and the Mark Fuhrman tapes--so has Hollywood’s depiction of the department.

“Hollywood’s relationship to the LAPD is that when they’re down, they’re quick to kick it and when they’re up, they’re the first to gold-plate it,” says “LAPD” producer Dave Bell.

No gold-plating is evident in either “Strange Days” or “Devil in a Blue Dress,” which both tackle the sensitive issue of the abuse of power by local law enforcement.

While incidents depicted in both films seem to take their cue from recent events, both projects were conceived well before the 1991 King beating.

“Devil” is based on the first of Walter Mosley’s Easy Rawlins detective novels. “Strange Days” was developed from a 9-year-old story by the film’s producer and co-scenarist James Cameron.

“Devil” is set in South-Central Los Angeles in 1948, while “Strange Days” transpires over the last two days of the millennium. Yet there are striking similarities in police behavior, particularly toward members of the African American community.

“Los Angeles is a flashpoint society. And we [in the movie] raise that reality to the level of myth,” says “Strange Days” director Kathryn Bigelow.

“If incidents like Rodney King reverberate in the movie, it’s only metaphorically,” says Jay Cocks, the co-screenwriter on “Strange Days.” “The crisis situation owes more to the tension that exists in Los Angeles as a city and the approach of the millennium. This is not a story of the LAPD as a bunch of maniacs, but as an organization of power. Racist behavior and other abuses exist in any organization of power.”

Still, recent events are likely to ring uncomfortably in viewers’ ears as they watch “Strange Days.” “Mark Fuhrman just snuck up behind us,” Cocks says. “It tilts the perspective, but it’s not what the movie is about.”

Bigelow concedes that “we couldn’t anticipate the film’s timeliness,” while pointing out that both the “good and the bad” of the LAPD are depicted. “There is an entire spectrum of behavior,” she says.

Walter Mosley says he never set out to single out the LAPD for criticism.

“The story wouldn’t be so different if it was set in Baltimore. The LAPD has a lot of problems. But the whole idea of police has a lot of problems,” he says. “My research was simple. It was based on genuine knowledge and my own feelings in dealing with the police.”

For “Devil” director Carl Franklin, the setting has as much to do with the city’s history as with the conventions of film noir--L.A. being the cradle of the genre.

“The situation with the police is not overstated in the book and I’ve tried to do the same in the film,” Franklin says. “It’s just another obstacle for Easy.” In fact, he says, the relationship between African Americans and the police in “Devil” is quite favorable compared to the one delineated in his previous movie, “One False Move,” set in present-day Arkansas.

Bell, whose series requires the cooperation of the department from the brass down to individual patrol officers, is an unabashed fan, calling the LAPD “one of the best police departments in the country.”

Certainly, it’s the best-known. Bell says he polled 200 people in five cities around the country and every single respondent recognized the initials LAPD.

He conceived the no-frills reality show (airing weeknights at 11:30 on Channel 13 in Los Angeles) four years ago. It faced some hurdles initially, Bell says, “but right after Willie Williams came in, he gave us permission because he thought in the wake of Rodney King the community should know what’s going on and how good a force it really was.”

According to John Symes, president of worldwide television at MGM, which distributes “LAPD,” the program doesn’t go out of its way to take on the force, “although it’s a far more visceral look than you might expect.”

Bell concurs: “I’ve seen someone sticking someone up against a wall so they know they’re being stuck up against a wall.”

Though controversy is not skirted, there’s not likely to be a major incendiary incident on the show, since the officers know they’re being followed by a camera crew. Within that framework, however, Bell says, the reactions are as varied as the individual police officers, from the openly hostile (“Who the hell are you?’) to the welcoming (“It’s about time”).

Even so, the show’s LAPD technical advisers sometimes audibly cry “ouch” when reviewing episodes for procedural content. “There’s bound to be times when they run roughshod over the rules,” Bell says. “But as long as no laws are broken. . . .”

For accuracy, Bigelow relied on Call the Cops, a company founded in 1988 composed of current and former LAPD officers. The firm provided technical advice on “Strange Days” and Bigelow’s previous film, “Point Break,” as well as the 1994 20th Century Fox film “Speed.”

Randy Walker, the company’s founder, spent 10 years on the SWAT team and is currently an officer in the LAPD’s mounted unit. Call the Cops doesn’t advise on a film’s content but rather on the depiction of procedural and tactical activity. “I’m there to help achieve a degree of authenticity,” Walker says. While he refuses to comment on “Strange Days” (because he worked on it) or “Devil” (because he hasn’t seen it), Walker acknowledges that “you can’t control how police are portrayed [in movies].”

But he tips his hand a bit when he adds: “Being a law enforcement officer is a tough job and a controversial one. The LAPD is comprised of over 7,500 men and women . . . 99% of whom are hard-working and do a job nobody else wants to do.”

Yet, he is also aware that a policeman’s average day would be dramatically tedious and that aberrational (even highly exaggerated) behavior can make for exciting action. “Everybody would like to see his profession portrayed in a positive way,” Walker says. “But, unfortunately, there are people in all professions who make errors in judgment. Thousands of hours of good police work can be overshadowed by negative rumors.”

But as Mosley points out, calling attention to any abuse of power in the LAPD is not intended to tar the entire force with the same brush. And it is appropriate because “the police are supposed to be good--all of them.”