Brooklyn's Finest had its world premiere at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival on January 16, 2009, and released in the United States on March 5, 2010.

While talking in a car, Detective Sal Procida shoots someone named Carlo Powers, grabs a bag of money and flees.

Sal later confesses the murder to a priest, asking for help with his abysmal financial situation: his wife is pregnant with twins, and they live in a house that is too small for their four existing children; it also has mold that jeopardizes his family's health.

Sal, who is a New York City Police Department (NYPD) narcotics detective, has begun to steal drug money from raids.

Having been promised a promotion including a desk job for years, Butler is finally offered detective first grade if he betrays his close friend Caz Phillips, a known criminal recently released from federal prison.

After Smith makes a racist remark and refuses to pursue Red, a furious Tango lunges at her but fellow officers restrain him.

While sitting in his car contemplating suicide, Eddie sees a woman who had earlier been reported missing being shoved into a van.

Rosario witnesses the young man fleeing from the crime scene and is devastated when he finds Sal's dead body in the apartment.

[5] Michael C. Martin's script originally took place primarily in the Louis H. Pink Houses in East New York, which were near where the writer and a couple of his friends grew up.

[7] Michael C. Martin, the writer of the screenplay, went to South Shore High School, where a film appreciation course sparked his interest, and an anterior cruciate ligament injury derailed a possible basketball career.

[6] Brooklyn's Finest premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2009, and was picked up by Senator Distribution with a price "in the low seven figures".

[13] The film also grossed $36,440,201 in theaters worldwide,[1] and achieved 11th place on Box Office Mojo's "Dirty Cop" genre ranking, 1973–present.

The site's critics consensus reads: "It's appropriately gritty, and soaked in the kind of palpable tension Antoine Fuqua delivers so well, but Brooklyn's Finest suffers from the comparisons its cliched script provokes.

"[18] Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle praised the actors for "bringing dimension to these stock characters", but criticized the film for being "a melodrama about three cliches in search of a bloodbath.

"[19] A. O. Scott of The New York Times also gave the film a mixed review, stating, "the sheer charismatic force of much of the acting keeps you in the movie", but "Mr. Fuqua and Mr. Martin dig themselves into a pulpy predicament, and then find themselves unable to do anything but shoot their way out.

"[20] The Los Angeles Times reviewer commented that "Brooklyn's Finest is an old style potboiler about desperate cops in dire straits that overcooks both its story and its stars.