Movie Review: We Own the Night
We Own the Night is the story of two brothers on the opposite ends of the law. Joseph (Mark Wahlberg) has just been appointed a captain in the New York Police Department and Bobby (Joaquin Phoenix) runs a club where drug use runs rampant and Russian mobsters bandy about. Bobby is content managing his club, smoking his pot, snorting his coke and fornicating on his couch with Amanda (Eva Mendes) but his life is turned upside down when Captain Joseph decides to make his mark on the New York crime scene and busts the club. A great move in theory but now Joseph and their father, Chief Burt Grusinsky (Robert Duvall), are forced to look over their shoulders as the ruthless mobsters seek revenge. Bobby must now choose between his life in the high stakes, fast-moving New York club scene or consider helping his family before they end up sleeping with the Hudson River fishes.
We Own the Night is a decent movie but I wouldn’t call it anything great or groundbreaking. In many ways, it’s a movie we’ve all seen before — the whole Russian mob vs. the police angle. In fact, just 7 or 8 days ago I saw Eastern Promises, which focussed heavily on the Russian mob. Is there no other mob that exists in Hollywood? Are Russians really that bad? At least Eastern Promises brought something slightly new and slightly interesting to the table. We Own the Night is really nothing new. It’s got a real “TV movie of the week” feel to it, except for the fact that it stars a few of the best actors working in Hollywood today. The movie just seems to plod along, with very little excitement except for a decent car chase scene and a handful of other exciting moments here and there. It also features some of the sloppiest police work that I have ever seen on film in recent memory. Yet despite this questionable police work they still managed to make a serious dent in the drug trade in New York City…
In the end, I guess I was expecting a lot more from We Own the Night. It’s not that it is a terrible movie because it’s not. It’s more that it stars Oscar winners, Ocsar nominees and the trailers made it look like it would be an exciting movie with lots of action and tension but it just didn’t live up to the hype that I created for it in my own mind. The movie definitely has some good moments and is worth at least a single viewing at some point in your life but after that one viewing, chances are it will soon be forgotten. (6.5 out of 10)
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