MOVIE REVIEW: We Own The Night (2007)

What’s a cop drama without at least one good car chase? We Own The Night, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg as brothers on opposite sides of the law, doesn’t disappoint in that respect, in fact it provides one of the most original and heart-pounding pursuits in recent cinematic memory.

The scene in question, which takes place about two-thirds of the way through the film, is set in the midst of a pounding rainstorm. Because the cars being driven by the good guys are unmarked it’s hard to know, for both the characters and the audience, who’s who and whether a gun is going to emerge from a window and start firing into the vehicle alongside it. It’s a pivotal scene in several respects and writer-director James Gray (who also directed Phoenix and Wahlberg in The Yards) deserves accolades for making it so realistic and terrifying.

Phoenix, whose performance also elevates We Own The Night - the title a reference to the motto of the NYPD’s street crime unit - above the formulaic, stars as Bobby Green, the manager of the Russian-owned nightclub El Caribe in Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach in the late 1980s. Green, who doesn’t go by his real last name Grusinsky in order to distance himself from his family of police officers, parties it up there every night with his girlfriend Amada (Eva Mendes) and looks the other way as mobsters deal drugs out of the establishment.

But as the New York drug scene threatens to spiral out of control, Bobby’s brother Joseph, an esteemed NYPD investigator, targets El Caribe and the illicit activities taking place there. Bobby tries to stay neutral but is forced to choose sides when he learns Joseph and their father, the deputy chief of police (Robert Duvall), are both in danger of mob retaliation.

Joaquin Phoenix in a scene from We Own The Night

As Joseph Grusinsky, Wahlberg is essentially playing a toned-down version of his bulldog-ish cop character from superior film The Departed, for which he received an Academy Award nomination. Both his character and father Burt are ashamed of Bobby’s decisions, and even when Bobby tries to do the right thing you can still sense their doubt and lack of faith in him. Phoenix plays the tortured soul like no one else, and if anyone’s in line for award nominations it’s him. Mendes also contributes a solid performance as the loving girlfriend who’s dismissed as a tart by Bobby’s family.

Bobby’s decision to help his brother and be an informant is fraught with peril, as he must infiltrate the ever-suspicious Russian mobsters who’d considered them his friend. That leads to a tense scene where a wired Bobby is taken to a mystery location to test the latest drug ahead of a major deal. Bobby’s nerves get to him and it raises the Russians’ suspicions about whose side he’s really on.

While We Own The Night isn’t in the same league as finer cop dramas like Martin Scorsese’s aforementioned The Departed or William Friedkin’s The French Connection, it’s still an entertaining two hours in the theatre owing mainly to good performances and several truly thrilling scenes.

Posted by Cate Jones

Agree? Disagree? Email Cate at criticizecate@gmail.com

We Own The Night (*** out of 5)
Rated: R
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Mark Wahlberg, Robert Duvall, Eva Mendes
Directed by: James Gray
Written by: James Gray
Related links: Official site, IMDB page, Apple trailer

Comments

[Brian McKechnie]

I agree with Cate - the film is very well done. It does drag though and might disappoint those expecting a little more action.

-Brian