The Review: We Own The Night

We Own The Night 7/10

I finally finished watching We Own The Night which I started months ago. I began on my Kindle but there are some things that you just can not enjoy the same on those things. This is a movie that I had heard of but did not know who was in it or what it was about. This is a good, solid movie that I am surprised that not that many people have ever mentioned this. It stars Mark Wahlberg, Joaquin Phoenix, Eva Mendes, and Robert Duvall. Seriously. With that cast how have I not seen this movie before now? It takes place in Brooklyn, New York in 1988. Phoenix is Bobby Green. He is running a super popular night club, doing all the drugs, having all the Mendes sex, and generally enjoying his life. Meanwhile his brother Joseph played by Wahlberg is a super cop. He raids the club one night and Bobby is all about not cooperating. He fights back and is arrested. By the way, no one knows they are related.

Theater Whore: The Gambler

The Gambler 4/10

Meh. This movie The Gambler has a lot of great actors in it, stars an okay one, and somehow manages to be pretty mediocre. Mark Wahlberg is a guy that teachers in college and also has a huge gambling problem. John Goodman, Micheal K. Williams, and Jessica Lange are totally wasted in this. Lange particularly because whenever she is on screen its good. Maybe its the fact that I don't gamble and can't relate to gamblers but all of the gambling parts bored me. The best scenes involved Williams, Lange, and Goodman. The rest is me seeing a guy I don't care about playing games I'm not interested in. This isn't really worth running out to see. 

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Theater Whore: 2 Guns

So I decided to see 2 Guns which turned out to be a major mistake. I didn't think it would be possible to make a film starring Denzel Washington, Mark Wahlberg, Edward James Olmos, and Bill Paxton not interesting. At the very least you'd think it would very difficult. Turns out that I was wrong. If I had known that this was based off a graphic novel I would have lowered my expectations for it since those are notoriously hard to adapt for film. But I'm stupid and always do my research after the fact. 

"You read the script? Yeah. Me neither."

This movie is about two people double crossing each other at the same time while also being double crossed by the agencies they work for (DEA and the military) who are in turn being double crossed by a federal agent who is also being double crossed by a Mexican drug lord. See what I mean? It got to a point where I wasn't sure what the hell was going on but I knew no matter what that these two would be friends till the end!

DVDiculous: Max Payne & Hitman

For no reason I decided to watch some video game based films. The first I viewed was Max Payne starring Mark Wahlberg and Mila Kunis. Max Payne is a angry cop. I guess I’d be too if my wife and infant son were murdered by some crack heads hopped up on goofballs. Actually, its some new drug that is all the rage amongst random ass people. Don’t know about you but doing a drug that makes me see demons sounds fun!

Party!!!

So Max heads to this club and starts fucking with folks until this hot ass chick from Quantum Of Solace played by Olga Kurylenko starts messing around with him. He doesn’t want a piece of her though and leaves. She comes to his place and starts stripping down to her draws and he kicks her out. No! I refuse to believe this is possible! The best way to get over the loss of a family is by boning the bejesus out of a hot chick! Right?

Theater Whore: Contraband

Sometimes I write about a movie and its hard. Not because its bad but because it should’ve been good. I know that barely makes sense but you know how I roll. The trailer for this looked pretty cool what with the dudes with tape wrapped around their faces and everyone pointing guns at one another.

The problem is that in between all of this is flat acting, unbelievable shootouts, and ridiculously inescapable traps people are set in lies a movie about getting money in the most difficult ways possible. I looked up the director and I don’t know any of his other work, but he obviously loves Michael Mann.