I was cleanly stumped by how much the plot thickened and surprised me as the movie progressed. It is good to see a film daring to market something else and contains a package of different substance in it. I was expecting a tug of war in between two brothers separated by the law which have been played brilliantly in lot of Indian movies mainly the Bollywood’s “Diwar” and the remake of it in Tamil, “Thee”. It is quite co-incidental that I was talking about these movies with a friend of mine, Karthik. Well it is nothing like that while I would have wanted but it has other factors to make it a good movie.
It takes a veteran actor like Robert Duvall as Burt Grusinsky and two well matured actors like Joaquin Phoenix as Bobby Green and Mark Wahlberg as Joseph Grusinsky to generate the heat in between them without any foundation of these three characters’ history. Bobby does not want to be linked with a cop family to climb up the ladder of profits and running a club for his boss, Marat Buzhuyev (Moni Moshonov). He takes his Mother’s last name to separate as much as possible from his family. The movie is set during 1988 at Brooklyn, New York which apart from cars and the drug flow does not need much of period or location. Bobby with his girl friend Amada (Eva Mendes) is setting up a foundation for a family as his own. With Joseph as his cop brother and dad Burt being so proud of Joe following his foot steps, he is an outsider. One cannot blame Burt when his son and his girl friend inhaling pot before entering the honorary function for Joseph. But it runs more than that when Bobby is warned and asked about the information of a Russian gangster Vadim Nezhinski (Alex Veadov) visiting his club. Already being looked down and humiliated, he discards them and goes on his own. Bobby and Joseph clearly strike each other for attention of their father and it gets the height when Bobby is busted and erupts. This is the part where the story could have been taken anywhere and especially as advertised. They surprise us.
Phoenix has acquired this talent over the period of time to make himself comfortable in Bobby. He knows that he has been in the wrong foots with his family and takes responsibility for the happenings. He starts as an underdog and ends as some one else. His transformation from a coke snorting club manager into a different personality is more of his performance than a screenplay. Wahlberg with his punching foul mouthed Dignam in “The Departed” shows a different cop Joseph. He gets less screen time but it is the steam he generates with Phoenix which makes us to build up their history by ourselves. We believe that Joseph had everything right with his father. In the span of getting his attention he might have overstepped his brother. We do not know but we can feel it. Two things got missed though. Eva Mendes as Amada was only used as an intimacy for Bobby than support and mainly I would have liked few more scenes of Joseph and Bobby confiding and facing the history which has led them out there.
There are two terrific scenes which brought me closer in anxiety and tension. The drug bust and the rainy car scene which nailed and broke the traditional handling of those sequences which are gripping and tense in every moment of it. The film sustains by the performance and may be that is the reason at the end of it, we feel a little void. The plot which thickened so hard and engrossing failed to capitalize on the bond in between these brothers who had their way different but need to come in terms for a common goal. Robert Duvall at his class forming the bridge in between the two has his moments with Phoenix of comfort and care which explains a lot about the mood of change he shows. He does not believe in Bobby and when he sees it in him, we see the difference.
Director James Gray is good in materializing his talent in the right manner but does not quite finish it as punching and polishing. The terror the character of Vadim should have been propelled even more. Bobby fears as hell and we know why for the reputation Vadim has created but we miss it at the crucial moment. The suspense as the Hollywood has come up with now is no more of suspense than a guessing game. Out here they do not at least play open games of that sort but use it as a nice finish for a full circle of events. I would have loved to see Phoenix and Wahlberg crack, curse and produce that the love they shared for their father is mutual. It ends in that way but not the way it moves you. It brings the regular ritualistic smile for a movie like this.
It takes a veteran actor like Robert Duvall as Burt Grusinsky and two well matured actors like Joaquin Phoenix as Bobby Green and Mark Wahlberg as Joseph Grusinsky to generate the heat in between them without any foundation of these three characters’ history. Bobby does not want to be linked with a cop family to climb up the ladder of profits and running a club for his boss, Marat Buzhuyev (Moni Moshonov). He takes his Mother’s last name to separate as much as possible from his family. The movie is set during 1988 at Brooklyn, New York which apart from cars and the drug flow does not need much of period or location. Bobby with his girl friend Amada (Eva Mendes) is setting up a foundation for a family as his own. With Joseph as his cop brother and dad Burt being so proud of Joe following his foot steps, he is an outsider. One cannot blame Burt when his son and his girl friend inhaling pot before entering the honorary function for Joseph. But it runs more than that when Bobby is warned and asked about the information of a Russian gangster Vadim Nezhinski (Alex Veadov) visiting his club. Already being looked down and humiliated, he discards them and goes on his own. Bobby and Joseph clearly strike each other for attention of their father and it gets the height when Bobby is busted and erupts. This is the part where the story could have been taken anywhere and especially as advertised. They surprise us.
Phoenix has acquired this talent over the period of time to make himself comfortable in Bobby. He knows that he has been in the wrong foots with his family and takes responsibility for the happenings. He starts as an underdog and ends as some one else. His transformation from a coke snorting club manager into a different personality is more of his performance than a screenplay. Wahlberg with his punching foul mouthed Dignam in “The Departed” shows a different cop Joseph. He gets less screen time but it is the steam he generates with Phoenix which makes us to build up their history by ourselves. We believe that Joseph had everything right with his father. In the span of getting his attention he might have overstepped his brother. We do not know but we can feel it. Two things got missed though. Eva Mendes as Amada was only used as an intimacy for Bobby than support and mainly I would have liked few more scenes of Joseph and Bobby confiding and facing the history which has led them out there.
There are two terrific scenes which brought me closer in anxiety and tension. The drug bust and the rainy car scene which nailed and broke the traditional handling of those sequences which are gripping and tense in every moment of it. The film sustains by the performance and may be that is the reason at the end of it, we feel a little void. The plot which thickened so hard and engrossing failed to capitalize on the bond in between these brothers who had their way different but need to come in terms for a common goal. Robert Duvall at his class forming the bridge in between the two has his moments with Phoenix of comfort and care which explains a lot about the mood of change he shows. He does not believe in Bobby and when he sees it in him, we see the difference.
Director James Gray is good in materializing his talent in the right manner but does not quite finish it as punching and polishing. The terror the character of Vadim should have been propelled even more. Bobby fears as hell and we know why for the reputation Vadim has created but we miss it at the crucial moment. The suspense as the Hollywood has come up with now is no more of suspense than a guessing game. Out here they do not at least play open games of that sort but use it as a nice finish for a full circle of events. I would have loved to see Phoenix and Wahlberg crack, curse and produce that the love they shared for their father is mutual. It ends in that way but not the way it moves you. It brings the regular ritualistic smile for a movie like this.
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