Pride and Glory a suspenseful cop masterpiece

JEREMY TOWNES
This Week On DVD

**** out of 5

Few police dramas are anything more than cliché narratives and bullet-riddled, two-hour non-refundable tickets.
The Departed broke from the norm and set a standard for what a cop movie should be about in 2006, and Pride and Glory has followed suit in 2008. The movie reveals itself to viewers as a family of New York police officers tears itself apart from the inside dealing with loyalty, family, friendship, and career. Directed by Gavin O’Connor, this two-hour, 10-minute gritty film will have you cursing the villain, hoping for the good guy, and generally satisfied when it’s time to return it.
The cast is led by routinely excellent actor Edward Norton as Ray Tierney, an honest cop caught between father Francis Sr. (Jon Voight), a chief police detective who looks to run from truth rather than accept it, brother Francis Jr. (Noah Emmerich), whose life’s work hangs in the balance between a wife dying of cancer and a corrupt unit he can’t control led by brother-in-law Jimmy Egan (Colin Farrell) whose crooked actions deny all sense of morality and principle.
The plot pivots around the murder of four police officers during a botched drug bust. Francis Jr. was in command of a unit that included Jimmy. When the city is shaken by the tragedy and carnage of the deaths Francis Sr. pulls strings to have son Ray join a special task force to help find a cop killer. Ray, determined to find the murderer, is shaken to the core when a trail of clues and evidence confirm his suspicions that there’s more than meets the eye from this murder scene. He will have to confront his family in their darkest hour to solve this crime.
The movie isn’t without flaws and arguably gets off to a slow start, but as the family drama unfolds and each individual character shares bits and pieces of their lives subsequently explaining why they are headed down their respective paths, it becomes hard for anyone watching the film to not be captivated by what’s happening on the screen.
Easily deserving of four out of five stars, Pride and Glory offers a little bit of everything for viewers. Action, suspense, drama, and mystery. It will keep you on the edge of your seat while you watch four actors perfectly portray characters caught in a battle that may tear them apart.

Movies for This Week On DVD are provided by Movie Gallery, St. Stephen.