An average movie

Since I really loved James Gray's debut, 'Little Odessa', I have watched all his flicks and I was expecting a lot from this one. Furthermore, it is one of the most catchy title I have ever seen, the cast was quite awesome and the story seemed intriguing enough. Eventually, it turned out to be his most disappointing movie so far... I don't mean that it was bad, absolutely not. The directing was awesome as usual, the cast (Joaquin Phoenix, Eva Mendes, Mark Wahlberg, Robert Duvall) was pretty good and they all delivered some decent performances, especially Joaquin Phoenix (thank God he dropped the whole retirement/hip-hop career/hoax thing....). The main issue was with the story. I mean, it starts out as a gripping gritty crime drama with the 2 brothers standing each at the opposite side of the law and I was rather hooked but then, in the second half, the whole thing just turned into some big nonsense. Indeed, after Wahlberg gets shot, Phoenix who used to be some lowlife gangster, suddenly became instantly a cop and goes into a quest to avenge his brother and father and eventually kills a whole bunch of bad guys... It was really preposterous and, honestly, I kind of lost interest in the whole thing afterwards. Still, it remains a very well made crime drama and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in James Gray's work like I do.

6/10