DVD Review: Patriots Day
Patriots Day takes a cinematic look at the Boston Marathon bombing. Not exactly high drama and not something I especially wanted to see. I mean, to be blunt (and very wrong) the Boston bombing was just a minor attack with a couple of small bombs, on the news and gone again. Not really an edge of your seats thriller. But then I remembered that Peter Berg and Mark Wahlberg worked together on the remarkable Lone Survivor and the equally mundane looking but surprisingly tense Deepwater Horizon. Maybe this pairing could make something out of nothing.
And they did.
The Marathon is obviously just the backdrop of the film. Wahlberg plays the role of Tommy Saunders, a fictional police officer, a composite of several officers who played various roles on that day and the days following. Remember this as Saunder’s seems to be in play at every essential scene, making him some kind of super cop, but also allowing the story to have some grit and pace.
It’s also a very emotional story as you get to see some of the smaller stories that a news report can never focus on. The intensity of the film however is in the chase for the perpetrators and Patriots Day steadily builds momentum until we’re introduced to the most unlikely of heroes and soon after the film’s defining scene, and one of those action film scenes that will be on many best of lists, where in a quiet suburban street the police and the terrorist engage in an explosive and tense fire fight.
But for all it’s bravado, Patriots Game also manages to be real, real in how violence effects people, and how love conquers all.
Rating: R13 Violence, offensive language & content that may disturb.
FILMGUIDE rating:
