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It’s often said that there aren’t any new stories left to tell—that Hollywood just keeps regurgitating the same couple of stories over and over and over again. I’m not going to say that that’s always the case, but when it comes to cop movies, that hypothesis seems to be pretty accurate.
Pride and Glory is the story of a family of NYPD cops whose careers collide one night when four of their fellow officers are killed in a raid gone wrong. The four dead cops worked under oldest brother Francis Tierney, Jr. (Noah Emmerich). They were colleagues of Fran’s brother-in-law, Jimmy Egan (Colin Farrell). And one of them was a close friend of younger brother, Ray (Edward Norton).
When the NYPD forms a task force to look into the officers’ deaths, Francis Sr. (Jon Voight) pulls some strings to get Ray out of his self-imposed exile in Missing Persons and onto the streets to find the cops’ killer. But when Ray starts uncovering information that points back to the department—and, specifically, to his brother-in-law, Jimmy—his father urges him to keep quiet and bury the incriminating evidence to protect his family.
Unfortunately, though, no one thought to bury this movie to protect me from wasting a perfectly good Tuesday night. Now, that’s not to say that Pride and Glory is an absolutely horrible movie—though it’s certainly not a good one. It’s just that I’ve already seen this movie more times than I ever needed to.
Pride and Glory is just another typical cop movie—complete with a typical cop-movie story and a bunch of typical cop-movie characters. There’s the dark, brooding cop (Ray) who has something to prove. And there’s the good, hard-working cop (Francis) who just wants to be a good boss and a good provider for his family (and, to ensure that you’ll really feel for him, the writers also gave him a wife who’s dying of cancer). Both brothers have been taught by their hard-working cop dad to be good, honest cops who look out for their own.
But then there’s the crooked cop (Jimmy)—who, fortunately, is only related to the good guys by marriage. This guy’s not just crooked, he’s evil—inhumanly, unbelievably evil. There’s hardly a single positive thing about him. He has no conscience. No morals. And he’s entirely incapable of showing restraint. He’s so absolutely depraved that he has no problem punching a woman in the face while she’s holding a baby. And wherever he goes, gallons of fake blood are sure to appear in his wake. He’s so purely evil, in fact, that he’s almost silly.
Like the characters, the story, too, is sure to give you a two-hour-long case of cop movie déjà vu. You’ve seen it all before—and you’ve most likely seen it done much better. This time around, it’s needlessly complex and ridiculously blood-soaked and much, much too long. Since you know who the bad guys are from the beginning, there isn’t a whole lot of suspense, and there aren’t any surprises. And then it ends in the easiest, most convenient way possible.
So unless you absolutely love the same old run-of-the-mill cop movie, you’re definitely better off skipping this one.
