Pride and Glory Has Neither

I really like a good crime movie. Thrillers are the best, but even weird, noirish types will work as long as they’re good—with a decent plot, great acting, and definitely a surprise somewhere. I’m not sure what I was expecting when I sat down to watch Pride and Glory; I think the previews had me ready for something truly shocking. However, the film really doesn’t have much of either pride or glory; in fact, it doesn’t have much of anything.

Recently I wrote that many critics claimed the movie Obsessed was simply an excuse to get Ali Larter and Beyonce brawling together in a cat fight. Well, I would surmise that Pride and Glory is a similar movie—only instead of the two beautiful starlets, we’ve got two Hollywood hunks duking it out in a bar room brawl. You have to admit, it’s sort of fun to watch, even if the jaunty Irish tune playing in the background makes it feel disjointed and surreal (which could be cool if that were the point—but it’s not the point of the movie… Warning: spoilers ahead.)

I had to laugh as I warn about spoilers, because the entire movie is revealed within the first, oh, twenty minutes or so. Colin Farrell is a drug-dealing, law-breaking, a**hole cop who leads a bunch of fellow officers in similar pursuits. The rest of the movie deals with his cop father and brothers-in-law trying to either cover up what he and his buddies are doing or do the right thing and turn them in. Norton plays the good boy of the family, willing to sour the family and the force by being the proverbial rat.

I know, it’s totally unique, right? Gripping. There’s some gory scenes where cops are killed, dealers are killed, and a witness has his family threatened, and a scene where Farrell gets bludgeoned to death by an angry mob, if you like that sort of thing. But the rest is just police angst.

If you really want to catch this movie, don’t waste your money on it. I’m sure it will be on USA or TNT or one of those networks come next Christmas, since it’s got the criteria those channels seem to set for “Chistmas Movie Marathons!”—you know, snow and a family dinner and stuff.

Honestly, the only reason to watch it would be for the aforementioned weird bar fight between Norton and Farrell, or to see Jon Voight act drunk—which, for that, you might just be able to invite him over for Christmas dinner and skip the movie in the first place.