Teck tells the story about Bobby Green, the man who works as the manager of the hottest Gotham clubs. Things seem to be bad behind the scenes, when they overlook surveillance of criminal activities. Over time, Bobby will be a target for dangerous criminals in the city if sensitive information is revealed, which could be very dangerous.
[Gray's] feel for dialogue has rarely failed him, and it doesn't here.
Watertown Daily Times
July 22, 2008
Although We Own the Night is never as suspenseful as it wants to be and can be a little formulaic, it never comes close to being boring, and that's something you can't say too often about movies these days.
Director-writer James Gray makes it all seem more urgent than it has any right to feel, because he knows how to make tense, violent dramas that are soaking in mood.
It's not surprising, but it's engaging enough that most patrons will likely cut the director some slack for the out-of-period details and convoluted plot contrivances that make the film seem at once sloppy and too neat.
A generic thriller that aims for deeper resonance, We Own The Night is an intriguing feature, undermined by a plot that stretches credulity, yet which still manages to conform to predictable gangster flick cliché.
Time will tell, but from where I'm sitting this deceptively routine cop movie runs deep. In fact, it already looks like a classic. Cagney and Tracy would be proud.
If We Own the Night is flawed and somewhat choppy, it served notice that Gray, once he refined his technique, would be a force to be reckoned with in the cinema world.
A desperate violence and urgency spills out in the film's flash-point set-pieces - not least a sensational car chase, shot through a windscreen, hammering rain and a blur of fear.
