Review of Patriots Day (2016) by Kristofer H — 15 Jan 2017

Proper Perspective: Yes, it is early and the events of the Boston Marathon Bombing is just a mere (almost) four years old, Peter Berg handles the recount of the events with class and the type of realism that put you in the moment again. This movie has narrative, but not to the point that it impacts the actual events that hit home so hard for so many.

Official Synopsis: "An account of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and the aftermath, which includes the city-wide manhunt to find the terrorists responsible.".

Plot: We follow the local police, politicians, and FBI leading up to the events of April 15th, 2013 and the following four days that led to the death and capture of the two terrorists responsible. Mark Wahlberg (Tommy Saunders), John Goodman (Police Commissioner, Ed Davis), Kevin Bacon (FBI Agent, Richard DesLauriers), Michael Beach (Governor, Deval Patrick) lead the ensemble cast. The events run from Sunday, April 14th 2013, the day before the marathon and through the capture of the second bomber played by Alex Wolff (Dzhokhar Tsarnev). The citizens, medical personel, and all of the brave individuals who led small helping hands to capture the brothers who plotted to bomb the marathon and then hit other landmarks, including Time Square.

Throughout the movie we jumped through the day following a married couple who went to the marathon as spectators (played by Rachel Brosnahan and Christopher O'Shea), a father and his young son (Dustin Tucker and Lucas Thor Kelley) going to see their mother run, and the city as a character.

Take: There is a right way and a wrong way to handle these movies and Peter Berg has found the right way from Lone Survivor to Deepwater Horizon and now with Patriot's Day. Let's get the negatives out of the way. As these events transpired we can imagine the conversations and how individuals reacted, but unless the audio was lifted for all of the scenes to fill in the dialog the lines in the third act felt really inauthentic. The liberal use of "F-Bombs" and characters going out of character to say things that did not fit stood out like a sore thumb. Other than that, this movie was terrific.

Initially some of the backstories on the side characters felt unnecessary and the way the movie spliced in the security camera footage with narrative camera shots also felt odd too. Then, as soon as the bombing happens in the story, both of those factors enriched the movie. The editing in this movie is Oscar worthy. Hands down the best editing in any movie in 2016 in my opinion because of the use of original footage, recreated security footage, and the switching back-and-forth between all of the styles was flawless. Truly great.

The unheralded actions of police officer Sean Collier (Jake Picking) who lost his life protecting himself against the bombers, college student Dun Meng (Jimmy O. Yang) who escaped the capture of the terrorists to alert the authorities to where the terrorists were, and the citizen who noticed that during the city-wide search and lockdown his boat not secure and the terrorist hiding in there were all told as well.

All of the acting was great. Nobody played a character, rather everyday people doing their jobs and trying to balance the shock of the situation with the necessity to keep working through. This movie is terrific and has very little flaws to poke at other than the dialog toward the end.

Recommendation: Go out and see this movie. It is a depiction of human characters on the most real and classy manner. Peter Berg has found his niche and the cast could not have been better across the board with how they portrayed these very real people in a very real event. This is Berg's best movie to date in my opinion, coming off Deepwater Horizon which is great, is a huge feat.

QUICK ADDENDUM: I did not know until after the fact that Mark Wahlberg played a mostly made-up character. That takes away from the film a significant amount after I digested that fact. Just tell the real story, how the story happened, we do not need the dramatic effect in a story that is full of drama inherently.