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Monday, May 17, 2021

END OF WATCH (2012)

Easy enough to write off David Ayer’s buddy/buddy L.A. policier as just another OTT urban cop drama now showing its age, but, fine reception notwithstanding, this should have been pegged as used goods when it came out, its COPS meets THE OFFICE shtick barely hidden behind intense turns by Michael Peña & Jake Gyllenhaal’s bickering best-buds, patrol-car partners working badboy backstreet angles.  And what a caseload of front-page worthy assignments they cover over a few weeks (burning building baby rescues; drug cartel takedowns; human trafficking exposures; and more!) while back at home one proposes/one has a first child; never a dull moment!*  All ‘captured’ thru various video portals, half personally shot by Gyllenhaal, documenting his days even when crawling thru smoke-filled rooms.  The technique leading to the film’s single laugh when a bedroom scene implies a third partner.  (Hey, someone's holding that camera.)  Not without its effective sequences and a touching end (undermined by a comic/ironic final coda), but ultimately as manipulative as the films it's trying to show up.

SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY:  *Had David Ayer originally conceived this as a series (or mini-series), then stuffed a year’s content into 110 minutes?

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