Film Reviews & Movie Analysis

There might be 21 bridges that lead out of Manhattan but all roads eventually lead to justice.

The Synopsis
During a mix up on a routine burglary, petty criminals, Michael (Stephan James) and Ray (Taylor Kitsch) leave the scene with eight bodies in their wake and the entire Manhattan police force on their tail.

Put in charge of tracking down the murderers is Detective Andre Davis (Chadwick Boseman) who is known in the force for catching and killing ‘cop killers’. Against his will he is paired with narcotics detective Frankie Burns (Sienna Miller), and together they race against the clock until the city reawakens to catch Michael and Ray. The deeper they go into their prey’s motives, the less things start to add up, and the closer they get to the truth, the more there seems to be to unravel.

Caught in a conspiracy he can’t quite understand, a night born of coincidence turns into one of questions, and Detective Davis isn’t going home without answers.

What my cinema companion said:
 “‘Close the island’ – what a line! I wish I could say that and have everyone listen no questions asked.”

The Good
Firstly – Chadwick Boseman. He wasn’t the draw but I also wasn’t offended when I saw him in the trailers. For a lack of a better description I was pretty indifferent. However I have to say he played that smart, straight-faced, independent detective, with a thirst for truth, justice and liberty,  fantastically.

Another actor I want to give props to for their role is Stephan James who played the intelligent and misfortunate criminal Michael. There was a certain undercurrent of complexity to his character that came out really well on screen.

I thoroughly enjoyed the action sequences that came from this movie, once or twice my jaw dropped in surprise at some of the chases, crashes and deaths which showed the level of engagement not just from me but from the people viewing it around me.

There isn’t much to say about the plot itself as it was pretty basic but within the norms they amped up the rawness of death and touched on the people behind the badge.

The Bad
Detective Davis being the ‘cop who kills cop killers’ wasn’t really that clear to me from the beginning, and also wasn’t a good enough basis for being brought onto the investigation. It wasn’t like he was the ‘cop who was great at tracking down and then killing cop killers’ – and even then in both cases it’s as if the force hired a hit man for the night not a man who was full of morals and integrity.

I still don’t quite understand why Internal Affairs was so interested in Detective Davis. I really thought that meeting at the very beginning of the movie was going to lead somewhere but nothing came from it. Like the opening funeral scene, as great as a set up as I thought it was – it wasn’t, and just felt like a little bit of a waste of viewing time.

Who is Sienna Miller? Her name sounds very familiar but not her face, I only ask because the accent she had on for the movie was incredibly off putting. I’m not even quite sure what accent it was supposed to be, but I cringe in anticipation of someone informing me.

21 Bridges is an amazing name for a movie… and this sounds so trivial, but the bridges didn’t factor into this movie at all which was so disappointing!

The Conclusion
As far as police based action movies go – 21 Brides was surprisingly good – I say surprisingly because I was on the fence about seeing this one however I thoroughly enjoyed straight faced no nonsense Chadwick Boseman and the subtle set up for a sequel gets my thumbs up.