rickyvee Review of Pride and Glory

Pride and Glory (2008)

It can't be rated like other cop drama thriller films. here's why...

[10/10 · 4 February 2009]

I'm reading that it's ineffective as a cop drama action thriller. Of course it is! Anyone writing that is missing and not appreciating Stone's work. It's a mood piece. Of course it's loosely structured, fuzzy in focus. Its point and its storytelling get lost in the mood set scenes. But that's how it's designed. That's what Stone Does! There was a scene, all of which I couldn't watch. The Christmas dinner scene where Voight gets lost over praising Norton. The seeds of the destruction of the family are there. But the performers are so strong, so much in tune with the point of the scene, that it was painful to watch. It's a Stone kinda thing. It's his gift. It's intimate, and unsmooth, unfinished looking. Not unfinished, just unfinished looking. It's not a tight crime thriller. It's a mood painting, it's a 10 of a mood painting, not a 6.9 of a Crime | Drama | Thriller, so I give it a ten for what it is, not a 6.9 as an attempt to make what it isn't. You don't rate Oliver Stone on the same scale as Jerry Bruckheimer. It's apples and oranges, fer cryin' out loud! Stone made what he attempted to make, and it's beautiful and perfect at what it does.