21 Bridges (2019) - Movie Review

 

The son of a murdered cop, who himself is a detective in New York, gets brought in on a seemingly open-and-shut robbery case. Of course, when the robbery in question is one of the biggest drug seizures in the city’s history, and the culprits are not only still at large but have racked up a sizeable body count of police officers, things are about to get complicated. To give themselves a chance to catch them, detective Andre Davis orders that all 21 bridges connecting Manhattan to the outside world are to be blocked off, trapping the killers on the island.

If you’ve seen basically any police-centric action thriller in the last handful of decades, you’ve likely already encountered basically everything this film has to offer. It’s a procedural yarn that experiments with crooked cops and muddled alliances, but for a story built on twists and double-crosses, it is remarkably obvious on all fronts. It goes beyond this merely being an issue of repeated material, as it plays its hand so openly and so quickly, even for a 90-minute offering (excluding credits), that all the technical competency in the world isn’t enough to save it.

That, and an admittedly game cast who are clearly trying to elevate the material involved. Chadwick Boseman as Andre gives the film a good moral center, and he certainly brings conviction to the role, but again, it feels like he’s aiming below his pedigree. I mean, I know that executive producers Anthony and Joe Russo are likely also trying to get out of the Marvel bubble with this feature, but while Boseman works here, the apathy surrounding him made me yearn for a ‘Wakanda Forever’ moment.

Stephan James and Taylor Kitsch as the antagonists do quite well too, and they sell the action scenes the best out of everyone here, and J.K. Simmons as the police captain… exists, I guess, much like the rest of the supporting cast. The most engaging performance here comes from Alexander Siddig as a forger, and it is downright criminal how little we see of him in this.

And speaking of things that are woefully underutilised, for a film that openly presents a number of idea that could set it apart from its competition, this doesn’t even try to flesh them out. The titular 21 bridges and the closing-off of Manhattan? There is zero feeling of compression and isolation to be found here. I know that The Dark Knight Rises didn’t win over everyone out there, but as far as a No Man’s Land scenario, this really pales in comparison. The ticking clock given by the FBI agents on how soon Andre has to catch the murderers? The pacing here could not feel looser if it tried, likely a result of director Brian Kirk’s majority experience in TV work, and the tension just isn’t here. The chip on Andre’s shoulder about his father and his willingness to shoot suspects? Brought up at the beginning and basically forgotten right afterwards, robbing him of any real character development.

But the worst part of all this? It’s a film about the American police force that presents their methods, their ideology, and even their shoot-first-ask-question-later policy… favourably. To say that this isn’t a good time to release a film like this is an understatement. Sure, with how prevalent those issues are, there probably isn’t ever a good time for a film like this, but this really goes the extra mile to make itself conspicuous. Like, once we get into the nitty-gritty of the crooked cop side of the plot, we actually get a moment where the script tries to excuse police officers trafficking cocaine throughout the city. It’s an attempt at moral ambiguity that… isn’t so much reading the room badly as much as it reads the entire building badly.

Under normal circumstances, I would at least give this film credit in that it is competently-made and well-acted, which it still is even with everything else said. Shame that everything from the original working title 17 Bridges to the finished product reeks of underachievement. It keeps presenting chance after chance for spice that the film seemingly goes out of its way to ignore entirely, the meat on the script’s bones is bland as fuck to begin with, and the approach to police corruption is frankly embarrassing. I can’t even damn this with faint praise. This is just not worth the time, and if you do decide to check this film out anyway, don’t be surprised if you forget everything you just saw as soon as you leave the cinema.