Max Payne
Screenings
Based on the popular video game, Max Payne has been adapted for the screen by UT-Austin alum Beau Thorne. He does a fine job of fleshing out what is essentially a convoluted shoot- em-up better suited to the joystick-and-POV combo. Trouble is, no matter how much craft Thorne poured into this particular script, the end result comes out of the mouth of Wahlberg. That's not good, because the actor bites down hard on the words before they barely have time to exit his mouth. He's so bleakly stoic in his characterization that he ends up trapping inside whatever emotional punch the original dialogue may have carried. But maybe that's the point. Payne is a NYPD cold-case cop whose wife and child were killed by cityscape scum. A loose cannon with no real target, Payne embodies equal parts Will Eisner's The Spirit and free-floating, postwar nihilism. Which war? Does it matter? Not really. With Payne, it's personal.


Pride and Glory
Tinseltown South
5501 S. I-H 35
512/326-3800
Fri, Nov 21, 3:30 PM
Fri, Nov 21, 9:30 PM
Sat, Nov 22, 3:30 PM
Sat, Nov 22, 9:30 PM
Sun, Nov 23, 3:30 PM
Sun, Nov 23, 9:30 PM
Mon, Nov 24, 3:30 PM
Mon, Nov 24, 9:30 PM
Tue, Nov 25, 3:30 PM
Tue, Nov 25, 9:30 PM
It's a good thing this movie has been sitting on the shelf for a year or more, because, apart from the difference in release dates, there's little to distinguish this new cop drama from last year's cop drama We Own the Night or last decade's Cop Land or dozens of other police procedurals that pit brothers against one another in a struggle between clean and dirty law-enforcement tactics, all played out under the watchful eye of a father figure who's also the top dog in the department's chain of command. With a predictable screenplay, Pride and Glory's only chance for individuality lies in the manner of its telling. Visually, the film is crisp and detailed (it's shot by cinematographer Declan Quinn), yet the performances, though solid, are less than extraordinary. A film starring such mercurial actors as Norton, Farrell, and Voight raises expectations of fireworks onscreen, which makes their absence all the more noticeable.