John's Movie Musings

Remember when The Departed came out and won all those Oscars? And you know how Hollywood likes to copy anything that's successful? Well Einstein, you should have known We Own the Night was coming before Scorsese finished his acceptance speech.

In The Departed, the two main stars are on opposite sides of the law. Both happen to be cops with one undercover. In We Own the Night, the two main stars are on opposite side of the law, but they are brothers. See? It's different.

The Departed has ultra-realistic gunplay and violence. We Own the Night has super-ultra-realistic gunplay and even more violence. Oh, and it adds a car chase.

Mark Wahlberg stars as a hard, no nonsense cop in The Departed. In We Own the Night, Mark Wahlberg stars as a hard, no nonsense cop...with a brother.

So you can see, We Own the Night is a totally different movie. No seriously, it is different. It's worse.

I've heard that it's not fair to compare one movie against another. Each movie must stand on its own, right? Wrong. If Hollywood goes out of its way to blatantly rip off another movie, isn't it only fair to compare that effort to the original? I think so.

If you've never seen The Departed, you need to watch it first. If you saw it and thought, "Man, I wish Mark Wahlberg's character was in another movie!" go watch We Own the Night.

Grade: C