Review: Patriots Day đź‘Ž
Last week’s Sneak Preview took us on a very serious ride down memory lane. Our cinema here in Berlin screened Patriots Day [IMDb, Trailer], a cinematic monument for the victims of the bombing at the Boston marathon in 2013.
As you can probably guess, it is a tough movie to watch. Not that I know many details about what really happened, but I get the feeling that Peter Berg tried to stick as close as possible to reality. Thus, the movie obviously does not come with much of a story arc, because everybody knows what happened. However, he still found a good way to keep the viewers on their toes: Leading up to the explosions, the camera switches between several story lines. You see the terrorists, police officer Tommy Saunders (Mark Wahlberg) and several soon-to-be victims. Although you know what is about to happen, the uncertainty of the exact timing creates suspense.
After the bombs went off, the story mostly follows Saunders and shows how he and his colleagues suddenly have to deal with an impossible situation. I think this part of the movie greatly benefits from the main character. Without focusing on him, the chaos would have been too overwhelming to follow.
What makes this movie very believable and almost too real, is the extensive use of surveillance camera footage, be it original or just in a similar style. That creates a little documentary feeling that is absolutely crucial in making this movie into what I initially called “cinematic monument”. In the end, Berg included original footage of the Boston Red Sox game, where the victims and heroes of that woeful day were honored.
A final word of warning: There are some very explicit scenes that are quite hard to forget. Berg didn’t soften anything and that might be too much for some people. This is not an entertaining movie at all. It is very well executed and honest, but I cannot think of a situation, for which I would consider this movie to be a good choice. It does not really teach us anything we didn’t know before, it is not fun, there is no story that tickles your mind. It just reminds everybody of a horrible occurrence. It is a monument made of celluloid. Well…not really, because that’s not how movies work anymore, but you get my drift.
