Don't get in the car...

Rating: 8/10 (26 April 2012)

This dark movie transports us to a neighbourhood in blue-collar Boston, where good things tend not to happen.
There is a constant undercurrent of trauma, violence, rage and revenge. Men turn to crime. Problems are solved by violence. Children are kidnapped and molested (by bishops, no less). Pedophiles are fully active. Children are murdered; children are murderers. Mothers are dreadful harpies. Pregnant wives run off. Men are killed by old friends. Lovers are killed by brothers. Wives suspect innocent husbands, but stand firmly behind the evil ones. Killers are punished, but not for their crimes. Killers go free, despite their crimes.
For me the movie really ended when Silent Ray Harris and John O'Shea finally got sucked into this vortex. The cycle was complete. The trauma of a new generation was now fully in place. This was confirmed by the disturbed and haunted look in Dave's son's eyes as his guilty, guilty, guilty mother waves at him frantically from the sidelines of the parade. What chance does this boy have? What will happen to him is far worse than whatever happened to Dave. As Sean says needlessly at the end, "we're all still boys locked in the cellar".
By the way, I can't say I was surprised by who dunnit. There were enough clues. I was surprised though by how the movie ended. Very dissatisfying. We're in a different moral universe--Mystic River.
The acting was superb, but of course you knew that already, didn't you.