TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Majorthebys Charming and brutal

Seraherrera The movie is wonderful and true, an act of love in all its contradictions and complexity

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

George Taylor This might have been a decent movie, but I found it hard to sit through since they went with the found footage idea, which I hate.

cdpmedia1 First of all I cant believe this movie was even made in cop hating Hollywood and released to be seen in cop hating America. Its truly bizarre that I didn't see a single PC adjustment, slanted depiction of society or revision of reality to align with our PC BS laced version of reality that the media portrays. Frankly, this movie is so good and so matter of fact it must have a million PC zealots simmering. Watch it now before it gets banned.

Sean Newgent Police dramas are a dime-a-dozen in most entertainment mediums. Television is loaded with them and has been for thirty years. The New York Times Bestseller list is usually dominated by them. And, of course, cop films are a favorite of Hollywood. The popularity of the buddy cop genre, thanks to the Lethal Weapon films, has led to dozens of imitators to varying effect. Most of these glamorize the police lifestyle or throw aside reality to provide entertainment. Every once in a while, though, we see a movie like End of Watch that asks us to look at policemen from a variety of angles, not just a heroic lens.Jake Gyllenhall plays Brian Taylor, a beat cop with the LAPD partnered with his best friend Mike Zavala (Michael Pena). The two wind up learning too much about a cartel and become the target of their viciousness.Simple premise. And from the outset you can guess what is going to happen. But the movie isn't traditional in its storytelling. We see everything from body, dashboard, and hand-held camera perspectives giving an almost Cops (the television series) like feel to it all. We the viewers are a part of the action in a way I've never encountered before. Found footage horror films are a subgenre that we've all most likely encountered for good or ill. The idea of applying that to a police film is inventive and interesting, allowing for a close-up and realistic approach to telling what is an otherwise generic and by-the-numbers central plot.What the found footage reveals are two cops who are best friends and brothers who joke around, tell stories, and are entirely human. They aren't portrayed as badass, cool, or any other convention. They're just two humans. And seeing them policing the streets we get a variety of situations that show how tough it is to be a cop. Typically a film like this would have the heroes be above the law or strictly apply it. Here they beat up supposed crooks, they get rowdy when they see something they dislike, they act like dicks. But we also see them heroically rescue children from a burning house and shoot the breeze with local hoods. That multi-dimensional aspect makes the characters interesting, human, and entirely lovable.Add to that the non-cop footage of dates and weddings, major events in the duos life. It's an air of humanity that endears End of Watch and forces you to see the police in a different and more sympathetic light.The acting here is one of the main reasons the film succeeds so well. Gyllenhaal and Pena have such great chemistry and are totally believable as best friends. Given the direction and style on top of the script, it's hard not to be fooled that the two aren't real cops and they aren't ad-libbing every conversation. It's masterful.The ending, as I said at the beginning, is obvious, but it hurts still. That's the sign of a damn good film, when even with a conventional plot line and predictable finale, you still walk away feeling emotional. Because as conventional as the majority of the movie may be, it is entirely unconventional in presentation and delivery.End of Watch is edge-of-your-seat action and drama from start to finish. Fast moving and full of stellar performances, it's the type of dark and unique cop film that breathes life into a tired genre and changes your perspective in unexpected ways. Definitely give this one a watch.

Pelle So you look at the score given on IMDb, you see Jake Gyllenhaal, it says action drama and you think that OK, this will be good! Time to see a good movie and it has all the premises to not let you down. But this is bad. I mean not just bad.. its so bad I had to create an account here on IMDb just to warn people so they could spend their time on something good, that doesn't make them wanna break their TV just to get a sense of undoing this garbage they just witnessed.About the movie itself then... The movie will, as soon as it start, be a cliché of everything. I will not spoil anything but believe me this movie will be bad..Who wrote the dialog for this movie. Maybe if this would be a parody where it should depict these cops this would be a perfect dialog.. but it is not.. its tagged as action and drama for crying out loud. Maybe they should just one extra time include a line where someone could say "(insert cliché phrase) ladies!" to our main characters just to be sure someone didn't miss it during the movie..Why not just include a useless love story and some talk about their families so you get to know these average Joe cops, just so you can recognize yourself with these cops.. Great that half of the movie is wasted on this. Because every time it feels like the movie is about to finally getting somewhere you get these love stories ruin the movie. I would rather have commercial brakes than this...So you sit and wait for this waste of time going down before you eyes and it seems like it is finally going to happen, it's going to end. And damn is it a bad ending. The movie is really giving you the middle finger here, and to make things worse, when it finally ends they cut in this worthless scene between the two partners and as soon as the first one opens his mouth you know exactly how the story ends.The only crime committed here is that this train wreck was ever produced. The day before watching this mess I got a knee to my forehead doing Muay Thai and had to get some stitches, but if I could turn back time and choosing to redo just one of these two things I would go back and ask to get my skull cracked with the knee this time just to be sure to never have to end up seeing this "movie".Oh and did I forget to tell you about the camera work. What do you know! It sucks as well.I thought writing this review would let the anger out but it didn't. The worst part is that I suggested this movie.. I now have a ban on choosing movies because no one will ever forget this horror I had to make them sit through. Thanks David Ayer!