Broken City

I give this a five for the cast, but a two for the obtuse and predictable script, which inexplicably appeared on the Black List of best unproduced scripts -- in which category it should have remained. In development hell for years, it should at the very least have undergone a major rewrite to simplify the story (which wanders all over the place and becomes dumber by the minute) and raised the tone up out of the gutter. Whichever studio execs placed this on the Black List need to stop sniggering over the dirty words and earn their money by figuring out just what constitutes a good script. Wahlberg is always a pleasure to spend time with but the phoniness of so many of the scenes and the clunkiest car chase ever defeat even his efforts to entertain. So much of this movie is predictable and so many scenes are actors simply going through their paces with inferior material. The gorgeous, gorgeous Catherine Zeta Jones is totally wasted in this piece of dreck. Somewhere in this movie there may originally have been a good idea about corruption in the city. Unfortunately nobody appears to have had the courage to grab it by the throat, beat it into shape and present it to the public with any wit, style or originality. Like it says in the header, this is painting by numbers.