There's some wars you fight, and some wars you walk away from.

Date: Monday 25th February
Film: Broken City (2013)
Director: Allen Hughes
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Russell Crowe and Catherine Zeta-Jones
Running Time: 01 hour, 49 minutes
Rating: 6/10

Monday night, post Oscar party. The CW and I are exhausted, but it's a free screening and we have nothing better to do (apart from catching up on sleep, perhaps) so off to The O2 we schlep for Broken City.

We'd watched the trailer but, at this point, hadn't seen any reviews or comments on the film - other than that Graham Norton Show appearance - so we were going in a little blind. We knew the basics of the plot - Mark Wahlberg plays a private investigator hired by Russell Crowe's mayor to look into his wife's (Catherine Zeta-Jones) affair and things don't go all that smoothly.

But, that synopsis isn't really what Broken City is about. Yes, that is the basic storyline but within 5 minutes of watching it becomes clear that this film wants to show more than that. It wants to show corruption of politicians, officials, and public figures. It wants to investigate the humanity of those living and working alongside these figures. It wants to be a slick psychological thriller.

The problem with Broken City is that, as hard as they try to create a back story  you don't really get a feel for any of the characters. I don't think I particularly liked any of them. There are scenes that make no sense to the film, at times they don't seem to fit with what you are seeing. As if they were exposition scenes for plot lines that were cut away in editing.

Mark Wahlberg plays his part very well, providing his role is to play Mark Wahlberg. There doesn't appear to be much of a distance from other thriller/action films he has made before.

It was watchable but, like Contraband it just didn't engage. It tried to hard to be slick and meaningful, and lost something along the way.

Challenge day: 153
Challenge time: 09 days, 16 hours, 51 minutes
Challenge film total: 120