21 Bridges
As reported by Dollyforme
I found the great movie in my local Redbox machine. I really enjoyed this flick. So let’s get going. It’s pretty clear what is going on with 21 Bridges, at least in regards to its star, Chadwick Boseman. Despite already having a notable career before taking the role of Black Panther in the MCU, there’s no denying that his explosion from a reliable young actor to a household name happened because of his turn as the King of Wakanda. It’s a role that is so synonymous with his being that pictures of Boseman looking particularly exhausted while exchanging the “Wakanda Forever” salute with fans have become a pretty hilarious meme. Credit to Mr. Boseman for sticking with it, regardless of however tiresome he may find it. It’s clear that he understands how much T’Challa means to the fans, and he’s the man for powering through to make them happy. But with another Black Panther film looming on the horizon, it’s no surprise that the actor would like to establish himself outside of franchise bondage.
21 Bridges is an attempt at doing exactly that. Produced by the Russo Brothers, the architects behind the latter era of the MCU, this basic cops-and-robbers thriller makes a valiant attempt at coasting on the goodwill afforded by the MCU to give one of its most exciting performers a leg up in the biz. The talent is there, but that’s only half of the equation. Anymore, a burgeoning superstar must engage with the business end of things, playing the long game and staying ahead of any potential hurdles. Audiences are finicky, and once you’re a superhero, it’s tough for a lot of them to see you as anything else. If that means leaning on your on-screen capital as a jumping off point, so be it.
At the same time, putting the word “avenger” on your poster, AND putting it into the literal first line of the film is a weird choice. I don’t know how I feel about it. Audiences may really be as non-discerning as the cynics of the world would have you believe, prioritizing recognizability over quality, or maybe they’ll be turned off by the needless connective tissue being heaped upon a movie that does not have any plot-connection to the MCU. Will pushing the MCU adjacent elements of production be a helpful crutch or a cringe-inducing window into the increasingly common “fuck ‘em, they’ll pay for it” nature of mass-market film exhibition?
It’s an interesting notion to be explored in another piece, but I believe it’s essential in speaking about 21 Bridges. With every new entry in the MCU’s gigantic connected universe being a sort of experiment (the whole thing is unprecedented in every way), we must also consider the fact that, despite being a concept as old as the business itself, the “I’m more than the one role that made me famous” project, has become experimental as well. With Black Panther being such a cultural behemoth, is it even possible for an actor like Chadwick Boseman to pull off this notoriously difficult move? Time will tell. But as it stands, 21 Bridges makes a commendable effort.
No, it’s not the next Se7en or Heat, but it could be the next 16 Blocks (underrated IMO), and not just because of the numeric title either. 21 Bridges is exactly the type of movie I remember stumbling across late at night on HBO after my parents had gone to bed and the restrictions on what I was allowed to watch had disappeared. It’s a lean, exceptionally paced thriller that doesn’t leave enough time between action beats for the viewer to realize how dumb so much of it is. But that’s fine. In an entertainment landscape that seems to demand every piece of fiction take a strong progressive stance against something, anything, I’m happy to have a little dumb in my life.
Boseman plays Andre Davis, a young cop who is famous for two things. First, he’s the son of a respected cop who was killed in the line of duty. Second, he has no qualms about pulling the trigger and killing bad guys while on the job. He’s colloquially referred to as a trigger, a term that Andre promptly reminds a white detractor to be cautious with his diction when using. Andre takes his job very seriously, and he’s damn good at it too. His ability to assess a crime scene and retrace what happened is unmatched by anybody he works with, but his quest to find truth behind purposeful obfuscation gets him his fair share of resistance from the brass as well.
On this particular night, two smash-and-grab toughs for hire (Stephan James & Taylor Kitsch, both fantastic) are sent to relieve a drug kingpin of his cocaine and bring it to a competing dealer. When they arrive, it turns out that there’s a LOT more cocaine than they expected, making the robbery that much more difficult. When the cops show up, bullets are exchanged, and bodies start piling up fast. When word of this massacre reach Andre’s team, he has an unconventional plan to catch this duo of cop killers: Shut down all routes in and out of Manhattan (21 bridges, 3 rivers, and 4 tunnels), effectively trapping them on the island and preventing the FBI from taking the case away from the local boys.
What follows is a cat and mouse thriller, complete with copious amounts of violence, fast talkin’ cops (including J.K. Simmons and Sienna Miller as the fast talkingest), and a breakneck pace that helps smooth over the inherent silliness of a lot of the script. Sure I could sit here and do a cost/benefit analysis of the many confounding decisions made by law enforcement here, but I’d rather sit back and enjoy the mindless thrills of it all.
As for Mr. Boseman, he’s more than proved his talent (watch Get On Up to see his best performance, albeit in a so-so movie), but will 21 Bridges successfully disassociate him from being solely Black Panther in the eyes of the filmgoing audience? Tough to tell. All things considered, he doesn’t really get to do much here, but what he does do, he does quite well. Well worth a rental our streamed from Netflix.
