DVD Review: END OF WATCH

Officers Brian Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Mike Zavala (Michael Pena) chronicle their days as Los Angeles patrol cops through video camera. They talk about their relationships, arrest a criminal who has Liberace's AK (a gold plated AK-47), save kids from a burning house, and draw the attention of a drug cartel who puts a price on their heads. END OF WATCH is writer/ director David Ayer's latest movie examining Los Angeles cops. He combines the cop movie with the found footage camera style to create a movie that is sometimes very compelling while sometimes feeling like an art film drama in other places. I do feel the scene where you hear and see the drug cartel taking the hit out on the cops could have been left out in addition to the scenes of a gang tailing them should have been left out as they distract the viewer from the POV of the two patrol cops. I wanted the movie to be from their POV where one scene of Taylor's girlfriend filming herself is the exception. I do like how END OF WATCH shows their lives on the job and their lives outside the job.

PS The Liberace's AK bit does make want to see a Grindhouse action film with Liberace and a golden AK-47.

SPECIAL FEATURES:

The audio commentary with writer/ director David Ayer comes off as a little dry even though it does bring some details about the production that the featurettes lack.

The best extra is the 46 minutes of deleted, extended, and alternate footage which results in 17 scenes which range from the two cops being interviewed by a local news station and an alternate ending where both cops are dead.

The five featurettes (FATE WITH A BADGE, IN THE STREETS, WOMEN ON WATCH, WATCH YOUR SIX, HONORS) are brief promo fluff which has quick sound bites from cast and crew in addition to clips from the movie.

FINAL ANALYSIS: END OF WATCH is a near perfect examination of the lives of two patrol cops. The best extra is the assortment of deleted scenes.

this DVD review is (c)1-27-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com