WE OWN THE NIGHT (Sony) James Gray’s third feature works the same moody groove as Little Odessa and The Yards, reuniting the latter film’s stars — Mark Wahlberg and Joaquin Phoenix — as fractious heirs to an NYPD dynasty. Gray’s ’70s-inflected style has led some to label him an imitator, but his homages are subtle and smartly integrated into his storytelling. At a time when gimmicky self-reflexivity is the dominant mode in American auteur cinema, We Own the Night’s clean narrative lines, lived-in performances and dead-serious tone are fetchingly retro. Plus, Gray is a whiz with action scenes: there are two shootouts here deserving of entry into the movie-gunplay pantheon. EXTRAS: Director commentary, “Police Action: Filming Cops, Cars and Chaos” and “A Moment in Crime: Creating Late ’80s Brooklyn” featurettes.

GONE BABY GONE (Alliance) Moving from the sadly under-praised to the comically overrated, we arrive at Ben Affleck’s much-lauded directorial debut: a Dennis Lehane adaptation that frames the Mystic River author’s pet concerns (lost children, urban tribalism) within another sodden, implausible Boston potboiler. A lot of critics praised the film for its local colour (read: unattractive people leaning on stoops) and “toughness” (read: unrelenting luridness) but at best this is competently made pulp, with delusions of authentic moral inquiry. EXTRAS: Director/writer commentary, extended ending, deleted scenes, behind the scenes, casting featurette.

Also out this week
BECOMING JANE (Alliance) Anne Hathaway should be playing the sister who settles in a Jane Austen novel, not the author herself. EXTRAS: Commentary, deleted scenes, “Discovering the Real Jane Austen” (perhaps the featurette does a better job than the movie), “Pop Up Facts.”

MARTIAN CHILD (Alliance)
K-Pax gets remade with a moppet in the place of Kevin Spacey; the decline of John Cusack continues unabated. EXTRAS: audio commentary, deleted scenes, featurettes.

NO RESERVATIONS (Warner) Catherine Zeta-Jones twinkles; Aaron Eckhart cashes a paycheque. EXTRAS: a set visit by Unwrapped host Mark Summers (beware of food-related puns).

Out Feb 19
American Gangster, Lust, Caution, Margot at the Wedding, Michael Clayton and three of last year’s commercially unsuccessful Iraq-themed movies: skip the prefab pathos of Rendition and In the Valley of Elah and scope out Redacted, a cinematic dirty bomb from Brian De Palma.

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