The Pledge (2001)

There can't be such devils out there.

The Pledge is directed by Sean Penn and adapted to screenplay by Jerzy Kromolowski and Mary Olson-Kromolowski from Friedrich Dürrenmatt's novel, "The Promise". It stars Jack Nicholson, Robin Wright Penn, Aaron Eckhart, Sam Shepard, Patricia Clarkson, Helen Mirren, Tom Noonan, Benicio Del Toro, Mickey Rourke, Dale Dickey, Vanessa Redgrave and Harry Dean Stanton. Music is by Klaus Badelt and Hans Zimmer, and cinematography by Chris Menges.

Police chief Jerry Black (Nicholson) is literally on his last day before retitement. But during his leaving party news filters through that a young girl has been brutally murdered. Talking his chiefs into letting him tag along to the crime scene, Black ends up breaking the dredful news to the girl's parents. There he pledges to the mother that he will find her daughter's killer.

Dürrenmatt's source material has been mined a few times for other filmic ventures, where the best of the other bunch is "Es geschah am hellichten Tag" ("It Happened in Broad Daylight"). It is here, though, in Sean Penn's hands, that we get the version that got two thumbs up from the author, mostly because of the ending staying true to his work.

It should be noted from the off that this is not police procedural detective piece. This is a slow burn, moody and edgy picture, the kind that Penn excells at as an actor. Thankfully, in spite of it losing money at the box office, it shows Penn the perfect director for such material.

It obviously isn't a film for everyone, more so if not prepared for it being a picture about one man's tumbling emotional descent. As Jerry Black searches for the perpretrator of heinious crimes, he also is faced with a moral judgement call and a major affair of the heart.

The trick of the screnplay here is not in the red herrings and the little dangles of clues that appear to be on offer to Jerry, it's that we are never quite sure if Jerry is actually right in his belief of a child serial killer at work. Is it the product of a man so driven by the pledge he made, that he isn't thinking straight? Or worse losing his grip on sanity? The answer will only will out with the clinically daring finale.

Lead actors Nicholson and Wright Penn turn in some of their finest work, both responding to Sean's probing of troubled souls in search of an exit. There's an array of quality support actors in small parts, which is a testament to the pull that working with Penn did appeal. The musical score is nervy and sits smartly with the ethereal tones that Menges brings via his photographic lenses.

The Pledge is a haunting and disturbing character study that refuses to cop out. It achieves its aims and wasn't going to pander to any crowd pleasing bums on seats tactics. A dark thriller for grown ups who have the patience for such a telling, and perhaps more crucially are prepared to have their emotions tested with the finale. 9/10