good back-story, and good acting

Simple and well acted, it has tension enough to knot the stomach.

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

As a kid I remember watching the movie Es geschah am hellichten Tag / The bait (Ladislao Vajda, 1958) several times and it was an always exciting experience, no matter I already knew exactly what happend on it, who was the murderer and so on... Today I've seen Th Pledge on TV (did't even know a remake had been made of the great movie I enjoyed so much in my youth) and recognized the story at once but has really been annoying watching how can a great story can develope into such a boring movie. by the way: why does Penn need 2h 4m to tell it? Removing the useless footage this movie could have lasted little more than one hour, I think it's stupid Penn makes it longer than 2 hours!Also the end, completely different to the original story, is pretty stupid and disappointing. Awful movie...

Jack Nicholson is in one sense a throwback to the old time studio system of actors in like stars such as Cary Grant or James Cagney he's so identifiable, impersonators have made whole careers of doing Nicholson. But the usual Nicholson is not really present here. Director Sean Penn kept the usual Nicholson shtick carefully in check in The Pledge, but did get a great performance out of him as a cop who just can't let the job go. Happens in many jobs when you are conscientious and care about what you do.On the eve of his retirement Nicholson who is at his retirement dinner goes out with the rest of the detectives and uniforms on a crime scene of a brutal rape murder of a child. A mentally challenged Benicio Del Toro is arrested and a confession is wormed out of him. But rather than go through the system DelToro steals a cop's gun and it's suicide by cop. Nicholson isn't satisfied and he thinks he has found a pattern of a serial killer. He also befriends Patricia Clarkson who has a little girl of the same type as the one this serial killer is supposed to like. Clarkson is a good soul who has had it rough and she and Nicholson start developing a relationship which under normal circumstances might go somewhere. But even in retirement Nicholson is a cop first and foremost. That fact kills any chances he'll have of happiness and completion.Sean Penn assembled a good cast that gives great performances, especially those I've mentioned. No Nicholson shtick here like you find in such classics as Chinatown and A Few Good Men, but a really good acting job.

Well acted, some beautiful imagery, keeps you interested with it's at times almost painful levels of suspense but is ultimately a big let down. We felt like we deserved a better ending. I suspect the author tried to come up with something different to an age old killer on the loose storyline and cop with "a hunch" but at the end of the day the audience has a certain requirement to enjoy what they've witnessed and if that fails to materialise for whatever reason then the movie can't be rated highly purely for the acting alone. Perhaps the book is better.

A little girl is sexually assaulted and brutally murdered. The police fumble and prevaricate (why must it always be so?), closing the case on the basis of a confession extracted from a junkie - who conveniently shoots himself immediately thereafter - which has chasms larger than the Grand Canyon. It's left to Jerry Black, retired police detective, to have conscience qualms, meet the girl's shattered parents, and, on his soul's salvation, pledge (ergo, the film's title) to bring her killer to heel. He proceeds, on his investigation and to his department's obvious discomfiture, via the well trodden route of investigating similar crimes in the area around, in the past, etc etc.Thus far, it's run-of-the-mill - at least so far as the plot goes - and reasonably predictable. However, once Black (unforgettably brought to life by Jack Nicholson) gets set on the right track, and finds all his hunches, and inferences, to be justified, one by one, the script runs wildly off track.Now that, ordinarily, would be a criticism, rather than a compliment. However, in the case of "The Pledge", director Sean Penn - who has distinguished himself as much in the field of direction as in that of performing - carries us with the completely random flow of the events that unfold, each more unpredictable than the last. Till it all ends in a climax which, I am willing to wager, no one, absolutely no one who has been watching the lunatic turns the plot takes, could have predicted.Whether the end of the film is fulfilling, or not, is debatable. I don't really care. I only know that this is a film which I would unhesitatingly advise anyone, and everyone, who wants to know what imaginative filmmaking is all about, to see. It stands luminously aloft as an example of how, even while working within staid formulaic parentheses, something genuinely and gratifyingly creative can be crafted. By one who has the gumption to do so, and is willing to take the risks, however. Like Penn.