Warning: Some spoilers.

People are going to hate "The Pledge." And by "people," I mean mainstream audiences. Because the film is not clear cut. Sean Penn, the director, much like Sean Penn, the actor, brings forth a masterful performance. Here, however, he does so from behind the camera. Much in the way as an actor he tries anything, moves into new territory, refuses to follow established rules, utilizes every tool in his arsenal, Penn directs the film with the same unabashed passion. He tries new things, he breaks cinematic rules, he allows the film to unfurl like a beautiful haiku. Of course American audiences don't want haiku, the want a hamburger. Shame on them.

It's free form jazz style will confuse many. It's lyrical qualities will bore them to tears. It's lackadaisical pacing will drive them to the exit doors. The wont see the beauty in the gorgeous images Penn brings forth here. Every shot in the film counts for Penn. He makes every frame magical and unique. People won't see that, of course.

Women will really hate "The Pledge." It's disturbing images of violence against young girls, and I mean young - 8 years old, is far too graphic for most women, and, yes, also most men. And rightly so. But Penn includes these disturbing images with just cause. He must show us what Jack Nicholson's character, a police detective named Jerry Black sees. He must show us these flashes of repulsive and brutal violence against young girls to remind us of the abhorrent nature that Nicholson's character is dealing with. It necessary. But audiences and women may be right to rage against it. It is troubling stuff.

Penn and Nicholson create a story here that is novelesque and breathtaking in it's scope. Covering several years and featuring many minor characters, the film spans the story and plot with seeming ease. Nicholson and Penn take their time, develop the themes included and allow the film to simply evolve. In the space of the film's real body, the team of actor and actor/director create a complex and interesting theme of a man in the throes of real mental trauma. Nicholson's policeman Black, on his retirement, begins a "case," a story, that will permeate his life for the next several years. Here, the film travels down many paths, exploring many ideas: Nicholson's inability to accept retirement, which makes us wonder if he manufactures a bogeyman to allow him to continue his work; Nicholson's relationship with a young mother and daughter, which makes us ponder if he is truly delving into a relationship or simply attaching himself to someone who might act as bait for the serial killer he is trying to capture. These ideas thread through the film like a finely spun spider's web, capturing our interest and forcing us to evaluate what is going on. Penn refuses to spoonfeed us and, by sometimes allowing the film to slow and even get a bit boring, offers us time to digest and ponder the ideas and themes he is presenting. In Penn's film, time passes and the passage of time allows the story to evolve and congeal for the viewer.

Penn's film features a panorama of faces, most of them not pretty, that gives real human face to his story. By making only the young girls, the 8-year olds, pretty, he offers us a reasoning for the killer's lust. This is very subtle. But the adult world is so unattractive and so unsavory here that we even begin to wonder if it is Nicholson himself who is the killer, even if we know for a fact it is not. His fatherly attentions to the young girl he "adopts" here borders on the pedophilic, in a very delicate way. Again, we are disturbed. Even customarily attractive actors, like Costas Mandylor, Benicio Del Toro, and Robin Wright-Penn are shown in unflattering light. Nicholson himself is shown by Penn to be old and weathered. Vanessa Redgrave is also seen to be a bit aged. Actors of generally non-typical Hollywood looks are also employed like Patricia Clarkson, Sam Sheppard, Michael O'Keefe, Harry Dean Stanton, Mickey Rourke to continue this inclination. And a plethora of "extras" and minor characters played by a variety of "real" types walk through the film making it sad and human.

Only Helen Mirren, as an older psychiatrist, who also discusses sex with Black, is shown to be attractive in her mature state. Here the idea related to Nicholson's retirement is presented, that he is also not sexually active, which allows us to see why he is fixating on catching a murderer when the police already think the killer has been caught. When Mirren asks if he is sexually active and points out his chain smoking, we see that Black is indeed obsessing. His need to be involved with crime fighting is as much attached to his inability to relax (i.e. grow old) as it is to his need to prove his virility.

"The Pledge" is a beautiful, complex and wonderful film. Here Penn yet again proves that his talents are wide and his work in film, whether in front of or behind the camera, is some of the most important work of this era. "The Pledge" deserves accolades. From mainstream audiences, however, it will receive nothing but derision. Again, shame on them.

Note:

Script by Jerzy and Mary Olson Kromolowski based on the novel by Friedrich Durrenmatt.

Penn is also a producer.

Music by Hans Zimmer and Klaus Badelt. Cinematography by Chris Menges.

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