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Police Beat

EMAILPRINTNorthwest Film Forum

Police Beat reviews
58
8.0 User Score:

Mixed or average reviews

Based on 10 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 1 votes
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Movie Info

Genre(s): Crime  |  Drama

Written by: Robinson Devor
Charles Mudede

Directed by: Robinson Devor

Release Date:
Theatrical: April 28, 2006

Running Time: 90 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Language(s): English / Wolof (with English subtitles)

Summary

RATING: Not Rated

Starring Pape Sidy Niang, Anna Oxygen, Eric Breedlove, Sarah Harlett, and Elijah Geiger

Police Beat is both a strikingly poetic examination of displacement and a gently surreal compendium of criminal behavior. Z, a young Senegalese and Muslim man, experiences his adopted city of Seattle through his job as a bicycle cop, leading him to encounters with all manner of strange and troubled people. Z himself, however, is less concerned with his job than with the possibility that his American girlfriend may be cheating on him while on a camping trip with a male friend. (Director's Statement)

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

75

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Paula Nechak

Pape Sidy Niang is terrific as the cop, Z, who is viewing America through a new immigrant's eyes.

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70

Chicago Reader J.R. Jones

Quietly unsettling in its vision of modern-day isolation.

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70

Village Voice Rob Nelson

Dreamlike in style, Police Beat is also a real-world vision of what American indies could be if they dared to recognize the drama in our own neighborhoods.

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70

The New York Times Manohla Dargis

A delicately funny tale about everyday surrealism.

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63

Chicago Tribune Michael Wilmington

An offbeat, poetic piece that eschews the terse, hard-boiled style of the standard cop movie or TV show for something softer-centered and more nakedly emotional.

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60

Variety Joe Leydon

Distinctive, physically ravishing indie is a natural for fests, but it's questionable whether this sometimes involving, sometimes obscure pic will have appeal beyond the specialty market.

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50

San Francisco Chronicle G. Allen Johnson

A bizarre original from the bizarrely original director.

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50

New York Post Lou Lumenick

Looks great, and the performances are solid, but the disparate elements in this oddity - which created a minor stir at the Sundance Film Festival last year - never entirely coalesce.

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50

The Hollywood Reporter James Greenberg

Soulful performance by non-pro Pape Sidy Niang as the bicycle-riding police officer Z, gives the film a poetic tone, but cumulative impact is diffused rather than enhanced by the fractured form.

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40

Film Threat Peter Hanson

The most frustrating aspect of Police Beat is that it's clear everyone involved has great talent...Too bad all their efforts are lost in the service of pointless material.

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 8.0 (out of 10) based on 1 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

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