Four Brothers

MPAA Rating: R

Entertainment: +2

Content: -3

Four Brothers is an action drama set in Detroit. Evelyn Mercer (Fionnula Flanagan) was a foster parent who adopted four highly aggressive and deeply troubled boys that no one else would take. Now grown, Bobby (Mark Wahlberg), Angel (Tyrese Gibson), Jeremiah (Andre Benjamin) and Jack (Garrett Hedlund) are reunited after their mother is gunned down in a grocery-store hold-up in their old neighborhood. Lt. Green (Terrence Dashon Howard), the investigating officer and an old school friend of Bobby’s, indicates that the shooting might not have been accidental. The Mercer brothers defy the police and begin their own search to find the killers, which takes them into the underworld culture of gangsters and police corruption that they fought so hard to escape as kids. They seek revenge for the death of the woman who brought them together, made them brothers and taught them the value of family.

The heartwarming story of a virtuous woman extending parental love to four troubled boys will certainly make the tender-hearted steamy-eyed. But this vengeful band of brothers, who take justice into their own hands, quickly blows away these warm fuzzies. The audience is assaulted with more than 100 instances of vulgar language. The obscene, frank comments about sexual matters are too inappropriate to detail in the summary section of this review. Comments about a younger brother’s homosexual interests are discussed jokingly and harshly. The brothers’ passion for violent revenge is exponentially more violent than the initial violent act that killed Evelyn Mercer. If anything, Four Brothers espouses a vigilante form of justice that is above the law. To top it all off, these hoodlum brothers embrace prayer and reverence to the Catholic faith as a tradition, not as a lifestyle. Don’t bother seeing Four Brothers.

Preview Reviewer: Brian Hughes
Distributor: Paramount

Summary
The following categories contain objective listings of film content which contribute to the subjective numeric Content ratings posted to the left and on the Home page.

Crude Language: Many (45) times – mild (hell 9, damn 6); moderate (b-stard 1, t-ts 2); strong (-ss 16, b-tch 8, SOB 1, a-hole 1, ho 1)

Obscene Language: Many (104) times – moderate (cr-p 1, s-ck 3); strong (f-word 46, s-word 36, BS 9, d-ck 3, c-ck 1, p-ssy 2, b-lls 2, other 1)

Profanity: Several (9) times – moderate (G 1); strong (GD 7, JC 1)

Violence: Many times – mild (shoving, pushing and chasing); moderate (fistfights and gunfights, one stabbing, gratuitous shooting); strong (demeaning violent treatment of people, multiple point-blank shootings, gory deaths of several characters, destruction of property)

Sex: Several times – mild (several implied sexual encounters between an unmarried man and woman); moderate (woman jiggles on top of a washing machine looking at her boyfriend lustfully); strong (man mounts woman and kisses her)

Nudity: Several times – mild (women in skimpy and revealing dresses); moderate (man sits on the toilet with upper thighs and hips exposed, mans buttocks briefly exposed coming out of the shower)

Sexual Dialogue/Gesture: Many times – mild (general comments about man and woman’s unquenchable desires for each other); moderate (several colloquial statements about a man’s ability to function sexually with a woman); strong (many blunt comments about unconventional sex between two men, blunt comments about wanting various parts of a woman’s anatomy)

Drugs: Several times – mild (drinking beer and whisky, smoking cigarettes)

Other: appropriate use of “Lord” in “Lord knows,” n-word used negatively twice as a racial slur

Running Time: 148 minutes
Intended Audience: Adults

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