"We Own the Night" is a tug-of-war tale about a son being pulled in different directions by his cop-heavy family and his Russian mob-connected employers, his "second family."

It would be nothing more than sturdy entertainment were it not for the presence of Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg, playing brothers and reunited with their director from "The Yards," James Gray.

Wahlberg is Joe, "the good son," the cop - a New York police captain in charge of a unit looking into the power-grabs by Russian expats, new to America's drug wars.

Phoenix is Bobby, the "bad seed" and the focus of the film. He's the guy who ran away from his family's ethnic surname, the one who turned his back on the Force and became a bartender who is now manager of El Caribe, a converted church that is one of the city's hottest nightspots.

Bobby works hard, parties hard and loves hard (Eva Mendes is his lady). He uses a little coke, drinks a little booze, keeps the peace in the club and steers clear of the shadier relatives of the kindly old Russian fur merchant who owns the joint.

But The Family wants the son to take sides.

"Either you're gonna be with us, or you're gonna be with the drug dealers," his police chief dad (Robert Duvall, flawless in a conventional role) lectures him.