Not quite a dish worth serving unfortunately.
Based on the 1972 novel and its loose but influentially
popular 1974 film adaptations starring Charles Bronson, “Death Wish (2018)” has
been touted as something of a victim of the modern political climate given the
nature of its predecessor’s celebration of armed vigilantism indicative of the
cultural background of the decade that birthed it, more specifically the high
crime rates and opaque nature of police conduct in a non-digital age.
One could argue the dangers of stoking such paranoia in today’s
climate with the tale of a man who only attains solace regarding the wrongs
done to him by taking the law into his own hands through his right to bear arms
but to focus the problems of “Death Wish (2019)” squarely into the zone of the
political would do a disservice to the rational sides of debate that could be
brought to its issues of gun ownership and vigilantism in the internet age,
while failing to address the more debilitating problem of the film just feeling
lifeless.
Directed by Eli Roth, this movie sees Bruce Willis step into
the shoes of Paul Kersey, imagined this time as a surgeon who seeks revenge for
the death of his wife and the assault of his daughter in a home invasion
burglary gone awry.
Whether the selection of the project was the result of
studio decision making or a personal pursuit on Roth’s part is not something
that I can get firm confirmation of but his sensibilities do undeniably synchronize
well with the franchise in question.
The man’s films (including Hostel, The Green Inferno, Knock
Knock) may not quite be everybody’s cup of tea regarding subject matter but the
man is undeniably a skilled craftsman of productions centered on atmosphere,
explicit content, and the exploration of the seedy, baser, and more disgusting
aspects of human nature conveyed through strong character driven performances.
Add in his imagination and lack of shyness regarding gore as
a consequence of violence and excess and the film should have been a match made
in heaven.
To the credit of “Death Wish (2018),” the film isn’t quite
terrible. It’s far from good but it has a solid functional foundation usually
indicative of an artist that usually knows how to craft at least a decent film,
while moving along at a decent pace.
Unfortunately, it can’t escape the realm of boredom because
the film is painfully lifeless.
Whether it wanted to go the Bronson route of glorifying the
path of the vigilante or reject such notions and the institutions that drive people
to it ala the narrative of deconstruction that the original novel was intended
to be, either extreme would have been preferable to this product, which is so
bland and paint by numbers that it almost could have been assembled by a novice
second unit director following textbook instructions.
Bruce Willis phones in yet another dead performance as is to
be expected and the only one that seems to be actively trying is poor Vincent D’onofrio
as his Kersey’s brother, who’s so much better than everybody he’s surrounded
by, he almost feels like he’s in another movie entirely.
The action lacks any real sense of style or notable
brutality as the movie shambles from set piece to set piece before reaching a
conclusion that feels surprisingly abrupt and lacking in its ability to
thematically tie together any of the preceding film with any sort of cohesion.
Nuggets of good ideas pop up every once in a while, such as
the over the top satire of the gun store that supplies Paul inadvertently
pointing out the absurd lunacy of second amendment loopholes granting anybody
potential gun ownership with no scrutiny towards qualifications or a glorious 3
minute long torture sequence in which Paul utilizes his medical knowledge to
interrogate one of his daughter’s assailants before leaving him to a grizzly
fate but these instances are just too few and far between.
From the mundane shootouts to creative bankruptcy of trying
to give Paul a vigilante persona in the vein of a superhero, nothing in “Death
Wish (2019)” works particularly memorably but it at least never dips below
being harmlessly forgettable.
Far more credit than I can give its far less flattering
knockoff.
Despite the problematic lack of ambition on display by
“Death Wish,” the movie does at lest function on a basic level, which is far
more than can be said for “Peppermint.” Anything that could have gone wrong
with “Death Wish” more or less does go wrong here and then some.
Jennifer Garner’s family gets killed by the Cartel and after
she gets screwed over by corruption in the legal system she goes on a trail of
rampage to seek revenge for the lack of justice she suffers.
Some of you may think that watching a middle age housewife
transform into a brutal and calculating killing machine is a transformation
that requires a strong mix of effort and subtlety to believe onscreen. Not only
would you be absolutely right, but the movie seems to be wholly aware of its
own ineptitude as it forgoes the transformation, arguably one of the best parts
of these types of movies, in favor of a nonsensical time skip drains the movie
of what little character it already had.
Coupled with the absolute lack of subtlety in portraying the
cartel as the most borderline hilariously offensive and stereotypical Hispanic gangbangers
I’ve seen brought to screen in a wide released theatrical feature in quite some
time and an oddly out of place focus on the trials of suburban motherhood which
makes the whole thing come across as a bad script written by a teenage intern
attempting to submit a pitch for a Lifetime channel original movie, and “Peppermint”
begins to morph into this oddly homogenous and sensational action flick less
interested in telling a story and more in getting the right reactions from a non-discerning
audience to simulate a compelling feature.
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