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'Death Wish' Provides Awesome Vigilante Action, Great Story

Bruce is back!

By Jonathan SimPublished 6 years ago 6 min read
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Eli Roth's Death Wish remake recently came out. I saw the trailer, saw Bruce Willis in it, being the badass he always is, and knew that I had to watch this movie, even though I didn't watch the original.

And I expected this movie to get modest reviews from critics. I thought that it would get about a 74 percent on Rotten Tomatoes and boy, was I wrong.

I mean, 15 percent? The main thing that stopped me from just forgetting about this movie altogether was the 84 percent audience score. Now, I'm a freelance critic, but I hold my own opinions. And I've been reading some reviews from professional critics, and I don't think they reflected the movie very well.

So, I'll give my opinion on it and give feedback on some other reviews of the film.

In the film, Bruce Willis portrays a surgeon named Paul Kersey, who lives in a crime-ridden Chicago with his wife and daughter. One night, burglars break into his house, rob him, kill his wife, and injure his daughter.

Kersey discovers this, and realizes that if a man wants to protect what's his, he has to do it for himself. And I personally loved how Willis portrayed the character.

Kersey has seen so many victims of gun violence in Chicago, and has seen so many die in his hospital. When his own family gets victimized, he becomes a vigilante. Kersey confronts victims of crimes in his city, always wearing a hoodie to conceal his identity and he is nicknamed "The Grim Reaper."

In terms of filmmaking, it was very good. The suspense in the scene where Kersey's family is attacked is amazing and had my heart beating out of my chest.

And the action scenes in the movie were BADASS. Bruce Willis was back, doing what he does best. Kill bad guys, and deliver one-liners that you don't get too often in recent action movies.

One of my favorite scenes in the film is when Kersey walks up to some drug dealers. They ask him who he is, and he responds: "Your last customer."

Kersey also isn't just some psychopath. He sees crime and the results of crime on a near daily basis. And he knows how ineffective the police can be. That's why he takes matters into his own hands.

The writing and directing was good, but my only criticism of the movie was that there was a near endless supply of bad guys that never seems to run out. We didn't really get to know any of the bad guys, but Willis kicks serious ass in this movie.

So, if you like action flicks and/or if you like Bruce Willis, this is definitely a movie that I would recommend you watch. Its plot is kind of cliché at this point, but it's definitely worth a watch.

Now, it's time for the serious gun talks and the message behind this movie. Many critics are calling this movie "badly timed" due to the mass shootings in the United States recently.

David Edelstein of Vulture called the film "practically an NRA promo." Jeanette Catsoulis of The New York Times said something very similar, calling it "ready-made for an N.R.A. ad campaign."

But that is ridiculous. Movies aren't always made to promote the hero's actions and encourage people to do the same. Vigilante justice is not recommended and it's only for badass mofo Bruce Willis fictional characters. And Charles Bronson. You got that?

Under that logic, Star Wars is an ISIS ad because Luke Skywalker blew up an entire planet of people he didn't like, right? Terrorism!

In fact, there is a scene in the film where a person attempts to mimic Kersey's vigilante justice, only to be killed instantly by a criminal. Kersey sees this and is ashamed for the fact that someone got killed because of him.

This scene HIGHLIGHTED the danger of vigilante justice.

The film also showed how easy it was to buy a gun. Kersey walks into a gun shop in one scene, and an employee there, Bethany, tells him in order to purchase a gun, there would be some easy paperwork, a quick background check, and a gun safety test which "everyone passed."

Now, this is a fictional movie, but then again, a kid who has made his dangerous personality public was able to legally buy an AR-15 at the age of nineteen and murder seventeen people in his high school. So, the line can't be that far off from the truth.

If anything, Death Wish just SHOWED how easy it would have been for Kersey to buy a gun.

Not only that, but it is not the fault of the film for being released after the Parkland shooting. It could have been released last November, but it was pushed back after ANOTHER mass shooting in Vegas.

Put simply, no matter when this film could have come out, it would have been after a mass shooting. Hell, if they had released this film three months from now, it would STILL be right after a mass shooting because Congress won't f**king do something to stop it.

Nevertheless, just because a mass shooting unrelated to the film happened before the film's release, that tells us exactly "jack" and "s**t" about HOW GOOD the movie is on its own.

Now, as for "it's badly timed" and "an NRA ad," the stuff in the film was not that bad. Death Wish did not encourage vigilante justice, and if anything, the fact that guns were so easy to buy was the main PROBLEM in this film.

The very first scene of the film contains news stories of the amount of people getting killed from guns. A child was shot in this film by a drug dealer on the street. Kersey's wife, Lucy, was killed by a man with a gun. Guns were a PROBLEM in this movie.

The film didn't promote vigilante justice, but it did promote the message of purchasing a gun for self-defense, which I agree with. I don't believe in the sale of semi-automatic weapons to civilians, though. (See: It Is Time to Talk About Gun Control)

And yes, Kersey was, at one point, able to buy a machine gun in the film, which he was able to use at the end of the film, but again, this is a fictional movie. Kersey also could have used a handgun in this scene, but they went with the machine gun because this is an action movie, and handguns would have been too anticlimactic.

So, what I'm saying is, no matter where you are on the gun control issue, you shouldn't let mass shootings affect your feelings on HOW GOOD it is.

Kersey is a "good guy with a gun", but this movie showed another "good guy with a gun" getting killed instantly by a bad guy with a gun. So, there's no need to get offended by this movie. It doesn't tell you to buy a semi-automatic weapon for self-defense, but it promotes the idea of buying a handgun for self-defense.

And remember–just because you don't like mass shootings or AR-15s in the hands of the public, it shouldn't stop you from watching and enjoying a good ol' Bruce Willis action flick that I highly recommend.

Thinking about taking the kids? The film has some language in it, and a lot of gun violence. There are also two scenes in particular in which a large amount of blood is displayed. If your kid is under 12 or 13, cover his/her eyes when you see it.

Anyways, go watch Death Wish! It's a really fun action movie.

Damn, you gotta love these hard-R action movies.

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About the Creator

Jonathan Sim

Film critic. Lover of Pixar, Harry Potter, Star Wars, Marvel, DC, Back to the Future, and Lord of the Rings.

For business inquiries: [email protected]

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