THE EQUALIZER 2 (Malaysia, 30 Aug 2018)

Genre: Action / Thriller

Running Length: 2:05

Cast: Denzel Washington, Pedro Pascal, Melissa Leo, Bill Pullman, Jonathan Scarfe, Orson Bean, Ashton Sanders

Director: Antoine Fuqua

Screenplay: Richard Wenk based on the television series created by Michael Sloan and Richard Lindheim

What's the film about?

Just like the first Equalizer movie, THE EQUALIZER 2 is a slow burn thriller which will build and build until it burst into violent outcomes.When Robert McCall (Washington) turns on his kill mode, it will usually end up in shocking and brutal consequences. No prolonged action sequences and crazy stunts like the recent Mission: Impossible.

With so much violence on screen these days, I thought I would be desensitized but there were moments in this movie which made me flinch. The difference between those films and this one - the pain here feels real.

In terms of the plot, it's not much different from the first one. Our superhero protagonist is the judge, jury, and executioner for citizens who are exploited and oppressed (Gotham's Dark Knight-like). But this time, it gets personal.

Highlights!

• Fuqua, the director really knows how to deliver nail-biting sequences; Melissa Leo's character walking back to her hotel room, a car ride and a scene in which a teen has to hide from some killers.  
• The closing action piece, which occurs at the height of a hurricane, provides a perfect setting for the climax. 
• Watching Denzel punish the villains. Something about it appeals to the middle-aged male fantasy. 

Lowlights

• There is a problem with the plotting. Too many unnecessary episodic fillers which doesn't add to the main plot. 
• The filmmakers tried introducing some dramatic elements like a surrogate father relationship between McCall and a teen who is involved with some bad company. And there's a subplot involving a very elderly Holocaust survivor. Eventhough all these side characters performed very well, their stories just didn't add anything to the table. Yes, I get it that we would know our mysterious McCall better from these relationships but there's this short scene of him talking to his former colleague in a park which was much more effective in unveiling his past than all these other subplots combined.   
• I didn't really like the final fight scene as it was too stunt double heavy (that said the final blow was still satisfying).

In summary

EQUALIZER 2 is more of the same with the first movie but at least in the latter, it had more "Bollywood action-hero" style, like the warehouse scene where McCall walks slo-mo under the sprinklers - wah...maximum alpha male fantasy unlocked. This chapter was dull despite the realistic violence.

I think what adds to the lack of excitement is also McCall's God-like indestructibility. You know he's going to survive in the end...for the next sequel.

RATING: 6/10

THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (2016)

Genre: Western / Action

Running Length: 2:12

Cast: Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Byung-hun Lee, Vincent D’Onofrio, Martin Sensmeier, Peter Sarsgaard, Hayley Bennett

Director: Antoine Fuqua 

Screenplay: Richard Wenk & Nic Pizzolatto, based on the screenplay for “The Seven Samurai” by Akira Kurosawa & Shinobu Hashimoto & Hideo Oguni 

This updated version of THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN brings nothing new to the table except to literally update it for today's generation since the original is more than 50 years old (the 1960 version was also a re-imagination of Akira Kurosawa's The Seven Samurai (1954)).

To be fair, the first act was a good set-up where we witness the chief villain (deliciously played by Sarsgaard) struts into a church of a small frontier town with his men and forces the villagers to sell their land for cheap. Of course, things went south and helpless peasants were brutally killed. As a result, one of the widowed decided to go against these aggressors by recruiting a fighting force. The plot is simple enough to follow but yet when the credits rolled, the entire experience just felt like an exercise in futility. 

The "seven" characters were underdeveloped and thus I didn't care much at all when the odds were stacked against them in the loud and chaotic final act. One interesting thing the filmmakers could have focused on is to invest a little bit more time to give a proper backstory to our heroes so that their purpose of assembling together is more believable. It felt like Suicide Squad ie. what's in it for a bunch of misfits to get together to save the world?   

Washington is fine as the ringleader. Come to think of it, Denzel has always been playing a "cowboy" in his action movies eg Equalizer, Man on Fire, The Book of Eli. Pratt is as charismatic as ever. There are hints of the iconic score from the 1960s version (dum, dum, de-dum, dum dum dum da-de-dum) but you will have to wait till the closing credits to enjoy its full glory. 

Overall, despite its slick production, the diverse cast and fun shoot 'em up scenes, this popcorn western is forgettable. Towards the second half, I had this nagging voice in me that I should have just watched the original version or even the Japanese one.  

Rating: 6/10

THE EQUALIZER (2014)

Genre: Thriller
Running Length: 2:13
Cast: Denzel Washington, Marton Csokas, Chloe Grace Moretz, David Harbour, David Meunier, Melissa Leo, Bill Pullman

Director: Antoine Fuqua 

 

"Would you do something about it because you can?"

That is basically the premise our knight in shining armour, Denzel Washington has to wrestle through in THE EQUALIZER. For the most part, this movie is a character study about an elderly man holding back his destiny because of his dark past. Antoine Fuqua (director) and Denzel Washington have collaborated before in a similar territory in Training Day, a gritty tale of police corruption with a more complex character study which was brilliantly explored but The Equalizer chose to flirt with the drama instead and focused more on the stylish (OTT at times) action scenes. Those looking for a non-stop revenge action flick (as seen in the trailer) will be disappointed as the filmmakers elected to develop this flick as a slow-burn thriller. A major portion of the running time is dedicated to set the viewers up into the right mood (the beautiful close-up shots and lingering camera work capturing the beautiful sunset over Boston) and to give a clue to who Denzel's character is (a disciplined, OCD-ish learned man. A genuinely kindhearted man with a soft spot for the oppressed and marginalized) so that when the violence starts, it's shocking and brutal. The hero scenes are from the Bollywood school of filmmaking - Denzel looks god-like as he walks calmly slo-mo across the room or away from an explosion. The action scenes are also very inventive - we get a lot of impressively choreographed hand-to-hand fight scenes using everyday items available (think Macgyver) to dispose off the uber badass baddies. Items include and not limited to; cork screws, books, sledge hammers, barb wires, a drill, broken mirrors etc If The Equalizer has any weakness, it's that Denzel's character seems to be superhuman - he is almost indestructible and can take on an army of baddies anytime (so much so that during a scene where Denzel confronts a bad guy, a cinema goer sitting nearby uttered in Cantonese, "(Profanity) lor...yi gor yau chai sei ngang" (translate: This guy is sure to meet his death)). The pacing of the movie could have also benefited from a tighter running time. In the end, The Equalizer will not carve out any new niches in the action genre (like how Die Hard did) but it's a memorable origin movie that will certainly belong at the top as one of the more successful TV-to-film adaptations, alongside the Mission: Impossible series. This is probably the ultimate Denzel movie.

Rating: 7.5/10