The coincidence of several vigilante movies coming out at once offers a prime opportunity for sociological criticism. But the mere fact that these films have erupted is less interesting than the differences between them, factors which may account for why one was popular and the other bombed. The Brave One, directed by prestigious Irish filmmaker Neil Jordan and starring Jodie Foster, was number one at the box office last weekend; Death Sentence was directed by James Wan, one of the Saw directors, and word of mouth dictated that the film had the crudity of that horror series despite the presence of star Kevin Bacon, and do the movie bombed.

That Ms. Foster and Mr. Bacon would both consent to appear, at this time, in vigilante films is interesting in itself, since such crude exploitation fare is usually beneath people of their stature. Death Sentence is the more “traditional” of the two. In it, hockey dad Nick Hume (Bacon) is on his way home one night and makes the mistake of stopping at at gas station in a “bad” part of town; within minutes, his son is dead, and he is severely injured by a group of wilding youths. In the aftermath of this event, Hume ends up taking the law into his own hands, tracking down the gang who participated in killing his son, and later his wife, while the law appears to take the side of the criminals rather than the victims. Death Sentence is based on a novel by Brian Garfield, but the book was a 1975 sequel to his ‘72 novel Death Wish, which itself became a popular Charles Bronson franchise in the mid-1970s. Death Sentence makes the obvious point that by engaging in a vengeance project Hume “becomes” like his enemies. Ian Mackenzie Jeffers’s credited script, however, offers no alternative to the audience satisfying vigilante campaign since society’s guardians offer no help, which was the problem with the original vigilante cycle of films beginning with Billy Jack. Perhaps actor Bacon thought that this moral point was worth the effort of a movie filled with excessive blood, cruelty, and special gore effects.

Thirty years after starring in the first of the great modern vigilante films, Taxi Driver, Jodie Foster now weirdly stars in her own, in which she goes after the gang that attacked her in a park one night, killed her fianc…, and stole their dog. And the new film bears certain resemblances to Taxi Driver. Like Travis in Scorsese’s film, Jodie Foster’s Erica Bain makes her first kill in a bodega. Also similarly, there is an “interview” scene set in a diner, like the one in Taxi Driver, and Bain, like Travis, rescues a hooker. Bain’s second kill, on the other hand, takes place on a subway, like similar scenes in The Incident, Bananas and like Death Wish. Unlike Death Wish, however, in which Bronson never met up with the gang that killed his wife, Bain finds her victimizers (and gets her dog back). Death Sentence also has its Taxi Driver inspirations, by the way; Hume shoots a guy’s fingers off, is himself clipped in the neck at the end, and plops down on a couch post-bloodbath just like Travis. Death Sentence also echoes the recent Bourne Ultimatum in which a car falling off a building is used as a weapon.

The real difference between Death Sentence and The Brave One is the difference between a boys movie and a girls movie. Death Sentence is set up to provide a straightforward tale of vigilante justice with a patina of moralizing that is meant to divert the censors from the real purpose of the film. In reality, the males in the audience will feel a grim sense of satisfaction as Hume blows away the bad guys despite the fact that he ends up, as his final victim admits, looking just like them. The Brave One, on the other hand, is a chick flick action film, like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Bain is permitted to kick some vulgar scum ass, but then she has to talk afterwards.

Bain is a kind of female Jean Shepherd, the host of a radio show in which she gathers the “sounds” of New York City. This being a quasi Good Woman feminist tract, white males are anathema, so Bain’s fianc… is a doctor of foreign extraction (Naveen Andrews) and her subsequent protector is African-American (Terrence Howard), and all of her work-friends and neighbors are either African-American or females or both (though the city’s criminals are also a mix of ethnic identities). This transparent bid for the Good Woman market, with its book reading clubs, its Take Back the Night rallies, and its censorship causes, is at odds, however, with the bloodlust in the film. In other words, despite its feminist message, the film is advocating that women, indeed, act with all the crude aggression of a man, at least when it comes to justice. Unlike Death Sentence, the police are mostly helpful, with the cop (named Sean Mercer: a reference to John Wayne in Hatari?) really caring about all the city’s victims. Meanwhile the look of the film, under the guidance of director Jordan, is dense and gritty, unlike his usual fare. The camera tilts and weaves and bobs as if the whole city were underwater, or she is always being followed, an attempt, I guess, on his part to underscore the “uncertainty” and discombobulation of Bain’s life post-attack. Instead the style bifurcates the film, between its feminist tract line and its vigilante line, ultimately offering no satisfying version of either. In the end, Death Sentence is actually the better film, much more solid in its technique and less internally compromised in what it wants to say.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 22nd, 2007 at 3:12 pm and is filed under Reel Politique - Film columnist DK Holm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.