Courtesy of Photofest
1974's Death Wish.
Still, as the saying goes — times, people and hairstyles change. And the new Death Wish movie fails on a number of levels, including its creators' inability to fully exploit Willis' star power. There are a handful of scenes where the actor's tough-guy smirk speaks for Kersey, who briefly comes across as an emotionally well-adjusted, sitcom-ready family man, such as when Kersey delivers a sardonic pout after he's challenged to a fistfight by a mouthy soccer dad during one of his teenage daughter's (Camila Morrone) games. But for the most part, Roth and Carnahan's Kersey could be played by anybody. Such as when Kersey whines to his hothead brother (Vincent D'Onofrio) that his killing spree is justified, "**** it, it's just not fair!" This sequence is rushed, and says a lot about Roth and Carnahan's general disinterest in Kersey's emotional journey from life-saving surgeon to ego-stroking murderer.
Then again, that discomfort with melodrama has always been a problem with the Death Wish films. Bronson insisted on rewrites for the third and fourth installments, probably because he recognized that on a basic level, that type of story was played out. That said, while Roth and Carnahan do sort of try to get inside Kersey's head, their version of the character's ethical quandary is expressed as an equivocal both-sides mentality.
In the new Death Wish, Kersey's biggest struggle is getting comfortable with the idea of relieving his personal stress by killing generic bad guys. For example: Gun-nut culture is sometimes portrayed in an implicitly negative light. It's shown to be cartoonishly profit-driven, as we see in the internet ads that Kersey watches where flirty saleswoman Bethany (Kirby Bliss Blanton) entices viewers with a crop-top as price tags for assault weapons bulge out at readers. Bethany also gets the short end of the stick in the scene where Kersey asks her in person what kind of paperwork he has to fill out before he can buy a gun. She reassures him that the only obstacle in his way is a gun-safety class that everybody passes. She then winks at him and says that once he clears that negligible hurdle, he should be "cocked, locked and ready to rock." (The line is predictably used in Death Wish's trailer.)
Also in Death Wish's trailer: AC/DC's "Back in Black," a cock-rock standard that Roth uses during a slightly tongue-in-cheek montage of Kersey's pre-one-man-war training. The use of the song in the scene is intentionally ironic, but only slightly. It's shot in a split-screen, so we see Kersey saving lives at his day job at the same time we watch him get better at cleaning, aiming and shooting a gun he stole from a dead patient. The scene is and isn't exactly what it looks like.
Mostly "is," though, since there are only fleeting moments where Roth and Carnahan do more than pay lip service to the idea that the people that Kersey loses his temper at are, generally speaking, not all bad. There's the scene where a (white) homeless busker tries to wipe Kersey's windows. Kersey angrily shoos him away, but then gives him some change a couple of scenes later. There's also the scene where a (black) civil servant misspells Kersey's name when he visits the Chicago police department. The clerk earnestly apologizes for his mistake, almost as if to confirm that Carnahan and Roth knew that they'd need to defend themselves against charges of racism. Bear in mind: This scene doesn't seem to exist for any other reason, since it doesn't push the plot forward in any way.
For further proof of my admittedly loaded assumption: See the conversation that Kersey has with an empathetic but impotent police officer (Dean Norris). It's a scene that RogerEbert.com's Matt Zoller Seitz singles out in his typically dead-on review: "Norris' character refers to gang-related murders as '*******-on-******* violence,' i.e., violence that's typical and therefore isn't worth getting worked up over, right before he tells Paul that his wife's murder and his daughter's catatonia are 'special,' and therefore personally upsetting to him. You don't need to be a dog to hear that whistle."
Roth and Carnahan's latent racism is also apparent in the scene where Kersey blows away a black drug dealer who calls himself "The Ice Cream Man." The Ice Cream Man is depicted as a stereotypical thug, and is surrounded by intimidating African-American heavies. But none of these hangers-ons move a muscle to help their boss/friend/meal ticket when Kersey walks right up and shoots him point-blank multiple times. Instead, these hangers-on seize the day, and help themselves to The Ice Cream Man's cash box. Criminals may be a superstitious, cowardly lot, but in this Death Wish, only the black criminals are too scared to shoot back before they try to stuff their pockets.
Roth and Carnahan's active disinterest in journeying too far inside Kersey's head is especially telling. First, they simplistically complicate Kersey's pre-spree headspace. Then they completely stop trying to justify Kersey's ostensible inner conflict. Remember Bethany? The gun-lobby mentality she represents is ultimately vindicated during the film's final home-invasion shootout, since that scene proves two of her earlier assertions/enticements: 1) The cops don't show up until minutes after Kersey's daughter calls them, at which point it's too late; and 2) A concealed, spring-action assault rifle case is proven to have its uses. Death Wish has moments where it isn't as bad as you think it could be. But eventually, those moments pass, leaving audience members to wonder: Why exactly are they still making these movies?
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Originally Posted by GeneChing
