DVD Thrillers - The Equalizer 1 & 2 2014 and 2018

Double DVD - 2014 and 2018

 Some time ago, I watched this 2014 action film, which was loosely based on the 1980s TV series of the same name and remembered being very struck with Denzel Washington's gripping character. A second showing was just as interesting. Playing a former US Marine turned DIA Intelligence Officer, we see this Robert McCall living a quiet, retired life in Boston. He works in a large hardware stall, remarkably like B & Q in the U.K. The first time I visited the latter after watching the movie, I quickly checked where all the power tools were stored! The film quickly established that McCall is a creature of habit, almost with OCD - his teabag must be carefully wrapped in a tissue/cloth, folded over the same way each time; his utensils at the café he regularly attends must be straightened... Methodical is an understatement.

He is helping an overweight colleague Ralphie train to become a security guard at the store, but his 'retirement', which includes trying to finish the 100 books his dead wife also had been attempting, ends when Teri, a teenage prostitute he has befriended in the café - whose real name is Alina and who dreams of becoming a singer - is hit by her pimp Slavi and forced into his car. Alina is subsequently admitted to hospital, badly beaten up. McCall had been handed a business card by Slavi, so he travels to the restaurant owned by pimp and his gang. He offers to buy Alina off them; Slavi refuses. Suddenly a rather tame story of a prostitute being beaten up explodes into mind-numbing violence. Robert checks his watch, shuts the door and launches into a ruthless attack on the gang - all lie dead within seconds. 

What McCall did not know was that Slavi was part of a much larger syndicate led by the Russian oligarch Vladimir Pushkin (near name of Putin!), who sends Teddy Rensen, his enforcer, to investigate the attack. Some superb and riveting scenes follow: two corrupt Boston PD detectives are hunted down; a money laundering warehouse is entered and the workers sent home, each with a dollop of the money whilst Pushkin's men are taken into custody by the police; two of Pushkin's oil tankers are destroyed. All in a day's work for MacCall. Helped by old friends and colleagues from the former Defence Intelligence Agency, Susan and Brian Plummer, Teddy is identified as Nikolai Itchenko, a Spetsnaz operative.

The tension builds to a thrilling but gruesome scene in the hardware store. Suffice it to say, I shall never look at another power drill or nail gun in the same way again. Teddy and his mates are drilled or nailed and Ralphie, as a bit support,  shows he had it in him as a security guard. Somehow, McCall gets to Moscow and deals with Pushkin in his exotic mansion - don't stand in water and switch on a defective light. Finally, Alina runs into Robert near the café - fully recovered, grateful for the money McCall has sent her, she has started a new life. A very satisfying ending.

The movie grossed $101.5 million in the USA and $90.8 million elsewhere. Its net production budget was c. $55-73 million. The Equalizer had an approval rating of 60% based on 203 reviews.

*********************************************************************************

Four years later, The Equalizer 2 came out. Robert McCall (Denzel Washington) is now working as a Lyft driver but also helping those less fortunate with the assistance of his former DIA colleague Susan Plummer. Susan and DIA officer Dave York, Robert's former partner (who thought McCall had been killed), are called to investigate the murder-suicide of an agency affiliate and his wife in Brussels. At their hotel, Susan is accosted in her room and killed. The expertly delivered fatal stab suggests to McCall that Susan was targeted and the murder-suicide staged. McCall informs York of his findings.

During one of his Lyft runs, McCall is attacked by an assassin posing as an ordinary passenger. He kills the man and retrieves his mobile phone; York's number is on the phone call list. He confronts York at his home; the latter confesses to having become a mercenary and killing Susan, knowing she had worked out the murder-suicide scenario. There are compelling scenes, involving Susan's widower, a young black teenager trapped while painting Robert's flat, and McCall's own escape. The movie climaxes at McCall's seaside hometown, which has been evacuated as a hurricane nears. He has, and York (who positions himself on the town's watchtower) and his three henchmen go looking for him. If it's not exactly nail gun time, the three sidekicks leave this world as a result of a spear gun, knives and a flour explosion trap. York is confronted on the tower top and leaves suddenly over the edge with his own knife in him for company. Having moved back into his old house, McCall is left staring out on a calm sea. Excellent acting again from Washington, although the film did not quite have the impact of its predecessor. The denouement on the coast was perhaps too drawn out and 'theatrical'. Apparently, a third movie is due out this Autumn. I will watch it.

Equalizer 2 grossed $102.1 million in the USA and $88.3 million elsewhere. The production budget was $62 million. On Rotten Tomatoes, the movie had an approval rating of 52% based on 206 reviews. A rather caustic comment came from Dave Ehrlich of IndieWire, who gave the film a C-, saying, The good news is that fans of Antoine Fuqua's 'The Equalizer' - a bland and pulpy 2014 riff on the '80s TV series of the same name - are in for more of the same. The bad news is the rest of us are too.