Law Abiding Citizen
11/14/2009
Short review: Holy shit.
I love revenge movies. Can't get enough. The ads for this one seemed a little shallow, and I'll admit I almost skipped this one entirely. That would have been a big mistake.
The movie wastes no time at all driving home the protagonist's motive, and at first glance it seems to devolve into typical Taken-style "CIA-trained superbadass offs the killers one-by-one." There's a twist this time - the "hero" is basically Bizarro Batman, with seemingly unlimited resources and connections and a very sharp eye-for-an-eye complex. For the first half of the film, the catharsis runs free and pure with some twistedly hilarious scenes, and those who love seeing the bad guys get their just deserts (one s - look it up) will be thrilled.
Bu the second half, things start to go a little cuckoo, when it quickly becomes apparent that neither side is 100% worth rooting for. It's amazing how fucked up the situation is becoming, and you'll be practically forced to suspend you disbelief in order to keep your eyes from rolling out of your skull. Hang in there, though; the ending is wild and worth the wait.
Rating: A truly masterful and unexpected deconstruction of the revenge thriller genre. I've not yelled "holy shit" in a theater in a long time until today.
I love revenge movies. Can't get enough. The ads for this one seemed a little shallow, and I'll admit I almost skipped this one entirely. That would have been a big mistake.
The movie wastes no time at all driving home the protagonist's motive, and at first glance it seems to devolve into typical Taken-style "CIA-trained superbadass offs the killers one-by-one." There's a twist this time - the "hero" is basically Bizarro Batman, with seemingly unlimited resources and connections and a very sharp eye-for-an-eye complex. For the first half of the film, the catharsis runs free and pure with some twistedly hilarious scenes, and those who love seeing the bad guys get their just deserts (one s - look it up) will be thrilled.
Bu the second half, things start to go a little cuckoo, when it quickly becomes apparent that neither side is 100% worth rooting for. It's amazing how fucked up the situation is becoming, and you'll be practically forced to suspend you disbelief in order to keep your eyes from rolling out of your skull. Hang in there, though; the ending is wild and worth the wait.
Rating: A truly masterful and unexpected deconstruction of the revenge thriller genre. I've not yelled "holy shit" in a theater in a long time until today.