Bullet Points: Death Wish (2018)

To say I am a fan of the Death Wish series of movies starring Charles Bronson would be a major understatement. So when news hit that a long talked about remake of the 1974 classic was finally happening I could have very easily taken the stance that a Death Wish movie without Charles Bronson was a crime against humanity.

But as the release date for the Eli Roth directed Death Wish grew closer, I found myself getting a feeling of anticipation. Was I skeptical? Sure. Was I willing to declare the movie crap even though I didn’t see it? Absolutely not.

• The Kersey Family: As the movie begins we meet Dr. Paul Kersey (Bruce Willis) his lovely wife Lucy (Elisabeth Shue) and his daughter Jordan (Camila Morrone). It is an emotional time in the Kersey household as Paul and Lucy begin coping with the reality that their daughter will soon be off to college in New York City. You really get a sense of how close knit the family is in the first couple of scenes of the film and in many ways it seems that Dr. Paul Kersey has the perfect life… Another key member of the Kersey family we are introduced to is Paul’s brother Frank (Vincent D’Onofrio). We first meet Frank when he meets up with the rest of the Kersey clan for some deep dish pizza (just to remind us that the film is taking place in Chicago). As The Kerseys are leaving the restaurant and waiting for the valet to bring their cars around, one of the valets overhears Lucy talking about the when and where of Paul’s birthday party will be taking place… this prompts the valet to use the GPS on Dr. Kersey’s car to find out where The Kerseys live, since he now has an exact time and date when he knows they won’t be home.

• The Night That Changed Everything:  The Kerseys are planning on celebrating Paul’s birthday in style… but just before they are about to go out to a swanky Chicago restaurant, Dr. Kersey is called into duty… such is the life of a trauma surgeon. Wanting to do something for his birthday, Lucy and Jordan run out to the store to get the ingredients they will need to bake their beloved husband and father a birthday cake. But when they get home, they are not alone… three masked men with guns are in their home, looking to rob them. Obviously the initial plan was that nobody was going to be home, but our burglars quickly switch over to Plan B, but when the Kersey women fight back, things go bad very quickly… Lucy is shot and Jordan ends up with a fractured skull. Lucy dies at the hospital and Jordan ends up in a coma after surgery.

• Broken Paul Kersey:  Dr. Paul Kersey’s life has been turned upside down. He is not sleeping, he is seeing a grief counselor and he is growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress the police are making on finding the men who were responsible for the death of his wife. Thoughts of taking the law into his own hands start becoming more frequent. One night he calls out to two guys that are harassing a woman in an alley, the result is Kersey gets his ass handed to him. Kersey realizes that if he’s going to fight crime, he is going to need more than the guts to speak up. Kersey manages to get his hands on a gun, not by purchasing one at the local gun shop where he’d be on camera and have to fill out all the necessary paperwork, but by pure happenstance. One night while at work, a gang banger is brought into the hospital and as he is being lifted onto the table the wounded thug’s gun drops to the floor and only Dr. Kersey notices, he scoops it up when nobody is looking and now the good doctor is armed and dangerous!

• Fear the Reaper: After a near fatal mishap with his new acquired gun, Paul Kersey begins teaching himself how to properly take care of and fire his gun thanks to the wonderful world of online videos. Interestingly enough, a hoodie wearing Paul Kersey ends up becoming a viral video sensation himself as a woman catches our new vigilante in action for the first time thwarting a carjacking and killing the men who perpetrated the crime. Kersey took the law into his own hands… and he liked it! Paul Kersey is quickly earning the nickname given to him by those on social media… The Grim Reaper! But as Paul Kersey gets closer to the men who killed his wife, the cops are getting closer to finding out who The Grime Reaper really is.

The world is a much different place than it was when the original Death Wish hit theaters and I thought the remake did a good job of telling the  story of a professional man who turns vigilante in today’s modern world.

I thought Bruce Willis was a great choice for the role of Paul Kersey. Willis is in the right age bracket for the character and the man has legit action credentials. Even if Die Hard was the only action movie the man ever did before this, that movie alone proved that Willis could convincingly play a tough guy.  And while Bruce Willis’ star may not be shining as bright as it once did in Hollywood, I think people are forgetting Charles Bronson was never the apple of Hollywood’s eye either, so in that regard Bruce Willis is damn near perfect for the role.

I enjoyed the 2018 version of Death Wish and I can honestly say that I would go to see it at the theater again. At a time when so many action movies get a limited theatrical release or are simply straight to video, it felt good seeing an old school inspired action film at the theater.

Fans of the original Death Wish and its sequels should give the 2018 version a chance and everyone should give these Bonus Bullet Points a chance…

• Familiar Faces: Dean Norris played Detective Kevin Raines, one of the detectives investigating both the murder of Lucy Kersey and the vigilante killings. With Norris as the cop, I felt the odds of Paul Kersey getting away with murder increased since Norris had no clue what Walter White was up to all those years… Len Cariou, plays Lucy’s father and the man who gives his son-in-law some sage advice when it comes to relying on the police to protect your family. Cariou is most known for his role on Blue Bloods as the eldest member of the family of cops… Mike Epps also has an uncredited role as one of Dr. Paul Kersey’s co-workers.
• Adventures in Death Wishing: The last time I saw Elisabeth Shue and Vincent D’Onofrio in a movie set in Chicago it was the delightful 1987 film, Adventures in Babysitting.
• Radio Days: Real life DJ’s Mancow Muller and Sway Calloway were featured in the movie playing themselves and as you might imagine the vigilante in Chicago was a hot topic of conversation on both of their shows.
• Unfair Comparison: While it is really unfair to compare 2018’s Death Wish with 1974’s Death Wish, one small area where I can definitively say that 2018 does it better is the television news segments… they look like actual news sets used by major network affiliates in big markets not something cobbled together by a high school audio visual class.