Official Synopsis
Robert McCall, a man who believes he has put his mysterious past behind him and dedicated himself to beginning a new, quiet life. But when McCall meets Teri (Chloë Grace Moretz), a young girl under the control of ultra-violent Russian gangsters, he can’t stand idly by, he has to help her. Armed with hidden skills that allow him to serve vengeance against anyone who would brutalize the helpless, McCall comes out of his self-imposed retirement and finds his desire for justice reawakened. If someone has a problem, if the odds are stacked against them, if they have nowhere else to turn, McCall will help.
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Let’s be honest here, anytime you give Denzel Washington some anger and motivation you typically end up with some great action. That is the case with The Equalizer, but it only comes in spurts and the parts in-between aren’t as good or as interesting as they should be. At the same time, that’s incredibly understandable. Let’s get it going.
The film starts out right with a gradual developmental build of our main character Robert McCall (Denzel Washington). His life is simple, he is a clean cut man, a loner, with rules he follows and he does everything he can to make the people around him better (for example, he helps out a fellow employee prepare for a security job opportunity). Anyway, the first act of the film concludes with McCall helping out a call girl named Alina/Teri (Chloë Grace Moretz), who has gotten herself into a world of a trouble with an abusive client. The act ends with Alina in the hospital and Robert formulating a plan and executing it (and some Russians) in badass style.
Pretty straightforward stuff.
What probably rubbed critics the wrong way about this film is how there is no solid connection between Robert and Alina. While his other friendships are explained through his work at Home Mart (Home Depot-esque place), the friendship between Robert and Alina is shallow at best. In any other movie this would be a huge issue with character development. We haven’t gotten to know Alina and Robert’s relationship at all. We don’t really know Alina as a person other than through 30 seconds of dialogue at the beginning of act one. If this was any other film or any other character, The Equalizer would be deemed poorly written.
But this is The Equalizer. This is what the character is supposed to be like and this is what the character was like in the 80s, as he walked into stranger’s lives, helped to fix them and then promptly walked back out. There was no connection between the main character of the show and the person he was trying to help. Otherwise, the entire premise of the show wouldn’t be as unique or possibly work for that matter.
As act two begins, the real antagonist of the film shows up and immediately causes some issues because of the death of his Russian employees. Teddy (Marton Csokas) is a rich Russian that is batshit crazy. He kills about everyone he can kill to get to the bottom of what happened to his comrades. Eventually, and this is where I had the most issue, he somehow makes it to McCall.
Act two is the weakest part of the film. Teddy, while driven by the death of his people, kills a LOT of Americans and gets away with it without retribution. Someone as high profile as him and incredibly sloppy when it comes to killing folks (he leaves a TON of DNA/traces behind) sure gets away with quite a bit. None of this is explained in the film, not even attempted. His rampage is a bit much and the writers honestly don’t give a hoot about any of the finer details here. I know The Equalizer is from the 80s, which is notorious for having dumb cops, antagonist that get away with everything and simple plots/storylines, but if you’re going to craft an 80s show into a modern movie, then some of those finer details need to be ironed out better. There was no ironing, as it’s just glossed over.
The other part of act two that I didn’t love is how they get to McCall. Their eventual connection to McCall and the Russian murders is random at best. It’s more of a guess than it is a solid lead. I wish there was something that could have been left behind, maybe McCall purposely leaving a calling card, but it seemed like a random guess. For such a sophisticated and methodical character like Teddy, it seems like he would have more than a random guess that leads him to McCall.
Director Antoine Fuqua seemed like he didn’t want to bother with the details and wanted to get straight to the action. Fuqua is better with action than he is with story, so it’s understandable. And when you see how act three goes down, you’ll appreciate and understand why that is the case. I won’t get much into act three, but I can guarantee you that Washington comes out swinging and doesn’t stop until there is nothing left. Again, I love it when Washington is kicking the holy hell out of people and in full ‘revenge’ mode in movies. He really shines when it comes to action, as does his director in The Equalizer.
At the end of the day, The Equalizer is an excellent film filled with great action, okay drama and decent character development. The core of the film stays true to the core of the 80s show’s character all the way through. I hope they make more of The Equalizer films, as it does have a place — especially with Washington leading the way, but not too many more because you can pretty much figure out how each is going to go.
On the Blu-ray side of the equation, you get some great visuals, even though the majority of the film is shot in a mostly dark tone. There are lots of grays, reds, browns and yellows for the majority of the movie. Each bringing some spectacular quality with them. There isn’t any signs of artifacts or graininess, as it’s just good quality HD transfer. Towards the end of the film you do get some solid daytime shots, which really stand out as well. Overall, Sony/Columbia Pictures did a good job with the HD transfer with this one.
The audio comes to you in DTS-HD 7.1 and the film aspect ratio is 2.40:1.
On the special features side of things, here’s what to expect:
– Vengeance Mode (with Denzel Washington/Antoine Fuqua)
– Denzel Washington: A Different Kind of Superhero
– Equalizer Vision: Antoine Fuqua
– Inside The Equalizer
– One Man Army: Training and Fighting
– Photo Gallery
– Children of the Night
– Home Mart: Taking Care of Business One Bolt at a Time
A solid set of features for this movie and something that adds to the overall value of the experience. The Vengeance Mode is pretty good, so don’t skip over that one.
