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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Death Sentence

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#1 of 1 Posted 9/4/07 12:12 PM

From Harveycritic Posts 1637 Last Jan-30
To All [Msg # 22616.1 ]

DEATH SENTENCE

Reviewed for CompuServe by Harvey S. Karten
20th Century Fox
Grade: B
Directed by:    James Wan
Written By: Ian Mackenzie Jeffers, from Brian Garfield's novel
Cast:   Kevin Bacon, Garrett Hedlund, Kelly Preston, Aisha Tyler, John Goodman
Screened at: Regal E-Walk, NYC, 9/3/07
Opens: August 31, 2007

Charles Bronson is alive and well, except that his name is now Kevin Bacon. Bacon, fitted out in James Wan’s “Death Sentence” with a bespoke suit and gentle, family manner, must have been lifting weight. The picture is on the theme of revenge–which puts it into the company of such recent movies as Talia Lugacy’s “Descent” (about a rape victim who extracts vengenace against the perp) and Neil Jordan’s “The Brave One” (a woman struggles to recover from a brutal attack). Here, a trim but not-likely-exercised corporate VP, physically takes on brutal gang members vanquishing some with his bare hands. Nothing like the spirit of righteousness to give a normal person the strength of ten men.

“Death Sentence,” which seems to have been hardly marketed, is well worth your time. While Bronson fans may find this an epigonous romp against conscience-challenged, murderous hoodlums, Bacon, a superior actor, keeps the audience adrenalin flowing. We get to scoff at a police detective who strangely believes that a man more familiar with hedge funds than with criminal behavior should leave matters of felony to the proper authorities. We in the audience know that such a philosophy is for sissies.

There’s nothing like a mortal assault against your own family to drum up a desire for revenge in the surviving members. This is why Nick Hume (Kevin Bacon), married to a loving wife, Helen (Kelly Preston), is beside himself when he helplessly watches hooded bandits rob a convenience store inside a gas station, one of the gangsters, Joe Darly (Matthew O’Leary), slitting the throat of his younger son, Brendan (Stuart Lafferty). When the getaway car leaves one hoodlum behind, Nick attacks the man, rips off his mask, and surprisingly refuses to testify against the arrested fellow in a pre-trial hearing. Determined to go after the blackguards one by one, he tracks one and takes him on without telling either his wife or his younger son, Lucas (Jordan Garrett). When police detective Wallis (Aisha Tyler) suspects that Nick has bypassed the force, she states, “You want a war?” giving the impression, however false, that she is siding with the gangsters.

Kevin Bacon’s actions, including his shaving of his own head when he’s out to commit serial revenge, is surprisingly credible, though John Goodman steals the show in the role of Bones Darly, the scuzzy father of the lead hoodlum, Billy Darly (Garrett Hedlund). Bones sports a four-day growth of facial hair, has an assortment of eyeglasses, and makes his living selling black-market guns to people with lots of cash. His healthy cash flow seems not to translate into happiness, however.

John R. Leonetti’s lenses contrast the grit of the criminal abodes with the lush surroundings of a corporate executive, with Columbia, South Carolina, providing the background for the tense, hard-fisted action. James Wan, who honed his audience-shocking skills with “Saw,” nicely directs the thumping action.

Rated R.    105 minutes   © 2007 by Harvey Karten Member: NY Film Critics Online

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Harvey Karten's Reviews

Review: Death Sentence

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