Review: Death Wish

Bruce Willis stars as a mild-mannered ER surgeon (!!) whose wife (Elisabeth Shue) and teenage daughter are victims of a home break-in. The wife dies, the daughter’s in a coma, and Willis gets increasingly fed-up with the thumb-twiddling done by detectives Dean Norris and Kimberly Elise. Willis is no “Dirty Harry” expert of dispensing vigilante justice, but damn it, the streets are scummy, the crooks are on the loose, and somebody’s gotta do something. Vincent D’Onofrio plays Willis’ ne’er do well brother, who worries about his supposedly straight-laced older brother’s state of mind. Len Cariou plays Willis’ gun-totin’ father-in-law.

This review was originally posted before the announcement of Bruce Willis' illness/retirement and certain comments are obviously no longer relevant. Nonetheless I'd rather add these words than subtract anything, perhaps as a reminder that we don't know someone's personal circumstance.

The world didn’t need a remake of “Death Wish”, and it certainly didn’t need one from the guy who made “Hostel”. The best thing I can say about this 2018 film from Eli Roth (“Cabin Fever”, “The Green Inferno”) is that it’s not as disgusting and objectionable as I’d feared, and is certainly better than “Death Wish II”. It’s sadly inevitable that Bruce Willis has ended up starring in this, his career and seeming lack of effort in recent decades have had an eerie similarity to the latter-day ‘lack of giveashit’ work by the late Charles Bronson.

Things start off amusingly for all the wrong reasons as the hilarious opening shot shows us Bruce Willis as an ER surgeon. I’m sorry, but he just looks absurd in scrubs, and although Roth is a schlocky director, I don’t think his tongue is as far in cheek as would be necessary for the joke to be intentional. Bruce Willis clearly does the bare minimum yet again here. When you hear him say to someone ‘I’m sorry for your loss’, it encapsulates everything about 2018 Bruce Willis because you’re wondering if he’s saying those words to himself. When Willis smiles in supposed pride over his daughter, he’s about as convincing as one of the people from those insurance ads. Dude just shows up, says his lines, walks off the set with cash in hand. It’s his right, but it’s frankly insulting and disheartening. Willis is also miscast here as a mild-mannered guy who turns vigilante. And that’s a shame, because the idea that this guy has no idea what he’s doing and gets nightmares from what he’s doing isn’t the worst idea in the world. However, they even drop the nightmare thing in a flash anyway.

Elisabeth Shue has been seemingly wasted in nothing parts over the last decade but puts in some effort in comparison to Willis and has charm as always. Sadly, he’s the star of the film and she’s gone early. Sigh. Dean Norris stretches himself by playing a cop, but in all seriousness is quite good. Vincent D’Onofrio does more acting and emoting in his first scene than Willis does in the entire film. Are we sure it wasn’t D’Onofrio’s wife who was attacked here? Look out for an absolutely bizarre appearance by Len Cariou, who is usually fine but the character here gives him no chance whatsoever. Likewise, the hot gun store girl character is fun and the most Eli Roth thing in the film, but it’s so jarringly comedic it just doesn’t belong here.

I don’t like rape-revenge thrillers but “Death Wish” is supposed to be a rape-revenge thriller and this remake eliminates any rape at all. So, what the hell is this? Why would the “Hostel” guy of all people take out the rape factor? Bizarre, and very, very un-“Death Wish”. In fact, for as much as I’ve ragged on Willis’ terrible lack of a performance, his latter-day Bronson emotion-free performance is the one thing that most resembles the original “Death Wish”. Biggest backhanded compliment of all-time? Actually, I’ll pay the film one compliment: Unlike the original, Willis actually specifically targets the people who wronged him in this. That was something that always bothered me about the original. Otherwise, it’s dumb and not my thing at all. The finale with Willis and the crims blazing away at each other with machine guns is particularly bloody stupid.

Willis doesn’t convince, the film doesn’t interest. It’s quite dull, actually and if it’s an intentional joke of a film, the subject matter contains no humour I could detect. Head-scratching all-round, this one just doesn’t work and seems rather pointless. Really sloppy storytelling in the script by Joe Carnahan (“Narc”, “Pride and Glory”) despite being a pretty bloody basic concept.

Rating: D+