The Equalizer 2 (2018)
Cast
- Denzel Washington as Robert McCall
- Bill Pullman as Brian Plummer
- Melissa Leo as Susan Plummer
- Jonathan Scarfe as Resnick
- Tamara Hickey as Grace
- Pedro Pascal as Dave York
Director
- Antoine Fuqua
Screenplay
- Richard Wenk
Director of Photography
- Oliver Wood
Action, Crime, Thriller
Despite working in feature films for nearly 40 years, Denzel Washington
has never until now appeared in a sequel to one of his films. Oh sure,
he has done a number of films where one suspects that future
installments might have been contemplated at some point but none have
ever come to fruition. Now he has finally taken the sequel bait with
“The Equalizer 2” and the only thing more baffling than the question of
why none of his other movies got follow-ups is the question of why he
would bring an end to that streak with something so completely useless.
Yes, the 2014 film, based on the mid-Eighties television show of the
same name, was a box-office hit, but it was one of those hits that
faded so quickly from the mind after it departed theaters that even
those who professed to like it would be hard-pressed to actually
remember anything about it. Luckily for them, that shouldn’t be a
problem this time around because even the most easily satisfied fans of
Washington will be unlikely to find much of anything in this sadistic,
stupid and sloppy sequel.
The first film featured Washington as
Robert McCall, a seemingly unassuming worker at a big box store who just
happened to be an ex-CIA agent with a particular set of skills that he
would deploy on anyone who crossed paths with himself or any of his
vague acquaintances. At one point, I recall, the store was robbed and
one of the thieves took a co-worker's cherished wedding ring. Luckily,
thanks to his unique skill set (which I believe consisted of getting the
license plate number of the getaway car), he figures out where the
thief lives, visits him in the middle of the night with a hammer
borrowed from the store stock and beats the guy with it before getting
the ring back and returning it. His only true friends were Susan Plummer
(Melissa Leo), a former agency colleague who is the only person who knows he is still alive, and her husband Brian (Bill Pullman).
This
time around, it seems that, like most people, McCall has been forced
out of the retail industry and is now a Lyft driver. Happily, this still
allows him to come across unsavory characters and brutally dispatch
them as payment for their misdeeds. He even gets the occasional
off-the-books freelance assignment from Susan—the opening sequence has
him destroying a group of kidnappers on a train bound for Istanbul. For
the most part, however, he seems to be in a bit of a lull as his current
projects—trying to help an elderly Lyft customer (Orson Bean) recover a painting stolen from his family by the Nazis and mentoring a neighbor kid, Miles (Ashton Sanders)
by encouraging him to paint a mural instead of dealing drugs—do not
require much stabbing, shooting or neck-breaking. That all changes when
Susan goes off to Belgium to look into the mysterious murder-suicide of a
high-level agency contact and meets an ugly end. This makes
things—Spoiler Alert!—personal, and McCall is soon on the case utilizing
his extraordinary intuition and impeccable killing skills to track down
Susan’s killers and wipe them out.
If the plot of “The Equalizer 2” sounds dull and perfunctory in the
retelling, you cannot imagine how much more of a drag it is to watch it
play out before your eyes. The screenplay by Richard Wenk
is a joke, a lame collection of bland characters, nonsensical plotting
and revenge-movie clichés that occasionally interrupt the carnage for
the uninspired subplot involving McCall and the kid that appears to have
been shoehorned into the proceedings in order to convince Washington
that he was making something that wasn’t just another “Death Wish”
clone. Neither Washington nor director Antoine Fuqua—whose previous collaborations have included the original “The Equalizer,” “Training Day” and the remake of “The Magnificent Seven”—seem
willing to do much of anything more than simply go through the motions
in exchange for their paychecks, it is the furthest thing from personal
for them.
The only memorable aspect on hand in “The Equalizer 2”
is also its least appetizing attribute—the relentless amount of sadistic
violence on display. Yes, I am aware that a film along these lines
pretty much requires a heaping helping of brutality throughout, but this
one, like its predecessor, is so far beyond the pale that it comes
closer to being nauseating than exciting. This is even more off-putting
because if I remember the original TV show correctly, the character
tended to get the best on criminals by using his intellect and would
only switch to violence as a last resort. I can definitely see
Washington playing a character like that successfully, but that aspect
has been almost entirely dropped in order to squeeze in a few more
neck-stabbings and face-spearings. The scene in which Melissa Leo’s
character meets her demise is especially ugly, all the more so when you
recall that in her previous film with Fuqua, “Olympus Has Fallen”
(2013), she went through another extended scene in which she underwent a
particularly brutal beating in what I sincerely hope is just a
coincidence. Even if it is, Leo might want to consider not picking up
the phone the next time he calls her.
“The Equalizer 2” is
slickly made and largely appalling garbage but there is a good chance
that it will do fairly well at the box office, thanks almost entirely to
the enormous amount of goodwill that Washington has generated with
moviegoers over the years. It is just too bad to see it squandered on
something as nasty as this. There is no doubt, of course, that he can
and will do better in the future with projects that make far better use
of his talents. Of course, moviegoers can also do better in the future
as well, especially if they avoid this one at all costs.
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