rating:
(out of
4 stars)United States; 2007
Directed by James Wan; produced by Ashok Amritraj, Howard Baldwin, Karen Elise Baldwin; screenplay by Ian Mackenzie Jeffers
Starring Kevin Bacon, Garrett Hedlund, Kelly Preston, Jordan Garrett, Stuart Lafferty, Aisha Tyler, John Goodman, Matt O'Leary
So the violent revenge flick is brought back to life both with Jodie Foster film 'The Brave One' and this sort of sequel to 'Death Wish', that Charles Bronson revenge film from 1974. At least it is based, just a little, on Brian Garfield's follow-up novel to 'Death Wish'. For some reason these films are very often compelling, probably because they show such a raw side of human nature. 'Death Sentence' is no exception, even though the other films mentioned above are both better.
Kevin Bacon is Nick Hume, who, after one of his sons is killed, makes the mistake of taking revenge on a gang, starting a war in which he stands alone. After Nick kills one of the gang members he and his family are target of numerous attacks. Although a detective offers to help, Nick decides he needs to take matters into his own hands. We also get things from the gang's pespective, especially through their leader Joe (Matt O'Leary) and his father Bones (John Goodman), who happens to sell guns to Nick.
Early on 'Death Sentence' works pretty well in the thriller genre. Especially before Nick completely goes berserk the film gives us some pretty effective scenes, most notably one in a multiple storey car park. The uncompromising way of depicting violence is effective too, since it needs to shock to make its point. The director is James Wan, who already showed - in the original 'Saw' - he knows exactly how to present violence for the right effect.
But after Nick really gets going the film kind of ends going. Turning him into a killing machine, quite capable with different kinds of guns, the film lacks emotional depth and presents itself more as an action film than a study of human nature, which makes these films interesting in the first place. By the time the film ends, how is easy to be predicted, we feel little sympathy for our hero.
'Death Sentence' helps 'The Brave One' in being pretty good, since its endings - which is really not good - at least matches the rest of the film.