The Warm Embrace Of Denzel's Knuckle Sandwich In 'The Equalizer 3'
The Warm Embrace Of Denzel's Knuckle Sandwich In 'The Equalizer 3'
#239: "The Equalizer 3," "The Deepest Breath," "Croupier," Michael Mann
Edition 239:
Hey movie lovers!
As always, you can find a podcast version of this newsletter on Apple or Spotify. Thank you so much for listening and spreading the word!
This week: Denzel Washington proves he can stick kick butt with a third Equalizer movie. I’ve got an extreme sports documentary you need to check out, and a bunch of crime movies I know you’ll love. In this week’s “Trailer Watch,” Austin Butler and Jodie Comer try to find love in a hopeless place…or at least the back of a motorcycle.
The Equalizer 3
The appeal of “The Equalizer,” first as a TV serial in the 1980s and now as a trilogy of Denzel Washington-led action romps, is that an old man minding his own business sees injustice in the world and is capable of single-handedly punishing the bad guys for it.
What I find funny about Washington’s particular moral compass in all these movies is that it’s not exactly altruistic, and he’s not really very reluctant to activate into superkiller mode. He doesn’t care about making the world overall a better place. It’s personal. The aggrieved must 1) be vulnerable in some way, 2) show him some kindness, and 3) be wronged directly in front of him. Then he will go to extreme lengths to enact vigilante justice on the mob, gang or group that is tormenting that person.
As the opening action scene of this movie depicts — someone steals the $400,000 pension of a guy in the back of Denzel’s uber, he flies across the world and murders 30 people to get it back.
It’s not quite the golden rule, it’s more “you scratch my back I stick a fire poker though your enemy’s throat.”
See, the other appeal of these movies is that in an era of bloodless, softcore action blockbusters, The Equalizer delights in showing a viewer increasingly creative and gory ways in which to kill someone. Much like the heightened violence of Tarantino, the audience reaction is to laugh or even cheer with glee as all manner of objects get shoved into all manner of bodily cavities (and where there are no cavities, new cavities are created).
Of the three movies this is the quietest, and for long stretches one may not even realize it is an action movie. That’s because Denzel, whose character name is Robert McCall but let’s be honest it’s just Denzel, gets shot early on and is laid up recovering from his wounds. It’s a little bit like a superhero getting zapped of his powers, and as any superhero fan can tell you, that’s often the least cool part of any comic or comic book movie. Why have a Ferrari if you’re not going to drive it over 30 mph?
The reason why it works here is because he’s recovering in a tiny, seaside town in southern Italy, and above all the movie serves above all as a promotional campaign for la vita lenta — the slow life. Everywhere Denzel goes, he sees vulnerable people who show him kindness. So when the big bad mafia inevitably roll into town, suddenly this 68-year-old with a bullet wound is on the hook for the entire population. I’ll let you guess how that turns out for them.
Because we’re talking about Denzel Washington, the viewer could watch him sip tea (which he does probably a half dozen times) and not be bored. He’s still the most charismatic man in the business, still totally capable of convincingly pulling off action scenes and bringing real gravitas to otherwise silly talking scenes.
This is a true movie star performance in the purest sense. The franchise would not exist were it not for him, the IP itself is worthless and could not be rebooted with another actor. And yet with him, it’s out to $75 million and counting, after the first two movies did $190 million-plus.
I enjoy that these movies know what they are, and don’t try to be what they’re not. This third one messes around with a little franchise mumbo jumbo, trying to connect some characters from previous installments and make it seem weighty, but even if you’ve never seen the previous two films you’ll be able to enjoy it for the same exact reason that the super nerds will. It’s kind of the reliable TV serial version of a movie, if you think about it.
Bottom line: put Denzel in anything and I can pretty much guarantee I will recommend it here.
Something New
The Deepest Breath (Netflix): There’s no motivation for watching something quite like FOMO, and by the time the third or fourth person mentioned to me in casual conversation how cool this documentary about free divers was, I had to check it out. It drops you into a subculture you likely know nothing about, as many great documentaries do, and in short order makes you care so much about the difference between 90 meters and 104 meters. Those distances are depths that divers reach on a single breath of air, the kind of bizarrely incredible feat that’s just as likely to have you asking “why?” as “how?”
The specter of danger and impending doom hangs over the whole narrative, which becomes increasingly stressful as viewers get more and more attached to the love story between a champion diver and her safety diver slash coach. While not nearly as technically accomplished as Free Solo, this story explores the same desire to continue to seek and push the absolute limits of human ability, until eventually one day you find them. That’s always going to be compelling to watch!
Something Old
Croupier (1998, Freevee, Tubi, Peacock): There’s a long tradition of “lonely man” movies, passed down from Citizen Kane through Taxi Driver and The Shining all the way to Her and The Lighthouse in recent years. As in all those movies, the interior life is truly the subject of this story about an aspiring writer who takes a job as a “croupier,” or dealer, at a seedy casino in London. Clive Owen is the perfect avatar, both irresistibly handsome and also believable as a deadbeat loser.
The story is something Guy Ritchie would be proud of, a pulpy crime thriller laced with the narration of Owen as he crafts his real life drama into the novel he’s writing about it. I know I’m a sucker for these types of noir movies, admittedly, but I found this one to be particularly clever and a little discomforting in a way that’s going to frustrate some people but delight others like myself. I loved it.
Something to Stream
Michael Mann movies! (Netflix): There’s been several times this year when Netflix has been very clever in bringing (read: buying) movies to its service that are related to other movies in the news, like the entire Indiana Jones series before Dial of Destiny came out. In anticipation for Ferrari — I’m guessing, though it may have been in response to the trailer dropped last week — Netflix added a handful of movies from director Michael Mann, who just so happens to be my brother’s favorite filmmaker (consider it an early wedding present, bro).
The masterpiece of the bunch is Heat, a heist movie epic featuring a legendary De Niro vs. Pacino showdown, but Collateral with Tom Cruise as a hit man driven around by Jamie Foxx’s taxicab is also great. You’ll notice the same themes in the other movies — Public Enemies is about famous criminals John Dillinger (Johnny Depp), Baby Face Nelson and Pretty Boy Floyd; Miami Vice is about a pair of detectives (Colin Farrell and Foxx) attempting to stop the drug trade; Blackhat is about a hacker (Chris Hemsworth) tracking down terrorists.
This is, without a doubt, VERY masculine filmmaking. If you like one, you’re probably going to like them all. And if so, they’re all on Netflix to binge!
Trailer Watch: The Bikeriders
Jodie Comer might be in my top 5 actors on the planet right now, so any time she decides to make some Oscar bait you know I’m going to be covering it in this newsletter. Pair her up with Austin Butler still rocking his Elvis haircut and I think that should convince just about everyone else. It’s a story about the Vandals bike gang in Chicago in the 1960s, but told with the glossy prestige of an awards movie from director Mike Nichols (Take Shelter, Mud) rather than the trashy aesthetic of an FX show.
The No. 1 thing I was curious about in this trailer was whether Butler was still using his raspy Elvis voice, and the fact that he only speaks about six words in this entire trailer feels strategic on that front (especially since all six have 110% rasp). Meanwhile, Tom Hardy has been trying to play Al Capone for his entire career — and one time he did, disastrously — and this two-minute snippet as the bike gang’s godfather looks like the closest he’s ever gotten.