![]() What sends McCall on his vigilante mission to weaponize everyday appliances - culminating in an outlandish, overlong climax that can only be described as Death by Home Depot - is an inciting incident as trite as it is offensive: an unspeakable act of violence against a female character, in this case a girl who’s been hyper-sexualized not just by her victimizing pimp but, by extension, the filmmakers as well. ![]() It turns out that Hemingway hardcover isn’t just a literary talisman, but also a convenient weapon, a dual use McCall manages to find in everything from a common screwdriver to a hedge clipper. But soon, the former music video director reverts to stylistic form, abandoning any pretense of restraint or artistic subtlety in favor of pulpy hyperbole. It takes only one or two of these encounters to establish both characters’ soulful, high-minded bona fides, with McCall ostentatiously reading “ The Old Man and the Sea” (in hardcover) over his ascetic cup of tea, while advising the waiflike Teri, an aspiring pop singer, to lay off white sugar in order to maintain her vocal cords.įuqua goes out of his way to stage these scenes as reenactments of Edward Hopper’s “ Nighthawks,” right down to the sulfuric green-and-yellow color scheme. So far so good, even when McCall strikes up a friendship with a teenage prostitute named Teri (Chloë Grace Moretz), who shares his penchant for late-night chats at a corner diner. The role of McCall - who leads a spartan, monklike existence and goes out of his way to help his co-workers (when he’s not expertly deflecting their curiosity about where he came from) - fits Washington like a supple, comfortably worn glove. Like Liam Neeson, whose late-in-life action career has given so many appealing actors a second chapter to which to aspire, Washington carries with him not just native sex appeal and charisma, but also decades’ worth of audience goodwill. ![]() Now nearing 60, Washington is a credible, even inspired choice to play Robert McCall, here a clerk at a Boston big box home construction store, whose banal working-stiff persona belies a darker, more shadowy past. Elsewhere” - will understand when I describe Antoine Fuqua’s big-screen adaptation of the show as an exercise in missed opportunities. ![]() Anyone ancient enough to remember when “ The Equalizer” was a terrific prime-time procedural - and to have harbored special feelings for Denzel Washington since his days on “ St. ![]()
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