Law Abiding Citizen, 2009
Dir. F. Gary Gray"I'm gonna bring the whole diseased, corrupt temple down on your head. It's gonna get biblical."
Law Abiding Citizen is a film with an interesting and deeply philosophical take on a question that calls into accountability our judicial system. But any depth to this film is so heavily buried underneath explosions and typical action film cliches, that it winds up being entertaining, but ultimately shallow and disappointing.
That's not to say it's a bad movie. It's just an average film, done very competently and masterfully. This absolute worst thing is that you can tell there's a better movie here, and that there's a lot of really good material that could've been mined for more intellectual fare. Instead, any questions about the basic morality in effect is completely lost for most of the film, up until the final act where the film tells you who exactly was in the right. A better script would've made the good guy and the bad guy near indecipherable, and paint the entire film in a moral gray zone. What better a way to have us question morality, then to not pick a side and show both equally and fully. Imagine the kind of debates and perspective conversations a film like that could have crafted after viewings. Instead the only conversations being had after this film would include the likes of "Hey, did you see that one scene where the car exploded," or, "Wasn't Jamie Foxx nominated for Ray?".
I'm being harsh on the film, because it should have and could have been a more cerebral and intelligent film, but instead we get a competent, albeit completely throwaway, action film...one that wastes the talents of both its leads, Gerard Butler and Jamie Foxx. There are a lot of great ideas underneath the surface, but in order to get to any of them, you would have to dig, really hard. It is an entirely serviceable and entertaining film, but one that this critic is in no rush to go back to for a second viewing.
3 out of 5
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