The Equalizer 3 - Review
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00:12 Hello everybody, I'm Dan Merl
00:14 and these are my thoughts on "The Equalizer 3",
00:16 the last movie of the summer movie season
00:19 here on this Labor Day weekend.
00:21 "The Equalizer 3" is the third and supposedly final film
00:24 in a trilogy based on the 80s TV series.
00:27 Antoine Fuqua returns as director
00:29 along with screenwriter Richard Wink
00:31 and Denzel Washington returns as Robert McCall,
00:34 the retired government assassin
00:36 who we find at the tail end
00:37 of one of his private enterprise altruism missions
00:40 with several bodies already on the floor.
00:43 Your man to my left finger on the trigger
00:45 but he's a foot too close
00:46 which renders your man to my right dead already.
00:49 He just doesn't know it yet.
00:50 I feel sorry for his family.
00:52 While recovering from this mission,
00:53 McCall finally finds a place that he can call home
00:56 in the small Italian town of Altamonte
00:59 but he also soon discovers that the Camorra,
01:01 basically the Italian mafia,
01:02 have designs on taking over the town
01:04 so McCall does what he does best,
01:06 kill people to protect the innocent.
01:08 - Whatever it is that you and your friends do,
01:12 please do it somewhere else.
01:15 - You warning me?
01:16 - I'm preparing.
01:18 - It's been nine years since the first "Equalizer" film,
01:20 it's been five years since "The Equalizer 2"
01:22 and one thing I think that "The Equalizer 3" does smartly
01:26 is to acknowledge the fact that Robert McCall
01:29 is getting past his physical prime.
01:31 I mean, Denzel Washington at this point is pushing 70
01:34 and it would be beyond absurd really
01:36 to ask the audience to believe
01:38 that he is basically Jason Bourne.
01:40 They're allowing the character to evolve over time
01:44 and over this trilogy and it works
01:45 because otherwise it would just have been too much to ask.
01:47 I think other movies like, for example, "The Taken" series
01:51 have tried to convince us that the aging action stars
01:53 in them have the abilities of a 35-year-old man,
01:57 that's just not the case here.
01:58 Robert McCall uses shadows and stealth in this movie.
02:01 He uses the element of surprise
02:03 to take down these much younger
02:05 and usually much stronger mafia guys
02:07 and as I was watching what he does,
02:08 jumping out at people and cutting the power
02:11 and using the dark to his advantage,
02:12 I realized that he's basically in this movie
02:15 a humanitarian slasher.
02:16 This movie takes on a much different tone
02:18 when you think of it from the point of view
02:20 of the mafia guys
02:22 and basically Robert McCall is Michael Myers.
02:25 They're like scenes that are taken
02:26 straight out of a Halloween movie.
02:28 The difference here is that we are rooting
02:30 for Robert McCall because he's killing bad guys
02:32 and not victimizing teenagers.
02:34 "The Equalizer 3" isn't just a reunion
02:36 of the off-screen creative team,
02:38 it is also a reunion between two co-stars,
02:40 Denzel Washington and Dakota Fanning,
02:42 who starred together in 2004's "Man on Fire,"
02:46 one of the final few films from the late, great Tony Scott.
02:49 While it would be really cool if it was revealed
02:51 somehow that "Man on Fire" and "The Equalizer"
02:54 were a shared cinematic universe,
02:56 that is not unfortunately in the cards.
02:58 Dakota Fanning plays Emma Collins,
02:59 a rookie CIA agent who's searched
03:01 for an international drug ring,
03:03 intersects with McCall's vendetta
03:05 after he tips her off about illegal activity.
03:08 - You kill him?
03:09 - I look like a guy who kills people.
03:12 - I'm warming to the possibility.
03:14 (laughing)
03:16 - Touche.
03:17 - And you can tell that they were able
03:19 to pick up their chemistry,
03:20 even though Dakota Fanning was much, much younger
03:22 in "Man on Fire."
03:23 They have a very easy rapport.
03:25 There's an energy and a propulsion to their scenes,
03:28 because they're also scenes where you have
03:30 this young CIA agent who's testing McCall
03:33 because she's trying to figure out,
03:34 why are you invested in me?
03:36 And why do you want me specifically
03:38 to look into these things?
03:39 And of course, that's answered over the course of the movie.
03:42 I enjoyed "The Equalizer 3,"
03:43 but I did keep waiting for it
03:45 to sort of kick into a higher gear.
03:46 They basically shift up into third
03:48 for the entire movie pretty early on,
03:51 and then they just keep it there.
03:52 And while it does keep a sense of energy and propulsion
03:55 throughout most of the running time,
03:57 I also kind of kept waiting for another shoe to drop.
03:59 But no, this is really just about Denzel Washington
04:02 taking out a bunch of mafia bad guys.
04:04 Yes, they are just despicably evil,
04:07 but the movie did feel a bit anticlimactic
04:09 because I was waiting for that escalation
04:12 that you see in most movies.
04:14 However, I will acknowledge that the movie
04:16 does dispatch a lot of these guys
04:19 in ways and in an order that I wasn't expecting.
04:22 So it's not entirely devoid of surprises.
04:24 And the major thing this movie has going for it,
04:26 and this franchise has had going for it,
04:28 is Denzel Washington.
04:29 I was driving home and I was trying to think about,
04:31 have I ever left a Denzel Washington movie
04:33 and thought Denzel wasn't good in it?
04:35 I've left Denzel Washington movies that I didn't like.
04:38 The movie just didn't come together for some reason.
04:40 But I cannot ever recall a specific instance
04:43 where he wasn't good in a movie,
04:45 and he's also really good in this movie.
04:48 The cinematography is also lush but moody
04:50 from the great Robert Richardson,
04:52 who also shot this year's air and many other great movies.
04:55 So much of McCall's presence is in the shadows
04:58 lurking in the background,
04:59 and Richardson shoots this film beautifully.
05:01 It really does show you the advantage
05:02 of having a cinematographer on an action movie
05:05 that really has a great grasp of the language of cinema.
05:09 Not to say that others don't,
05:10 but Robert Richardson is one of the best
05:13 directors of photography working today,
05:15 and every single movie shows why
05:17 across pretty much every genre.
05:19 Antoine Fuqua, I think, is also an underrated director,
05:22 and he has a really great grasp on his main character
05:24 and the tone of the series.
05:26 While The Equalizer may not be one of the most successful
05:29 movie trilogies of all time, if we're talking box office,
05:32 I would argue that it is one of the most
05:34 consistent trilogies, and if you have a lazy, rainy day
05:38 in the next two or three years,
05:40 I think you could do a lot worse
05:41 than just sticking on all three Equalizer movies
05:43 and enjoying a trio of badass Denzel Washington performances.
05:47 Times have changed at the box office,
05:49 but it is good to know that there are actors
05:50 and a filmmaking team out there
05:52 that can make a competent adult thriller,
05:54 and while The Equalizer 3 is not gonna be
05:57 one of my favorite movies of the year, I enjoyed it.
06:00 I got several laughs out of Denzel Washington's dry,
06:03 often kind of gallows humor in the movie,
06:05 and I also appreciate the fact that this movie
06:07 is under two hours long, because I think anything longer
06:10 would have been overkill.
06:12 You know Hollywood is upside down when a movie like this,
06:14 which would have been a safe bet in years past,
06:16 is no longer that safe, but still,
06:18 if you're a fan of Denzel, of the franchise,
06:21 of action, or of adult dramas,
06:23 I think you'll enjoy this movie,
06:24 if only as another movie from one of the last
06:27 and most dependable real movie stars.
06:29 On my personal chart, I'm giving Equalizer 3
06:32 an It's Good rating, and it does get my recommendation.
06:35 I will say that either watching or brushing up
06:38 on the previous two Equalizer films
06:40 is not required, but recommended.
06:43 There are a couple of things,
06:44 especially as you get into Act 3,
06:46 that sort of serve to tie together
06:48 all three of these movies,
06:49 and I think you'll appreciate them more
06:51 if you're a little bit more familiar or fresh
06:53 on those other two films.
06:55 So those are my thoughts on the Equalizer 3.
06:56 What do you think?
06:57 Will you be heading out to the movies this Labor Day?
06:59 Let me know down in the comments below,
07:01 and as always, thank you so much for joining me.
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08:27 Until then, stay safe, and I'll see you next time.
08:30 Bye.
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