Death Wish
0.5/5
Written by Luke Barnes
I have long defend the films of Eli Roth, a lot of people don’t like them or his style, but I defended him. Yet, this film is too much even for me. I think this film is symptomatic of everything wrong, with both modern action films as well as with gun culture in the States. There is nothing cool about a man who gets some weapons by iffy means and runs around and plays judge jury and executioner- those days have long past.
This film plays as somewhat of a wet dream for gun nuts, showing the ever present fear of what if it was your family? Asking the samey and egotistical question would you be ‘man enough’ to get the people who hurt your family, that whole idea feels deeply toxic and problematic now.
The gun violence/ vigilante stuff is fetishized to a point of being obscene, and with the rash of school shootings, and other shootings in the USA this feels more than a little icky and in bad taste. With something like the Punisher the violence is shown to be grim, unpleasant and crucially not glorified, whereas this goes the other way with it and ventures fully into bad taste.
Bruce Willis doesn’t care and isn’t trying, but then would you ever expect him to?
Overall, a far right fantasy and a stain on Roth’s career.
Pros.
It is at times laughably bad
Cons.
Its message
Willis
How it portrays gun culture
The violence
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