Go ahead, make her day
We have not kept pace with the newest wave of fall movies and, in fact, missed some of the summer releases.
For instance, "No End in Sight" has been on our must-see list for weeks but we might have to settle for a Netflix viewing.
We did find time to see "The Brave One" with Jodie Foster two weeks ago and I still have no idea what to make of it.
The movie still appears to me to be a glossier remake of Charles Bronson's old vigilante flick "Death Wish," which begat increasingly cartoonist sequels.
Foster plays the host of an NPR-like New York radio program who is attacked while walking with her fiance in a shadowy Big Apple park. Her fiance is beaten to death by the assailants, who digitally record the incident. Foster's character also is beaten to the point of falling into a coma.
Once she recovers, she gets a gun (illegally) and proceeds to kill bad people randomly, before tracking down her own attackers. She also kills a man whom she is told is a bad guy by a police friend. She seeks him out and wastes him in a crowd-pleasing scene.
Foster seems to be channeling her inner Eastwood. With an icy look on her face, she seems to be just itching for somebody to go ahead, make her day.
What is the message of this movie?
That it's OK to become judge, jury and executioner of not only someone who wronged you, but other people who just happen to mess with you in your daily travels and even other people you don't know but have been told are despicable?
The crowd cheered at the end.
I just felt uneasy and confused.
Comments (6)
To report abuse of the comment feature on this site, please use the feedback form at the bottom of any page.
I believe the movie was meant to be an anti-gun/anti-violence statement.
Here's a recent quote from Foster, made after The Brave One premiered:
"I don't believe that any gun should be in the hand of a thinking, feeling, breathing human being. Americans are by nature filled with rage-slash-fear. And guns are a huge part of our culture.
"I know I'm crazy because I'm only supposed to say that in Europe. But violence corrupts absolutely."
http://www.femalefirst.co.uk/celebrity/Jodie+Foster-17524.html
Posted on September 26, 2007 10:38 AM
See, I got the complete opposite message from the movie, Jaycee. If anything, I thought it was about the most pro-gun movie I've ever seen.
In the film, Foster's character is the victim of crime. So she buys a gun to protect herself - and that's exactly what happens. Eventually, it escalates into her seeking out bad guys and killing them, but they are all violent, totally evil criminals (murderers, would-be rapists, drug kingpins and the like). The film offers no sympathy for them.
There's even a scene early on where Foster's character tries to legally buy a gun, but is thwarted by a 30-day waiting period. So she buys one on the black market.
Foster herself may be against guns, but that wasn't the message of the movie.
Posted on September 26, 2007 11:14 AM
The movie was meant to show the negative side of taking the law into one's own hands, the theory that guns equate to power, can be used for lawlessness, etc. In the same vein, Peckinpah's movie The Wild Bunch was meant to send a savagely anti-violence message, largely by using mindless carnage and violence.
Posted on September 26, 2007 12:37 PM
I saw this film almost as purely supporting vigilantism, and cheating reality by making all the bad guys really, really bad.
But reality isn't so black and white. Free-lance justice is dangerous -- and tragically mistaken --in the real world, even if Foster makes it look excusable in the movie.
Remember, in one scene she seeks out a guy for execution.
The movie allowed for no grays.
Posted on September 26, 2007 1:01 PM
Hollywood actors ALWAYS say the polite liberal anti-gun thing, and just as often use violence to settle their problems. How many on-screen warriors publicly pronounce that they want to give peace a chance because violence doesn't solve anything?
I'm not planning to see the movie because I've already seen it. Like the countless interations of good-teacher-wins-over-struggling-ghetto-kids, there's nothing more to see.
Posted on September 26, 2007 1:58 PM
Hollywood actors ALWAYS say the polite liberal anti-gun thing, and just as often use violence to settle their problems. How many on-screen warriors publicly pronounce that they want to give peace a chance because violence doesn't solve anything?
I'm not planning to see the movie because I've already seen it. Like the countless interations of good-teacher-wins-over-struggling-ghetto-kids, there's nothing more to see.
Posted on September 26, 2007 2:00 PM