The Equalizer!

I very seldom see movies their opening weekend, hell, I very seldom see movies at all until my annual see all the Oscar nominees in two weeks splurge, but for Denzel Washington, I'll make the exception.

He's my age, he went to Fordham, my old man's alma mater, and he looks just like me, if I was good looking and not pasty white that is. Oh yeah, he can act like no other. The Equalizer proves it.

This isn't your Dad's Equalizer. It's your son's Equalizer.

This movie is a brain drain. Like Taken, it's two hours plus of some old guy kicking everybody's ass. And like Taken and Liam Neeson, it is a tribute to Denzel that he can pull this off. But he does.

Denzel is a mild mannered big box hardware store employee named Robert McCall who his fellow employees love and wonder where the hell he came from. He reads a lot, he doesn't sleep, he eats healthy, he trains friends to pass security guard exams and he lives like a monk. He drinks tea at a 24/7 restaurant late at night where he becomes acquainted with a young prostitute with high hopes and no options. A prisoner of the Russian mob.

Well guess where it goes from there?

Denzel Washington has never been bad in anything. This movie would be a complete failure, trash if you will, with anybody but him. He's fascinating to watch. As not subtle as this violence fest is, his character is as subtle as they come. Christ, he uses a gun one time to whack someone and it wasn't even his gun. The ending involving his fellow employees being held hostage by a Russian nutjob and his men-skis is masterful in the number of ways you can kill bad guys with nothing but power tools and garden tools. I was so hoping for death by something "As Seen On TV" but alas.

Other than a scene in so many movies nowadays I am so fucking sick of , gratuitous violence against an innocent woman, the rest of this movie is just what you think it is. It's Death Wish, Dirty Harry, and Taken. You bet you will see more of this character, Robert McCall.