Death Wish (1974)
“Conscious Objectors are unlikely vigilantes.”
also…
“Can you give me $20 in quarters, please?”
Modern “revenge” films tend to follow a certain formula. Something bad happens to a good person and wow! it just so happens that the victim de jour has a family member who, unknown to everyone, “has a very particular set of skills”…or is John Rambo. But that wasn’t always the case.
Death Wish is the story of a very un-Rambo-like character’s descent into slow madness.
So what’s the story about…and what is the story really about?
Death Wish opens with successful architect Paul Kersey (Charles Bronson - The Great Escape) and his wife, Joanne (Hope Lange - Blue Velvet), enjoying a vacation in Hawaii. There isn’t a lot of character development, but we do learn that Paul is a kind and compassionate guy who takes a lot of ribbing from his friends for being a “bleeding heart liberal.” We also discover that Paul is a Korean War vet, but that his service was in a medical unit, where his pacifism led him to become a conscious objector.
Shortly after returning to New York, Paul’s wife and daughter (Kathleen Tolan) are brutally - and I mean brutally…it is disturbingly graphic - assaulted by a gang of men (including Jeff Goldblum in his first film credit). Paul looks for justice through the police but becomes increasingly frustrated and decides to take justice into his own hands, taking to the streets with a sock full of quarters.
The turning point in the story comes when Paul travels to Tucson for work. While there he meets a land developer named Aimes (Stuart Margolin - Angel from The Rockford Files). Aimes (who is an interesting mash up of environmentalist and gun enthusiast), takes Paul shooting and to Tucson’s Old Tucson Studios to see old west-style gun fight reenactments - most involving swift (‘though not vigilante) justice against horse thieves and other evil doers. He also gives Paul a 32 caliber gift to bring back to New York…
Once back in the Big Apple, Paul launches an increasingly violent campaign of vigilante justice. His one-man-war is quickly joined by copycats and ordinary citizens who use everything from bricks to hairpins to assault criminals in their neighborhood. With Paul’s popularity rising and crime rates dropping, police and political leaders are forced to decide how to deal with him.
So we get the vigilante and action flick bits…but what is this movie really about?
The 1972 book this movie is based off (Brian Garfield’s Death Wish) is much more psychological study that action thriller. The focus is on Paul’s fantasies about revenge and how he eventually acts on them.
My take is that in the movie, Paul had a psychotic break when he was in Tucson (ok…you Tucsonans stop snickering) and that after the visit to Old Tucson he begins to view life as a Western movie.
Before the eye rolls, watch the movie and look for all the times Paul uses lines from old westerns after his time in Tucson. This could certainly be him being ironic or snarky…except for one pivotal scene near the end of the film when Paul orders a young hood who has dropped his weapon to “Fill” his hand.” When the guy looks at him confused, he yells “Draw!” Throughout the scene, Paul looks disoriented and unsure of where he is. There are other possibilities, but my sense is this is the “tell” that although Paul is generally capable of functioning in the real world, he sometimes slips into an old west fantasy, with him playing the Gary Cooper role.
You can catch Death Wish HERE for free if you have Amazon Prime. Give it a look and let us know what you think the movie is about.
Three out of Five Bad Boy Vigilante Architects.
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