Death Sentence (and a bit on The Brave One).

"By late summer, when director James Wan's Death Sentence is playing side by side with Neil Jordan's The Brave One at many of our nation's multiplexes, moviegoers will be forgiven for thinking that they've traveled through a time warp and landed in the late 1970s, when first-class cinemas and seedy grindhouses alike were flooded with urban-crime dramas about ordinary citizens taking the law into their own hands," writes Scott Foundas, who talks with Wan for the LA Weekly.

"And yet the differences between the two are like Chardonnay and rotgut: Jordan's is a somber, elegantly wrought mood-piece, while Wan's aims straight for the stomach lining," writes Scott Tobias at the AV Club. "It's tempting to call Death Sentence the more 'honest' of the two, since it's less ashamed to paddle around in the muck, but Wan often lets his guileless enthusiasm get the better of him."

Updated through 9/2.

"Based on Brian Garfield's novel - a sequel to the book that spawned the 1974 film Death Wish - Mr Wan's film is a middle-class white man's payback fantasy, leavened with phony references to class difference," writes Matt Zoller Seitz in the New York Times. "Aside from a stunning three-minute tracking shot as the gang pursues Nick through a parking garage, and [Kevin] Bacon's hauntingly pale, dark-eyed visage, Mr Wan's film is a tedious, pandering time-waster."

The best part of Roger Ebert's review - basically, he likes the movie - actually deals with the Death Wish series and the Chicago-set sequel that was never made.

"In the press notes, the director ponders the film's 'Shakespearean' qualities, while a producer loftily compares it to Greek tragedy," observes Newsday's in the Los Angeles Times. "One seriously wonders how much time either of them has spent slumming at classical theater: Exactly which Sophocles or Shakespeare dramas do they have in mind? To give credit where it is due, the fetishizing of gun violence, the cynical distrust of the jury system and the prioritizing of one's own family over the welfare of others are hallmarks that American popular culture should rightfully be able to claim for itself."

"Bacon, Hollywood's go-to heavy, can usually make the most loathsome characters - including killers and child molesters - seem poignantly human," writes Desson Thompson in the Washington Post. "But his thin-lipped intensity can't bring this character to life."

As for The Brave One, Justin Chang writes in Variety that "Jodie Foster unleashes her rage on the mean streets of New York with the same mesmeric intensity and steely resolve that have characterized her very best performances... Jordan neither subverts the pleasures of seeing lone-ranger justice onscreen, as David Cronenberg did in A History of Violence, nor panders overtly to the audience's baser instincts; instead, The Brave One attempts to tap into post-9/11 anxieties and comment on the very American idea of righteous payback."

In the Hollywood Reporter, Michael Rechtshaffen adds that Foster and Jordan's "considerable attributes go a long way in compensating for problematic plot mechanics that ultimately trip up the good intentions, especially in its portrayal of a New York that looks and behaves more like Charles Bronson's old stomping grounds than its modern-day incarnation."

Back to Death Sentence: "Obviously you've seen this story a dozen or so times by now, but Wan and Bacon do all they can to bring a little new color to the concept," writes Scott Weinberg at Cinematical. "There's a fantastic foot-chase sequence that leads to an excellent action scene in a parking garage - which is promptly followed by a rather sobering scene in which Bacon's character starts to really unravel. The dual approach elevates Death Sentence beyond 'just another action flick' - but the tonal shifts also do some damage in the flick's final act. At an overlong 110 minutes, the movie feels like it would definitely benefit from one more trip to the editing booth."

Update, 9/1: Karen Valby talks with Jodie Foster for Entertainment Weekly. It's actually quite a good interview, and I'm glad SXSW's News Reel has pointed it out.

Update, 9/2: "A surprisingly sturdy and effective genre picture, [Death Sentence] has style and energy to spare, but ultimately fails in rectifying its own central conflicts, serving as a warning to the costs—emotional and otherwise—brought about by attempts to satiate one's desire for revenge while also hypocritically encouraging and reveling in violent, shoot 'em up confrontations," writes Rob Humanick at Slant.

Posted by dwhudson at August 31, 2007 9:31 AM