After hearing about this from a teammate, a friend, and a coworker (not all the same person), I decided to watch it.
This is a tale of revenge. A middle aged man by the name of Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler) witnesses his wife and daughter get brutally murdered at the hands of two criminals. This atrocity happens very early in the movie and sets the tone. Asst. DA, soon to be DA, Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx), tries the case and doesn't secure a verdict satisfactory to Clyde. That leads him to take matters into his own hands.
The movie was quite inventive and clever, even if Clyde was mad with vengeance. You couldn't help but root for Clyde to some degree as he wrought death and havoc upon those responsible for his family's killer's light sentence. He started his warpath with the most responsible parties, i.e. The criminals, then he extended out from there. Each move made tactical sense until towards the end. I ask you: after the two scumbag criminals, their lawyer and the judge... who is the MOST liable for the lack of justice? Obviously it would be Nick Rice, the prosecutor who consented to the light sentence. So why then wasn't he immediately targeted?
At first I was thinking that Clyde had something more in store for Nick. I was thinking: he's going to destroy his life. Get him fired, make him lose his family and then land him in prison somehow. But, as the movie went on, Clyde was targeting everyone BUT Nick. It really didn't make any sense. Then the ending plain sucked. The dialog between Clyde and Nick was too cheesy; in fact, this was not a good Jamie Foxx performance. It was obvious that he was trying to play the cocky DA but he mailed in the performance.
Back to the ending... it was not well thought out.
Nick and co. Discovered Clyde's bomb and they brought the bomb back to Clyde's cell to make him do himself in, but that was beyond absurd!!
Let's see: 1.) transporting armed napalm 2.) having no idea when he'll detonate it 3.) getting it back to his cell (of course through the secret entrance) 4.) staying in the cell until he was ready to detonate it 5.) escaping before being blown up too.
Who came up with this!?
I have a better ending: A.) Nick Price straight up kills Clyde or B.) Clyde kills Nick Price as the final sacrifice and either gets away or gets caught and takes his death penalty having gotten the vengeance he sought. I assume this was supposed to be a happy ending because the good guy gone bad was killed, but I couldn't help but feel that the ending was incomplete. At the very least the ending was ambivalent; no way to say that good triumphed over evil. Nick essentially did Clyde a disservice, shrugged it off, and then got to play hero in the end by killing Clyde.
I demand a rewrite.
This is a tale of revenge. A middle aged man by the name of Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler) witnesses his wife and daughter get brutally murdered at the hands of two criminals. This atrocity happens very early in the movie and sets the tone. Asst. DA, soon to be DA, Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx), tries the case and doesn't secure a verdict satisfactory to Clyde. That leads him to take matters into his own hands.
The movie was quite inventive and clever, even if Clyde was mad with vengeance. You couldn't help but root for Clyde to some degree as he wrought death and havoc upon those responsible for his family's killer's light sentence. He started his warpath with the most responsible parties, i.e. The criminals, then he extended out from there. Each move made tactical sense until towards the end. I ask you: after the two scumbag criminals, their lawyer and the judge... who is the MOST liable for the lack of justice? Obviously it would be Nick Rice, the prosecutor who consented to the light sentence. So why then wasn't he immediately targeted?
At first I was thinking that Clyde had something more in store for Nick. I was thinking: he's going to destroy his life. Get him fired, make him lose his family and then land him in prison somehow. But, as the movie went on, Clyde was targeting everyone BUT Nick. It really didn't make any sense. Then the ending plain sucked. The dialog between Clyde and Nick was too cheesy; in fact, this was not a good Jamie Foxx performance. It was obvious that he was trying to play the cocky DA but he mailed in the performance.
Back to the ending... it was not well thought out.
Nick and co. Discovered Clyde's bomb and they brought the bomb back to Clyde's cell to make him do himself in, but that was beyond absurd!!
Let's see: 1.) transporting armed napalm 2.) having no idea when he'll detonate it 3.) getting it back to his cell (of course through the secret entrance) 4.) staying in the cell until he was ready to detonate it 5.) escaping before being blown up too.
Who came up with this!?
I have a better ending: A.) Nick Price straight up kills Clyde or B.) Clyde kills Nick Price as the final sacrifice and either gets away or gets caught and takes his death penalty having gotten the vengeance he sought. I assume this was supposed to be a happy ending because the good guy gone bad was killed, but I couldn't help but feel that the ending was incomplete. At the very least the ending was ambivalent; no way to say that good triumphed over evil. Nick essentially did Clyde a disservice, shrugged it off, and then got to play hero in the end by killing Clyde.
I demand a rewrite.