The year is 1994 and action cinema has exploded. James Cameron, let loose with the biggest budget ever at the time has delivered the spy/action/comedy, True Lies; Jan de Bont has unleashed the power of the nuclear-powered charisma of Sandra Bullock and Keanu Reeves upon a runaway bus in Speed; and Luc Besson has brought a taste of the arthouse to his thoughtful assassin flick, Leon. Simply put, the genre of bang bangs and booms has moved away from the unkillable muscle man movies of the 80s and found a new identity for the decade.
So, if this is true, how the hell was there yet another Death Wish movie released during the same year? Yep, struggling to keep up with high concept blockbusters and mega-budgeted action sequences was the creaking, leathery form of Charles Bronson’s Paul Kersey, who brought the vigilante out of retirement one last time.
Did the movie make a killing, or is the only Death Wish present here is the audience silently preying for this franchise to expire?
Seven years have passed since architect-turned-vigilante Paul Kersey last pumped a criminal’s body full of hot lead and he’s now living back in New York under the fake identity of Professor Paul Stewart who teaches architecture. While we wonder how good a fake indentiry that could possibly be considering he has the name last name, same job and lives in the same city as his last identity; we find that Paul has settled down once again, despite having a string of dead spouses and lovers in his rear view that could fill a morgue.
In fact, Kersey really does seem to be a glutton for punishment when it’s revealed that his new beau, fashion designer Olivia Regent, is still reluctantly in cahoots with her ex-husband Tommy O’Shea who not only is a gangster who uses her company to launder money, but is also the father to Olivia’s child, Chelsea.
For those of you who has never seen a Death Wish movie before, what you probably think is about to happen is more than likely bang on the money as, after brutalizing and eradicating a couple of Olivia’s more mouthy employees, Tommy’s good come after her when they discover that Paul have convinced her to go to the cops.
After a first encounter leaves her face looking like crazy paving courtesy of a cross-dressing hitman and an unyielding mirror (no, really) Olivia’s second run in with her ex’s goons ends badly and before you know it, Kersey has once again gone into the vigilante business in order to bring some justice to O’Shae’s lawless existence. Be it by exploding, radio controlled soccer ball or poisoned cannoli, nothing will halt Kersey’s latest rampage – not even the fact that the bastard’s now well into his late 60s.
It’s no big surprise to reveal that Bronson’s last ride as his most enduring character is as ridiculous as I’ve made it sound, I have to admit, I found Death Wish V: The Face Of Death (Faces Of Death was taken, I guess) a perversely enjoyable watch. Since the franchise dropped all the gratuitous scenes of violent sexual assault and gave up any semblance of realism, the movies eventually went from edgy, biased swing at social commentary and devolved into flat action thrillers that happily cast Kersey as a faultless hero that are actually fun to watch in a firm, so-bad-it’s-good vein and part 5 is no different.
To take any of this guff seriously is an act of futility, especially considering that at this point in his career, Bronson’s unmoving features look like someone’s stuck a fake moustache to a catcher’s mitt and yet is nimble enough to dodge bullets as a man a third his age. However, director Allan A. Goldstein (a man whose filmography contains not one other familiar title) gives proceedings a nice slick sheen and stages some entertaining takedowns of the array of scumbags that stand between Bronson and his latest paycheck – erm… I mean justice.
However, as Bronson goes through the motions, stubbornly refusing to show any emotion over his most recent loss other than a mild inconvenience, what really makes the film watchable is the cartoon mobsters that he’s targeted for extinction.
While the main legwork is done by a couple of typical goombas, standing tall with a hysterical brand of overblown villainy is a majestically unhinged Michael Parks who hurls racial slurs, indulges in body shaming to an almost pathological degree and wears a tie so garish, it’s liable to trigger epilepsy in more sensitive viewers. Simply, he’s a fucking joy to behold and as such is a splendidly hissable villain for Bronson to dispatch in typically outlandish form – although I am curious as to why there’s an acidic liming pool just sitting there, smack dab in the middle of the clothing factory that O’Shae owns. I guess health and safety doesn’t mean much to psychotic mobsters….
Also adding to the campness of the bad guys is Robert Joy’s lizard-like hitman, “Freddie Flakes”, so called because of a persistent dandruff problem who coos that his security system makes him feel like he’s in the womb, disguises himself as woman to maul Olivia’s face and runs around in leather trousers and a pompadour so high I assume it has its own separate weather system.
While having such broad, comic booky villains kind of defeats the purpose of Death Wish’s original message (such as it was), watching Bronson gift the dirt nap to such maniacal mad dogs is predictably satisfying and thus in the dopey action stakes, Death Wish V doesn’t do too badly at all – providing logic, restraint and a basic feeling of realism is something you just have to have with your gritty, bodycount thrillers.
However, credit, no matter how meager, has to be given to Charles Bronson who had shepherded his murder prone anti-hero from the grit and filth of the original, to the indestructible super hero he would soon become and to give the man his due – no matter how silly the movies got (I’ll type it again: “exploding, radio controlled Soccer ball”), he faced each dead romantic lead and every knife waving punk with the same steely resolve.
“Guns have their uses.” grumbles Kersey at one point; shame we can’t quite say the same for the Death Wish movies, but they certainly do what they say on the tin.
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