Culture shock series: Law Abiding citizen.

Rating: 8/10 (24 October 2009)

Before I go into the review, allow me to give you some facts about this movie on the other side of the earth. Firstly, it was among the highest ranking movies on popular Sino movie site Xunlei, with an incredible 9.8/10. Secondly, most Sino viewers actually think Clyde Shelton stands for goodness in this movie. Some of them even thought that he's the noblest martyr of his kind. Thirdly, the favorite scene considered by them and me was this one. The female judge was having an emergency meeting with lawyers Nick Rice and Jonas. When she got a phone call on her cell phone, the lawyers were startled by the fact that she's violating the law about no cell phones in the courthouse. She commented casually that the point of being a judge is she can do pretty much whatever she wants. The moment she picked up the call and put the phone to her ear, the phone exploded, and the tiny bomb blew her head open, killing her. Instantly, I burst into applause because it's too satisfying to see an injustice justice being punished by someone in the prison.
Does this kind of judge exist in practice? I am afraid most of you would say, "Definitely". OK, do good judges exist then? Honestly, I am not sure. I don't have any hard evidence about any judges' compass, be them pointing north-north, or north-northwest. But, after I saw Clyde Shelton's story, I guess bad judges do exist, so do madmen like Shelton. My question now becomes, do badness and madness have bounds on the screen, or do I enjoy this madness and on screen bad deeds each time they go a bit crazier? My answer is a reluctant yes, thus I admitted my sins watching movies. The point is I now know there's a need, a call deep from my soul that it's better to stop enjoying such a movie experience. The moment Clyde Shelton claimed he's a "Law Abiding Citizen", this term along with its original meaning in the USA constitution corrupted, since anyone who has seen this movie would unconsciously avoid using "law abiding citizen" by expressing his respected citizenship. Of course, there are exceptions, especially we Sino people who have come to believe there was no ultimate good in the first place, and everything including the law is all relative depending on which social class you're in. While the Americans may be able to tell there are good judges and there are still goodness in the juristic system, we Sino people can't. That's because we Sino people don't believe so even before we see the movie.
Even the American audiences can have some thrills watching it, actually. I've read on IMDb that a lot of people do think US jurisdiction system is faintly ill, which provided the hard facts as the justification of Shelton's rage. If one's rage can be justified, rationalized, then the next thing in line you need to nod to will be madness. Shelton wanted to see good in law, but actually he stocked more in revenge. His life was tore apart, yet he didn't know anything to seek beyond the law. If such a dramatic, tragic development of character is an art house rule, then Law Abiding Citizen the movie should be called a testimony for Split personality. I don't have a story in my life which is sadder than Shelton's, but if there's a chance I could talk to him, I'd say law cannot enforce itself. And, it's not a great discovery made by me or Columbus. It's just written in an old, ignored book, the Bible.
Actually, I don't plan to persuade any Shelton to abandon his revenge and self-induced justice, neither does the Bible. See, laws are for humans to know their sins, not for them to capture any goodness. In fact, there's nothing humans can wield to capture the goodness. The law, the education, the marriage can all be inspiring goodness if one's soul still have some brightness. On the contrast, the law, the education and the marriage can also be ongoing disasters if one has decided to eliminate that remaining brightness in his soul. OK, the fact about humans is that the brightness in souls are always dying, so the only way to be redeemed from that direction is to repent and turn to Jesus Christ, who in the Bible, provided he has come not to abolish the law, on the contrast, he has come to fulfill the law with his love and spirit.
Movies like Law Abiding Citizen didn't happen in the real world, but oops, that's only a half-truth. Mayhem on the screen was pushed to their most degraded, horrifying way, which more or less leaves a mark on audiences' souls. In the first place, it didn't happen physically, but then those who think they have immunity as a reasonable adult would find they will need to see something crazier to be satisfied next time. The not-so-convincing ending ensured the movie to be politically right, but still, comparing to the point the movie made with its disturbing illustration, such a political rightness is only a lie. You would think the Bible asked too much from you by calling you to reflect and repent, but compared to Law Abiding Citizen which urged you to question laws, moralities and goodness to the end, the Bible's much more forgiving.