A well performed solid action drama, better than reviews have suggested.

Rating: 8/10 (29 December 2014)

Robert McCall (Washington) works at Home Depot during the day where he encourages his fellow colleagues to achieve and be more, at night he sits and reads in a 24 hour dinner and does the same to a local escort who eats there. After a slow burning start its not long before this widower turns into a one man army taking down the Russian Mob and corrupt Policeman alike. Se entirely among the working class population of Boston its set among an urban America not populated by any middle class characters and is all the better for it.
Based on all original Television series starring the late Edward Woodward which always felt a bit cheesy here director Fuqua takes a more gritty and real approach. McCall at the start is just a nobody, but pretty soon its obvious he is a man with a past which is never entirely revealed to us. The Russian mob, led by the dark and scary Teddy (An excellent Martin Csokas) are determined to stop him. You know from the beginning that the film will end with a climax involving the aisles and lots of power tools but that's okay. The film is well paced, well directed and has an edginess that's just on the right side of believable and well away from the wrong side of the likes of Taken 2. All the cast do well and there's a very small cameo from Bill Pullman at one stage where more is hinted at about McCalls past, but this is Washington's film all the way giving a brooding performance as he dispatches bad guys between breakfast and dinner while taking the moral high ground. Its a good modern imagining of the original series, nothing more, nothing less. An undemanding, well made, thriller that will past the time quite pleasantly.