You have seen this film before 1000 times

Rating: 5/10 (16 September 2014)

A highly trained, retired field operative resorts to violence as the only way to free a Russian prostitute from brutal Russian men who are part of an international crime organization. The many years of retirement didn't show any sign of rust on Robert McCall (Washington) as he ran through his adversaries, dismantling one after another, without batting an eye. He made it look too easy. These bad Russian men had nothing for him, which is probably the biggest problem with this film. There is nothing interesting about a Good vs Evil film with weak bad guys. The filmmakers did work hard at trying to make Teddy, played by Marton Csokas, look ruthless and deadly. But I was never convinced, and I doubt whether the many who saw this film with me at the Toronto International Film Festival were convinced as well.
I found the film rather boring for the most part, with a setup unusually longer than anything Hollywood released in decades. The dialogue was heavy handed. The supporting roles didn't provide nothing more than their vulnerability to the scum of society, which beckoned on a hero like McCall to teach them a lesson or two.
And as I stated in my summary, you have already seen this film a thousand times already: the bad guys shooting big, scary guns and rarely grazing the hero, the hero walking away in slow motion from an explosion he caused, bad guys tracking hero down in this sort of cat-and-mouse thing, damsels in distress, high octane martial arts. Wait, the filmmakers did try to make the film unique by excluding a car chase and having McCall kill each and every bad guy in the most unique way every time. A bullet to the cranium wasn't good enough. No. He had to use methods like overflowing bathroom sinks to electrocute someone. He seemed like he was trying to one-up himself every time. The hero doesn't make any mistakes in the process, even taking the time to catch a fly ball to win the company baseball game. The way he swooped in, in slow motion, and snatched that ball from the joker character who thought he had it was roll-your-eyes worthy and completely laughable.
However, when the film got going it started to be exactly what I expected; an entertaining, highly stylized, popcorn film. At the same time, being Fuqua's weakest directorial effort since his first film, I cannot recommend it. 5/10