# Death Wish (film series)

The Death Wish franchise is an American vigilante action-thriller film series based on the 1972 novel by Brian Garfield. The films follow the character Paul Kersey, portrayed by Charles Bronson in the original series, and Bruce Willis in the 2018 remake. While the first film received mixed reviews, the subsequent sequels, as well as the remake, were panned by critics. The series made $87 million against a combined production budget of $61 million. Charles Bronson was the only actor to have appeared in all five films.

## Background
### Paul Kersey

Kersey was born in East Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1921. Kersey's father was an English-American who originated from Northern England and his mother comes from Provo, Utah. Kersey's Norman English ancestor, Pierre Whítmoré Keèrsye, anglicized his surname to Kersey. Paul was raised around guns and became a good shot as a child. After Paul's father was killed in a hunting accident, his mother prevented him from being around guns anymore.
Kersey served in World War II in the Pacific theater as a combat medic from 1944 to 1945. In 1950 Paul graduated from Princeton University with a degree in Civil Engineering. In 1953, he was a conscientious objector in the medical corps in the Korean War. In the late 1950s, he traveled to New York City to settle down.

## Films

| Film | U.S. release date | Director(s) | Screenwriter(s) | Story by | Producer(s) |
| Original series ||||||
| Death Wish | July 24, 1974 (1974-07-24) | Michael Winner | Wendell Mayes | — | Dino De Laurentiis, Hal Landers & Bobby Roberts |
| Death Wish II | February 19, 1982 (1982-02-19) | Michael Winner | David Engelbach | — | Menahem Golan & Yoram Globus |
| Death Wish 3 | November 1, 1985 (1985-11-01) | Michael Winner | Don Jakoby | — | Menahem Golan, Yoram Globus & Michael Winner |
| Death Wish 4: The Crackdown | November 6, 1987 (1987-11-06) | J. Lee Thompson | Gail Morgan Hickman | — | Pancho Kohner |
| Death Wish V: The Face of Death | January 14, 1994 (1994-01-14) | Allan A. Goldstein | Allan A. Goldstein | — | Damian Lee |
| Remake ||||||
| Death Wish | March 2, 2018 (2018-03-02) | Eli Roth | Joe Carnahan | — | Roger Birnbaum |

### Death Wish (1974)

Paul Kersey is an architect who served in the Korean War in the medical corps, and he lives in New York City. One day, three street punks posing as grocery delivery boys break into his apartment while he is at work. They beat up Paul's wife, Joanna and rape his married daughter, Carol Toby, spray-painting both of them and the wall of their apartment "just for fun." Joanna later dies of her injuries, and Carol is left catatonic. Paul's life is ripped apart by this attack.
Paul's boss decides that Paul needs to get out of New York for a while, so he sends him to Tucson, Arizona to meet with a client. There, Paul witnesses a mock gunfight at Old Tucson Studios, a reconstructed Western frontier town that is often used as a movie set. Paul's client gets him interested in guns. It turns out that Paul grew up around guns and is a good shot himself. When Paul returns to New York, he discovers that his client has put a .32 Colt Police Positive revolver into his baggage as a gift. When the police are unable to find the rapists, Paul sets out to find them himself. Paul begins patrolling the streets, killing street criminals as he encounters them.

### Death Wish II (1982)

Kersey and his daughter Carol, who is still catatonic, now live in Los Angeles because Paul accepted a deal from the New York City Police Department to leave town so they would not tell anyone that he was the vigilante. Paul now has a new woman in his life, KABC news reporter, Geri Nichols. One day while he is out with Carol and Geri, he is mugged by a gang of five punks. Paul fights back, but they get away.
The muggers go to his house, gag, rape, and murder Kersey's housekeeper. They then wait for Paul to return home and knock him unconscious and kidnap and rape Carol. The assault brings her out of her coma and she tries to get away by jumping through the second story window, but she dies when she is impaled on an iron fence stake.
Beside himself with grief and rage, Paul dedicates his life to avenging Carol. He rents a ratty hotel room under another name, and starts looking for the rapists. When the Los Angeles Police Department deduces that they have a vigilante on their hands, they decide to consult with the New York City Police Department, who fear that Kersey is killing criminals again.

### Death Wish 3 (1985)

After killing criminals in Los Angeles, Paul Kersey returns to New York City to visit his friend, Charley, who lives in one of the worst parts of New York City. When Paul arrives at Charley's apartment, he finds Charley dying after a vicious beating by a gang led by Manny Fraker. The police enter the apartment and find Paul standing over Charley's body.
Paul is arrested for the murder, but police chief Richard S. Shriker offers a deal: Paul can kill all the criminals he wants, if he keeps the cops informed about the death count. Though Kersey says that he stopped his mugger slayings, Shriker releases Paul to go after Fraker. Paul moves into Charley's apartment in a decaying building in the middle of a bombed out gang war zone.

### Death Wish 4: The Crackdown (1987)

Kersey had largely retired from slaying muggers shortly after Death Wish 3. In Death Wish 4: The Crackdown, Detective Phil Nozaki mentions mugger shootings downtown two years previous to the events of Death Wish 4, to which Detective Sid Reiner responds by saying that "the vigilante retired years ago". Kersey kept regular residence in Los Angeles, regardless of his breaking off his mugger slayings. Paul Kersey is back in Los Angeles, and is dating reporter, Karen Sheldon, who has a teenage daughter named Erica. While Erica is at an arcade with her boyfriend, Randy, she dies of a crack cocaine overdose, setting the scene for a departure from the series' focus on sexual assault by instead putting drug abuse as a center stage. Later, Randy goes back to the arcade with Kersey following him.
Randy confronts Jo-Jo Ross, the dealer that Erica got the crack from. Randy tells Jo-Jo that he is going to the police, but Jo-Jo kills him to keep him quiet. Kersey shows up and shoots Jo-Jo with a .380 Walther PPK pistol, and watches him land on the electrical roof of the bumper-car ride, where he is electrocuted. Next, Paul gets a note and a phone call from a publisher named Nathan White, who tells him that he knows about the death of Jo-Jo. Nathan explains to Kersey that his daughter had died of an overdose, so he wants to hire Kersey to wipe out the drug trade in L.A. – and in particular to target Ed Zacharias and The Romero Brothers Jack and Tony, rival drug kingpins who are the city's two main drug suppliers.

### Death Wish V: The Face of Death (1994)

Kersey's secret identity as the vigilante was effectively blown in Death Wish 4: The Crackdown, as Detective Sid Reiner of the Los Angeles Police Department, less sympathetic than Chief Richard Shriker or Detective Frank Ochoa, discovered it. Reiner stated he would arrest Kersey. Kersey retired and entered the Witness Protection Program and assumed the alias, Paul Stewart in New York City after meeting with the District Attorney of New York.
Seven years passed before Kersey's peace was again interrupted. New York City's garment district has turned into Dodge City when a mobster named Tommy O'Shea muscles in on the fashion trade of his ex-wife, Olivia Regent. Olivia is engaged to Paul Kersey, who provides a sense of security for her and her daughter, Chelsea. Olivia is not impressed when Tommy tortures her manager, Big Al, so Tommy hires an enforcer named Freddie Flakes, a master of disguise.
Freddie dons women's clothing to follow Olivia into a ladies' room, where he smashes her face into a mirror, causing permanent disfigurement. In the offices of District Attorney Brian Hoyle and his associate, Hector Vasquez, Paul and Olivia vow that Tommy should be prosecuted. Later, Freddie and two of his henchmen disguise themselves as cops, infiltrate Olivia's apartment, and shoot her dead. This causes Kersey to go from his retirement to his vigilante efforts yet again, as he tries to wipe out Tommy's ruthless Irish mob organization by killing all of his gang members responsible for Olivia's murder and in the process, Kersey kills his wife's assailants as well.

### Death Wish (2018)

Paul Kersey (Bruce Willis), a Chicago-area Emergency Room surgeon, lives with his wife, Lucy (Elisabeth Shue), and daughter, Jordan (Camila Morrone). When the family visits a restaurant with Paul's brother Frank (Vincent D'Onofrio), a valet named Miguel photographs their home address from their car's navigation software, after hearing about a night they plan to be away from home. However, Paul is called to work that night, and Jordan and Lucy are home when the three armed burglars break into their home. Moments later, one of the burglars is scarred from Lucy and Jordan's efforts to fight back in defense of their lives and home. The invading criminals shoot Lucy to death, and Jordan is seriously wounded and comatose from their attempted murder of her.
Paul becomes frustrated with the lack of police progress on the case, led by Detectives Kevin Raines (Dean Norris) and Leonore Jackson (Kimberly Elise). After seeing two men harassing a woman, Paul tries to intervene but is kicked and punched to the ground by the two assailants. He visits a gun store, but there is a long mandatory waiting period to legally purchase a firearm. When a gang member is brought to the hospital and his Glock 17 falls off the gurney, Paul takes it and practices shooting.
He uses the gun to stop a carjacking, a video of which goes viral. During the effort, he cuts his left hand due to improperly handling the pistol. Continuing his efforts as a vigilante, Paul decides to kill a drug dealer, calling himself "the Ice Cream Man", after a young boy comes to the hospital with a gunshot wound in his leg. Paul calmly walks up to the pistol-holding drug dealer, referring to himself as "his last customer," and shoots him. News, TV, and radio reports consistently demonstrate mixed feelings of support and condemnation of Paul's developing war against violent criminals.

## Cast and crew
### Cast

   * This table shows the principal characters and the actors who have portrayed them throughout the franchise.
   * A dark grey cell indicates the character was not in the film, or that the character's presence in the film has not yet been announced.
| Character | Original series | Original series | Original series | Original series | Original series | Remake |
| Character | Death Wish | Death Wish II | Death Wish 3 | Death Wish The Crackdown | Death Wish The Face of Death | Death Wish |
| Character | 1974 | 1982 | 1985 | 1987 | 1994 | 2018 |
| Paul Kersey The Vigilante | Charles Bronson | Charles Bronson | Charles Bronson | Charles Bronson | Charles Bronson | Bruce Willis |
| Lt. Frank Ochoa | Vincent Gardenia | Vincent Gardenia | Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Vincent D'Onofrio |
| Carol Kersey-Toby Jordan Kersey | Kathleen Tolan | Robin Sherwood | Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Camila Morrone |
| Joanna Kersey Lucy Kersey | Hope Lange | Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Mentioned | Elisabeth Shue |
| Jackson Reilly / Lenore Jackson | Christopher Guest | | | | | Kimberly Elise |
| Freak #1 / Knox | Jeff Goldblum | | | | | Beau Knapp |
| Samuel "Sam" Kreutzer | William Redfield | | | | | |
| Jack Toby | Steven Keats | | | | | |
| Ames Jainchill | Stuart Margolin | | | | | |
| Police Commissioner | Stephen Elliott | | | | | |
| Hank | Jack Wallace | | | | | |
| Joe Charles | Robert Kya-Hill | | | | | |
| PO Gemetti (Task Force Meeting) | Olympia Dukakis | | | | | |
| Cop at Hospital | Paul Dooley | | | | | |
| Subway Mugger | Eric Laneuville | | | | | |
| Park Mugger | Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs | | | | | |
| Grocery Clerk | Sonia Manzano | | | | | |
| E.R. Doctor | Tom Hayden | | | | | |
| Moving Man | Ciro "Jerry" Palazzo | | | | | |
| Kersey's Secretary | Marcia Jean Kurtz | | | | | |
| Security Guard in Lobby | Al Lewis | | | | | |
| Mugger | Robert Miano | | | | | |
| Slasher Mugger | John Herzfeld | | | | | |
| Central Park Mugger | Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs | | | | | |
| Supermarket Checkout Clerk | Sonia Manzano | | | | | |
| Alma Lee Brown | Helen Martin | | | | | |
| Receptionist | Marcia Jean Kurtz | | | | | |
| Geri Nichols | | Jill Ireland | | | | |
| New York District Attorney | | J.D. Cannon | | | | |
| LA Police Commissioner | | Anthony Franciosa | | | | |
| Donald Kay | | Charles Cyphers | | | | |
| Inspector Lt. Mankiewicz | | Ben Frank | | | | |
| Senator Robert McLean | | Paul Comi | | | | |
| Elliot Cass | | Michael Prince | | | | |
| Charles Wilson Nirvana | | Thomas F. Duffy | | | | |
| Cutter | | Laurence Fishburne III | | | | |
| Stomper | | Kevyn Major Howard | | | | |
| Jiver | | Stuart K. Robinson | | | | |
| Punkcut | | E. Lamont Johnson | | | | |
| Rosario | | Silvana Gallardo | | | | |
| Fred McKenzie | | Robert F. Lyons | | | | |
| Judge Lake | | Frank Campanella | | | | |
| Mike | | Don Dubbins | | | | |
| Charles Pearce | | Buck Young | | | | |
| Kathryn Davis | | | Deborah Raffin | | | |
| Police Chief Richard Shriker | | | Ed Lauter | | | |
| Bennett Cross | | | Martin Balsam | | | |
| Manny Fraker | | | Gavan O'Herlihy | | | |
| Hermosa | | | Alex Winter | | | |
| Maria Rodriguez | | | Marina Sirtis | | | |
| The Cuban | | | Ricco Ross | | | |
| Manny Fraker's Girlfriend | | | Barbie Wilde | | | |
| Captain Sterns | | | Manning Redwood | | | |
| Karen Sheldon | | | | Kay Lenz | | |
| Nathan White | | | | John P. Ryan | | |
| Ed Zacharias | | | | Perry Lopez | | |
| Reiner | | | | George Dickerson | | |
| Nozaki | | | | Soon-Tek Oh | | |
| Erica Sheldon | | | | Dana Barron | | |
| Art Sanella | | | | Danny Trejo | | |
| Jesse | | | | Tim Russ | | |
| Punk | | | | Mark Pellegrino | | |
| Olivia Regent | | | | | Lesley-Anne Down | |
| Tommy O'Shea | | | | | Michael Parks | |
| Freddie "Flakes" Garrity | | | | | Robert Joy | |
| Subway Mugger / D.A. Brian Hoyle | Saul Rubinek | | | | Saul Rubinek | |
| Lt. Mickey King | | | | | Kenneth Welsh | |
| Janice Omori | | | | | Lisa Inouye | |
| Lt. Hector Vasquez | | | | | Miguel Sandoval | |
| Chelsea | | | | | Erica Lancaster | |
| Sal Paconi | | | | | Chuck Shamata | |
| Chicki Paconi | | | | | Kevin Lund | |
| Runway Model | | | | | Melissa Illes | |
| Albert | | | | | Jefferson Mappin | |
| Maxine | | | | | Claire Rankin | |
| Detective Kevin Raines | | | | | | Dean Norris |
| Sophie | | | | | | Stephanie Janusauskas |
| The Fish | | | | | | Jack Kesy |
| Joe | | | | | | Ronnie Gene Blevins |
| Ben | | | | | | Len Cariou |
| Bethany | | | | | | Kirby Bliss Blanton |
| Dr. Jill Klavens | | | | | | Wendy Crewson |

### Crew

| Crew/detail | Film | Film | Film | Film | Film | Film |
| Crew/detail | Death Wish | Death Wish II | Death Wish 3 | Death Wish 4: The Crackdown | Death Wish V: The Face of Death | Death Wish |
| Crew/detail | 1974 | 1982 | 1985 | 1987 | 1994 | 2018 |
| Director | Michael Winner | Michael Winner | Michael Winner | J. Lee Thompson | Allan A. Goldstein | Eli Roth |
| Producer(s) | Dino De Laurentiis Hal Landers Bobby Roberts | Menahem Golan Yoram Globus | Menahem Golan Yoram Globus Michael Winner | Poncho Kohner | Damian Lee | Roger Birnbaum |
| Writer(s) | Wendell Mayes | David Engelbach | Don Jakoby (as Michael Edmonds) | Gail Morgan Hickman | Michael Colleary Allan A. Goldstein | Joe Carnahan |
| Composer | Herbie Hancock | Jimmy Page | Jimmy Page Mike Moran | John Bisharat Paul MacCallum Valentine MacCallum Robert O. Ragland | Terry Plumeri | Ludwig Göransson |
| Editor(s) | Bernard Gribble | Michael Winner Julian Semilian | Arnold Crust | Peter Lee-Thompson | Patrick Rand | Mark Goldblatt |
| Cinematographer | Arthur J. Ornitz | Thomas Del Ruth Richard H. Kline | John Stanier | Gideon Porath | Curtis Petersen | Rogier Stoffers |
| Production Company | Dino De Laurentiis Corporation | The Cannon Group, Inc. Golan-Globus Productions | The Cannon Group, Inc. Golan-Globus Productions | The Cannon Group, Inc. | 21st Century Film Corporation Death Wish 5 Productions | Cave 76 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Distributor | Paramount Pictures Columbia Pictures | Filmways Pictures Columbia Pictures | Cannon Film Distributors | Cannon Film Distributors | Trimark Pictures | Annapurna Pictures Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer |
| Running time | 94 minutes | 88 minutes | 92 minutes | 99 minutes | 95 minutes | 108 minutes |
| Release date | July 24, 1974 | February 19, 1982 | November 1, 1985 | November 6, 1987 | January 14, 1994 | March 2, 2018 |

## Reception
### Box office performance

| Film | U.S. release date | Budget | Box office revenue | Box office revenue | Box office revenue |
| Film | U.S. release date | Budget | United States | International | Worldwide |
| Death Wish | July 24, 1974 (1974-07-24) | $3.7 million | $20.3–$22 million | | $20.3–$22 million |
| Death Wish 2 | February 19, 1982 (1982-02-19) | $8 million | $29 million | | $29 million |
| Death Wish 3 | November 1, 1985 (1985-11-01) | $9–10 million | $16.1 million | | $16.1 million |
| Death Wish 4: The Crackdown | November 6, 1987 (1987-11-06) | $5 million | $6.9 million | | $6.9 million |
| Death Wish V: The Face of Death | January 14, 1994 (1994-01-14) | $5 million | $1.7 million | | $1.7 million |
| Death Wish | March 2, 2018 (2018-03-02) | $30 million | $34 million | $15.6 million | $49.6 million |
| Total | Total | | | | |

### Critical and public response

| Film | Rotten Tomatoes | Metacritic |
| Death Wish | 65% (26 reviews) | 51 (7 reviews) |
| Death Wish II | 33% (18 reviews) | 11 (7 reviews) |
| Death Wish 3 | 6% (17 reviews) | 18 (9 reviews) |
| Death Wish 4: The Crackdown | 14% (7 reviews) | 46 (6 reviews) |
| Death Wish V: The Face of Death | 0% (5 reviews) | 25 (6 reviews) |
| Death Wish | 17% (136 reviews) | 31 (32 reviews) |

### Analysis

In 2006, film historian Paul Talbot released Bronson's Loose!: The Making of the Death Wish Films, which covers the making of the five films and features interviews with author Brian Garfield, director Michael Winner, producers Bobby Roberts and Pancho Kohner, and more.
In 2010, novelist Christopher Sorrentino published a book-length monograph, called Death Wish, on the original film. In the course of a deep analysis of the film's content, Sorrentino declares Death Wish to be mythic and apolitical, and using The New York Times's Vincent Canby as a prime example, holds it up as an instance when reviewers used a film's perceived political incorrectness as a pretext to savage it.

## Music
### Soundtracks

| Title | U.S. release date | Length | Composer(s) | Label |
| Death Wish: Original Soundtrack Recording | October 11, 1974 | 40:28 | Herbie Hancock | Columbia |
| Death Wish II: The Original Soundtrack - Music by Jimmy Page | February 15, 1982 | 37:11 | Jimmy Page | Swan Song |
| Death Wish 3: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack | | | | |
| Death Wish 4: The Crackdown (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) | | | | |
| Death Wish V: The Face of Death (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) | | | | |
| Death Wish: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack | | | | |

## Other media
### Video game

The third film in the original series, was made into a video game of the same name by Gremlin Graphics for the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, MSX and Amstrad CPC. In the game, the player controls Paul Kersey in the streets and buildings in a free-roaming, all-out gunfight with gangsters. It was one of the goriest games of its time, featuring multiple weapons with detailed, different damage patterns and the possibility to kill civilians.

### Film based on novel's sequel

The 2007 film, Death Sentence was based loosely on the Death Wish novel's 1975 sequel of the same name. The film stars Kevin Bacon as Nick Hume, a man who takes the law into his own hands when his son is murdered by a gang as an initiation ritual.

### In popular culture

In 2020, the pseudonymous author "Paul Kersey", who had published numerous anti-black articles on white nationalist blogs and websites, was identified as Michael J. Thompson, a longtime employee at several mainstream conservative organizations. Thompson chose his pen name in reference to the films' protagonist.