Disclaimer: The views expressed here are mine alone and do not represent does of allgames.com.
Introduction to The Equalizer 2 Movie Review by Ms. H
It has been a few weeks since The Equalizer 2 movie has been released. I saw The Equalizer 2 during the movie's opening week and decided to wait awhile before I reviewed it. I wanted to give this movie the benefit of the doubt, thinking that time would be an asset to help me give the movie a higher rating. Unfortunately, this did not happen.
Ms. H’s Initial Reaction to The Equalizer 2 Movie
I was prepared to enjoy some serious Denzel Washington Oscar calibre-type acting when I saw The Equalizer 2 movie. In this movie, Denzel Washington plays the character of Robert McCall who seems to be some sort of vigilante. I think since Denzel Washington was the star of the movie, I expected the overall movie to be better than it actually was. In fact, after I saw the Equalizer 2 movie, I rewatched his oscar winning performance in the movie, Training Day. As I expected, there was no match between his acting skills in The Equalizer 2 movie when compared to Training Day. I would go as far as to say there was no comparison between the two movies at all, with Training Day being in a class by itself.
Denzel Washington’s Acting Skills in Training Day vs. The Equalizer 2 Movie
I’m sure that Denzel Washington did not star in The Equalizer 2 movie so someone could compare his acting performance with that of Training Day. [Sans the profanity]. However, for me, the comparison of the two movies was a natural response -- especially when I found myself thinking that something was lacking in his performance in The Equalizer 2. Of course the scenarios of these two movies are vastly different; however, the common denominator is that Denzel Washington is the star of both movies.
In his academy award winning part inTraining Day -- Denzel Washington really played his role to the Nth degree. Not only was he totally believable in Training Day, but you could tell that he was giving this performance his all and was not holding back -- especially in the final scenes where, to me, he invoked a mixture of sadness for a position he thought he had as well as a sense that he got what was coming to him. On the other hand, in The Equalizer 2 movie, I do not think he projected this character’s true essence in any way, shape or form. Additionally, I do not think Denzel Washington played this character as designed. For example, whenever he inflicted revenge, it was if he was ready to apologize soon after which was not the personality of this character.
Action Scenes in The Equalizer 2 Movie
In my opinion, more attention was directed to physical actions in The Equalizer 2 movie rather than Denzel Washington’s character. It was as if the director added as many fight action scenes in the movie as he could, instead of letting the audience get to know the character Denzel Washington was playing.
Spoiler Alert: A plus was the hurricane action scene at the end of the movie where Denzel Washington’s character had a one on one battle with his protagonist. I think this scene was very well orchestrated and invoked a sense of excitement in the movie.
Realism of The Equalizer 2 Movie
The Equalizer 2 is of course a movie, so realism is not the focus of the story. However, I could not help questioning the lack of truth in the scene where Denzel Washington appears at a person’s home and tells the client that his credit card was declined by the ride-sharing app. (In the movie, he acted as a Lyft driver). Of course, this could have been the writer-director taking literary license knowing that it is highly probable that the ride sharing app would have checked the credit card credentials before allowing the rider to participate in the program. There may have been other scenes, but this one stood out to me.
Assessment of The Equalizer 2 Movie
I usually look forward to Denzel Washington's movies, mainly because I enjoy seeing him act. To me Denzel Washington takes the acting profession to another level, acting with his facial expressions, actions and other mannerisms -- in addition to saying lines from a script. Unfortunately, I feel that he could have done a much better job in letting the moviegoers get to know the character he was playing. With that being said, I would not say that it was a waste of my time to watch this movie. My underlying impression of this movie is that it could have been a more entertaining movie -- especially with an oscar winning actor such as Denzel Washington as the star.
Rating of The Equalizer Movie 2
Based on a rating of 1 star to 5 stars, with 5 stars being the highest, I rate The Equalizer Movie 3 stars.