The Equalizer

On the outside, Robert McCall may seem like your average Joe you would meet while walking down the street. He's the kind of person who helps out with whatever you need, no questions asked and wanting nothing in return. Since Robert's wife died a few years back, he's lived a quiet life working at the local Boston Home Mart and helping one of his fellow co-workers named Ralphie train for a security guard position at Home Mart. At nights after work, he can usually be found at the local diner reading a book and interacting with other customers. Robert's quiet and simple life comes crashing to an end after he meets a young call girl named Teri. As he gets to know her, he finds out she wants to be a singer, so he helps her out by giving her advice on how to keep her voice taken care of, among other things. One night as Robert makes his way to the diner, he sees Teri and notices she has a bruise on her cheek. Soon both Robert and Teri encounter her bosses henchmen, and Teri ends up in the hospital after being beaten. In a fit of anger Robert makes a personal visit to Teri's pimp, a Russian Mafia member named Slavi. It's at this meeting where Robert reveals his dangerous (and violent) past.

I never saw the original TV show that The Equalizer is based on, so I can't make any judgements on whether it's a good adaptation or not. Solely on the merits of The Equalizer as a movie, however, I can say that I was hoping for a slightly better story, yet Denzel Washington was (unsurprisingly, considering he's an amazing actor) able to rise above the material and give a great performance as Robert McCall. The way he's able to go from the "bad boy" image to genuinely caring for the people around him is really cool. As far as the story goes, it's still your stereotypical revenge thriller that action movies are so fond of nowadays and are a dime a dozen. I also don't think I can recommend this for younger audiences, as the violence gets pretty graphic. The body count is high, and Robert dispatches his adversaries in various...uh, creative ways, for lack of a better description.

Still, for the more mature audience who can handle this kind of stuff I can safely say that if you are a Denzel Washington fan like I am you will most likely enjoy his interpretation of Robert McCall as the Equalizer.