Jodie Foster is a very talented actress and I have enjoyed many of her movies. I'm usually willing to see her new movies at least once and I've seen some of them several times. I was intrigued when I first saw trailers for her new movie The Brave One and decided that I wanted to see it. I did think it would end up being somewhat similar to Death Sentence, another newer movie staring Kevin Bacon, but I still went to see it.
Erica Bane, a DJ at a radio station in New York City, was happily engaged to doctor David Kirmani. One evening they took their dog for a walk in Central Park where they unfortunately encountered three dangerous men. The men attacked them, savagely beating them. When Erica finally woke up three weeks later, she learned that David had died from his injuries.
Once she was well enough to return to her apartment, Erica tried to put her life back together. She found herself afraid to even leave her building at times and later she was afraid walking through areas she had been comfortable in before the attack. She decided she wanted a gun and ended up buying one illegally because she didn’t feel she could wait the thirty days the law required. Soon after she started acting as a vigilante around the city even as she was starting a friendship with Detective Mercer. He was in charge of the investigation for the vigilante killings.
The Brave One didn’t have the most original plot with how it was similar to the movies Death Sentence and Death Wish. I think I saw the trailer for this movie before Death Sentence, and I do remember thinking it looked like it was going to be like Death Wish. I wasn’t bothered by the similarities to the other movies because I felt there were enough differences. I did like this movie better than Death Sentence and thought that it handled the subject better. The movie was very serious overall and dealt with disturbing and upsetting subjects. There were a couple of lines that were a little bit funny. I might be a bit morbid or twisted for thinking that, but everyone else in the theater laughed at them as well. I’m not sure if those lines were intended to be funny or that was just the way I - and the others in the theater - took them.
Like other movies that were mainly dealing with revenge, The Brave One was predictable. I did expect that going in to see the movie so I wasn’t disappointed. It also didn’t help that the trailer showed more than I believe it should have. Other viewers might feel differently. It really wasn’t surprising when Erica started killing people. The way she started was a bit different from how I had thought it might be. I think this way worked better. I was surprised with a few things that happened late in the movie. I thought those things worked even though they may not be the most realistic or believable.
The movie did take time to show how Erica struggled to regain some semblance of her life after the attack. I’m not sure exactly how long she was in the hospital after she woke up, but it was long enough for her face to heal. She had a lot to deal with once she got home, including discovering that she was too afraid to even leave the building at one point. The movie showed the emotions she was dealing with throughout the movie. The scenes dealing with those things did move slower. That didn’t bother me at all since I think it was important to show how she was trying to cope with everything. Erica went through a lot of changes because of what had happened to her and I did think those changes were understandable and believable. No one was ever heard suggesting to Erica that she talk to a therapist about the attack and David’s death, which I thought was unrealistic.
Not to long after she left the hospital, Erica got a gun. I really don’t think that Erica set out to start killing criminals when she made the decision to get a gun. It seemed like she wanted to the gun to make herself feel safer. Then she found herself in the wrong place at the wrong time and she used the gun. She did seem to feel some justification for what she was doing and she believed the people she went after deserved what happened to them. She did only go after criminals, but that didn’t mean that the police were happy with what she was doing. The whole idea of a person taking the law into their own hands for whatever reason is a touchy, controversial subject. I don’t agree with everything Erica did, but I think I can sort of understand her motivations.
There was a lot of violence throughout The Brave One that will be upsetting to some viewers. It was very disturbing to see how badly Erica and David were beaten just because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. There is a lot of crime in large cities, so I did think the attack was believable. Erica was shown when she arrived at the hospital and it wasn’t pleasant to see. There was more violence later in the movie as several people were shot or hurt in some way. There was a lot of blood shed without it going overboard like has happened in some movies. I didn’t think that the violence was as gory or graphic as it was in Death Sentence. There was also a lot of swearing, including use of the word that rhymes with luck. The movie deserved the R rating and isn’t for children of any age.
It was never said how long Erica and David had been engaged when the movie started. They were shown doing a few things together, including talking about the invitations for the wedding. They did seem very happy together even though they were only shown together for a short time at the beginning of the movie. Not much time passed before the attack, and after Erica had to try to deal with her own recovery and grief over David’s death. Flashbacks were used a few times when Erica was remembering David. Those few flashbacks did help to illustrate that they had been happy and in love even though they were short. There was a small amount of nudity during one of the flashbacks as well as when Erica arrived at the hospital and her clothes were cut off. There weren’t any graphic sex scenes in the movie.
The Brave One focused in on Erica and how she dealt with what had happened to her. She had seemed very happy with David and her job before the attack. She liked living in the city and it even played a part in her radio show. After the attack, she started changing, doing things that she’d never would have considered doing before. Erica was a likable character even after she crossed the line and took the law into her own hands. I really liked Jodie Foster in the movie. She made the character come to life. She was very expressive in scenes when Erica didn’t talk, so it was easy to tell what was thinking or feeling. Foster made Erica a believable person.
Detective Mercer saw Erica when she was still unconscious in the hospital. He had been there for something related to another case. Mercer and his partner were the ones who were investigating the killings that Erica was involved in. Mercer was very dedicated to his job and firmly believed in the law even though he was very frustrated when he found his hands tied by the law. Mercer was coming to really like Erica and consider her a friend. I thought that Terrence Howard was good in the part.
Detective Vitale, Mercer’s partner, wasn’t in as much of the move even though he was working on the same case. Erica’s boss Carol and her friend Nicole were also briefly shown without either woman playing that big a part. There wasn’t any sort of development for the men who attacked Erica and David. In fact, the men were barely in the movie.
Main Cast
Jane Adams - Nicole Naveen Andrews - David Kirmani Jodie Foster - Erica Bane Terrence Howard - Detective Mercer Nicky Katt - Detective Vitale
Neil Jordan - Director
I did enjoy The Brave One even though I felt it had some problems. I do think it handled the subject matter better than Death Sentence had. Fans of Jodie Foster may enjoy the movie.
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