This movie had been playing in US cinemas for a while and it was unclear why it only premiered in Indonesian theaters after more than a month. So we were pretty late in seeing this movie, but nevertheless I was still excited to see this as I had seen the first movie and quite enjoyed it. The movie oddly premiered on a Tuesday as opposed to the usual Wednesday probably due to another movie going to be released on that day. My wife and I opted to see this one at cinema nearest to our home as we could reach there by walking. We had difficulty in going to our favorite cinema with Dolby Atmos due to the vehicle restriction regulation in place in Jakarta for Asian Games purpose. Anyway, let's move on to the movie.
Brief Story Line
After the events in the original movie, Robert McCall (Denzel Washington - The Magnificent Seven, Training Day etc) now worked as an online transportation driver as his cover job while assisting people in desperate need, such as a woman whose daughter was kidnapped and so on. He was still in contact and got some help & information from his friend/former boss Susan (Melissa Leo - The Fighter, Louie TV series etc). They still got together with Susan's husband Brian (Bill Pullman - Independence Day and its sequel etc) in few occasions. Living in a small apartment, McCall befriended with few of the tenants and got quite close to a young high school student named Miles (Ashton Sanders - Moonlight).
Meanwhile a murder which happened in Brussels caught the eyes of the DIA, who sent its operative Dave York (Pedro Pascal - Kingsman: The Golden Circle, Narcos TV series etc) to investigate. Together with Susan, they seemed to find some irregularities which led to various complications. When the case became quite personal for McCall, he decided to take matters in his own hands despite the danger it would bring to him and his friends.
End of Brief Story Line
I have mentioned above that I saw the first movie and I enjoyed that one. I remembered that it was a rather slow burner, with occasional very brief fights but the finale scene was totally awesome. Compared to this sequel which was also directed by the same director Antoine Fuqua (whose previous works included some cool action movies such as Shooter, King Arthur, Olympus Has Fallen etc), it still had the same formula. There were a lot of drama, and the fight scenes were always very brief, showing how dangerous & good fighting skill Denzel had. The finale fight scene here may not be as violent as the original movie, but it was done stylishly in an unusual environment with difficult condition.
One thing that I personally thought not really satisfying might have been the main case as despite bringing up a bit of historical background of McCall character, it also felt a bit less straight forward and a bit more complicated. Even the supposed twist did not give me a surprise either (although to be fair I might have seen too many movies and made me able to guess such surprise). But as an action movie thriller, this one did not disappoint. There were times when my wife and I were feeling very tense, especially the scene in McCall's apartment towards the finale. Oh the drama moments took quite a lot of portion in here, with one or two minor characters given touching moments (which was quite emotional and also affected my wife). One supporting character that was quite interesting here was Miles (played nicely by Ashton Sanders). Whenever he appeared, he seemed to bring a bit of brightness in an otherwise very dark tone to the movie.
As I said earlier, the fight scenes in here were usually very brief, but they were always very violent. Even the guy sitting next to me last night was a bit restless when he saw the violent scenes. No wonder it got an R rating. The sound effects of the movie was awesome (which said a lot, considering we saw this without the Dolby Atmos sound system). The special effects in the finale was quite good. But certainly the main attraction here was how cool Denzel Washington in portraying this character.
Overall, I think this movie was pretty awesome in term of the story, and the character was also quite interesting. It was not the type of full action movie and for some maybe it's a bit too long (2 hours duration) but it was enjoyable for me and my wife. The action sequence was very good even if they were rather brief and it also had a unique and entertaining climax fight scene. It would probably be better if you have seen the first movie to get to know better of McCall's character. However, I do not think it had a lot of connections with the original to make us having difficulty understanding this movie. There was no middle or post end credit scene here. Even though we were very late in getting the chance to see this, I personally felt it was quite well worth to wait.
Happy watching!
Mike's movie moments rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
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