Death Wish II (1982)

First His Wife. Now His Daughter. It's Time To Even The Score!

Death Wish II

Welcome to Charles Bronson Week.  He was in something like 80 movies so I'll try to cover at least a few of them this week.  The first is Death Wish II.

In the original Death Wish,  New York architect and "bleeding heart liberal" Paul Kersey (Bronson) is at work when a group of thugs including Jeff Goldblum breaks into his home, rapes his daughter and kills his wife.  Kersey takes it upon himself to rid the streets of these scumbags with a nickel-plated .32 Colt revolver, and becomes a hero of the people of New York.  Because the crime rate was so drastically reduced and because the people would be in an uproar if Kersey was killed or arrested, the police let him go under the condition that he leaves New York permanently.

Death Wish II is completely different.  It takes place in Los Angeles and this time when thugs, including Laurence Fishburne, break into Kersey's home, his maid gets raped and killed and his daughter gets kidnapped... and then also gets raped, and because she is insane from the trauma of being raped in the original Death Wish , she runs through a window and impales herself on a fence.

"No!  This jacket is for Members Only!"

Paul Kersey becomes the leathery face of vengeance once again.  He rents a room in a crappy downtown hotel and walks the streets at night hunting down those drug-addled rapists who killed his maid and daughter and any other punks who get in his way.

News of the Los Angeles vigilante reaches New York and the police there know that Paul Kersey is up to his old tricks.  They also know that if he's caught by the LAPD, it will come to light that the NYPD knew of Kersey, had him in custody and let him go when he was killing bad guys in New York.  To cover their asses they send a detective to stop him.  Now Kersey is both the hunter and the hunted.

I've said it before and I'll say it again (or write it in this case), every Charles Bronson movie is a good one just because Bronson is in it, and Death Wish II is no exception.  He was a man among men.

Violence Rating: 3.5 out of 5
Booby Rating: 3 or maybe a 3.5 out of 5

Get Death Wish 2 at TLACult.com