Death Wish 4: The Crackdown

We, Sid the Elf, are staying in the world of Death Wish for as long as we can. This week we took the wonderful ride that was Death Wish 4. The Death Wish series seems to get better as they go along. Its like chicks: 3 is better than 2 and 4 is better than 3. By the time Sid gets done watching 5 in a few weeks, he might wet himself from sheer amazement and amusement.

First, Sid would just like to get to know Bronson. If it's Sid he says "This guy's got it." The man made maybe THE defining guy movie of all-time: The Dirty Dozen, then he made the Death Wish Series which are just cinematic pieces of exquisite art. Now, Sid's sources tell him, the guy has his own island in the Caribeen. Sid can only imagine what goes on on that island. Probably a lot of strange, strange things because Bronson has got to be a wierd dude in real life.

But, Bronson makes some of the finest B around. And Death Wish 4 is no exception to this theory. Sid just knew this movie had a ton of upside potential when a future 90210 cast member(Nicky, Brandon's cute, spunky freshman girlfriend from the gang's senior year) appeared as Bronson's woman's daughter who just happens to be a druggie in the first 10 minutes of this movie. Actually, Sid knew this movie had tremendous upside potential when the chick in the opening scene performed a magic act by looking up and making guys appear. So, we had potential and Death Wish 4 delivered. It had all of our favorite elements of B.

Take special note of these occurances of extreme crappiness. First, when Bronson was in the black hitman's apartment, Bronson hit him with the barstool. Then the guy obviously jumps out of the window. But, there's a twist here: the window clearly breaks a full second before the guy gets there. That's the damn Rolls-Royce of b-ness is what it is. Then, in the shootout at the oilfield, Bronson shoots the guy whose head goes through the car window. Before Bronson shoots the guy, he has no facial hair, but by the time Bronson shoots him he has grown a full 80's/David Crosby mustache. That's amazing.

Oh yeah, the plot. It can really be summed up briefly. Bronson gets hired to take down two drug cartels by the head of another gang posing as a wealthy do-gooder. So Bronson takes down the drug rings by knocking off maybe 40 or 50 guys which is completely realistic, there definitely wouldn't be like 100 guys in each organization. Then Bronson had to take out the guy who posed as the rich guy. This was possibly the finest moment in the movie. Bronson shoots the guy with a grenade launcher from about 15 feet away. Watching the incredibly fake-looking dummy they used blow up was funny beyond belief. Yeah, there were even explosions in this movie. On top of that, you had the Bronson slow-motion punches that somehow knocked guys out for a good 15 minutes. This is a move that would later be perfected by the immortal Steven Segal. One of the guys Bronson takes out is a corrupt detective who's controlled by one of the drug rings. So, add that on to Bronson's problems. We still don't get this guy. By the fifth and final movie they should just have him walking around with a rain cloud floating over him while he wears a grim-reaper costume. Sid thinks, though, the thing that's the best...and the worst about this movie is the fact that it was different in the respect that when you're watching a movie you predict what's going to happen next in your head. Everyone does it. And usually, you're way off base, right? That's why you're not a screenwriter. But, not with Death Wish 4. Everytime Sid made a prediction in this one it came true. Example: one half Sid said to the other half Sid "Watch the cop just let Bronson go." And...exactly.

There were a couple other b veterans in this flick. We were very happy to see Soon-Tek Oh, the guy who famously played the evil POW camp ruler, Col. Yin in Missing in Action 2: The Beginning/Braddock: Missing in Action III. And the guy who played the drug lord posing as the wealthy newspaper owner was John P. Ryan who played Gen. Taylor in Delta Force 2 - Operation Stranglehold. As you already know if you're wise enough to be reading one of Sid's reviews, those are two guys from Chuck Norris movies. So, that made Sid think, "Why didn't Norris and Bronson ever do a movie together?" Then the answer became clear. If they did, the weight of toughness, cheesey 80's mustaches, and bad acting would make the world collapse on itself.

Death Wish 4 DVD

The main 'problem' with Death Wish 4 is that there's a bit of a plot and that makes it a little different from the last 3 Death Wishes, but heck it's still a good time!! Having killed all muggers and rapists, Kersey's now killing mobsters connected to crack! He just keeps working his way up the food chain! There's a plot twist in this one too! Does it get any better than the Death Wish series? NO WAY! Nobody wreaks vengeance like Bronson! Wait until you see Death Wish 5!

Recommended for Charles Bronson fans, and fans of the Death Wish movies.

Gunner January 2008

Death Wish 4 (1987.) The fourth film in the Death Wish series.

INTRODUCTION:
By 1987, everyone most likely thought the Death Wish series was done. Charles Bronson had starred in three controversial but still excellent films, and it's not likely anyone expected anything new from the series. But just the same, a fourth entry arrived in 1987.

OVERVIEW:
Death Wish 4 was released in 1987. The film stars Charles Bronson and co-stars numerous others.

BASIC PLOT:
Paul Kersey (Bronson) is back in Los Angeles, trying to get on with his life. Everything seems to be going fine. He has a wonderful woman who could be his future wife, and his future daughter-in-law thinks the world of him, and even helps out at his architecture firm. Unfortunately, this is Paul Kersey's life, so you know things won't stay smooth for long. His future daughter-in-law dies of a cocaine overdose, prompting his wife to go undercover and find out what she can about the growing drug trade. Meanwhile, a rich newspaper mogul who also holds a grudge against the drug trade recruits Kersey to hunt down and kill the high-ranking men in both major drug organizations.

FILM OPINIONS:
This is a good movie but definitely a step down from the classic "trilogy" that came earlier. The simple fact is, even in 1987, there were just too many "war on drugs" films out there already. But fortunately, this is still distinctly Death Wish. The plot is paper-thin, but let's be realistic - we don't watch these movies for their storylines, we watch them to see Charles Bronson wasting punks. And you do get plenty of that here. If you want to see the continuing Paul Kersey saga, give this one a viewing. It's no masterpiece, but it's still a solid entry in the series.

DVD:
The Death Wish films got screwed for their DVD releases. Not only are all the films cropped and fullscreen, but most of them feature scenes that have been EDITED. This is most noticable in the rape scenes in the first and second film. For the first two films, import the Region 4 DVD that combines the first two films. For 3 and 4, import the Region 2 European DVDs. Or if you can find it, get the import Vigilante Collection that has all five films in widescreen. Just be sure you have a multi-region player first!

OVERALL:
Overall I recommend this film, but only if you're already a fan of the series and want to see how things play out for Kersey. Watch it if you're a fan, but any Death Wish newbie should start at the beginning.

Plenty of people here have summarized what the film is about, so I won't. I'll try to add something original to the mix, so forgive me if I don't confine myself to describing the film's plot. The popularity of this film cannot be explained without a wider understanding of cultural conditions and sentiments at the time of its release. Death Wish was a bombshell, as it gave voice to how hundreds of thousands of people were feeling, sentiments people felt and may not have publicly expressed for fear of backlash from the PC movement. In a few sentences, the cultural circumstance referred to was a growing discontent with what was growingly considered to be misguided attempts to solve society's "problems." In the sixties the government gave itself the responsibility to "fix" many problems, from teenage pregnancy to poverty to drug use to discrimination to crime, with social "programs," judicial activism and new legislation. Ironically, ALL of these problems were already rapidly decreasing in the early sixties. Crime was HALF what it was in 1930, even if you don't control for the increase in the population!! Poverty was lessening each and every year. What happened after the social programs of the late sixties and the generation of the welfare state? Well, the crime rate literally exploded. So did teenage pregnancy. Poverty quadrupled. Another thing that happened was the rewriting of law to lessen the punishment of criminals to the result that even the criminals that were arrested and successfully prosecuted often ended right back out on the street in a matter of months to commit even more crimes. People were sick and tired of this crap. Some filmmakers new it, and tapped into this sentiment with wildly popular films like Death Wish, The Stone Killer, and Dirty Harry. An entire genre of "vendetta/revenge/let's take out the human garbage" films was born, and Charles Bronson, after Death Wish, was for a decade the most popular actor in the world. Bronson's presence is undeniable. The seventies threw up some wonderfully gritty films drenched in utter realism, and the Death Wish films are some of the greatest of all time. Death Wish 4 isn't the greatest in the series, but it's still better than most of the crap that passes for action films today.

The Death Wish series is an interesting collection of films, featuring revenge ("Death Wish 2", "Death Wish 5") and vigilante ("Death Wish", "Death Wish 3", "Death Wish 4") tales and starring Charles Bronson as "The Vigilante" Paul Kersey. The first three films in the series were surreal, hyped-out urban fever dreams with the first two being believable and serious (and with DW3 beginning seriously and slowly turning into an all-out cartoon culminating in an all-out street war with chainguns, rocket launchers, Home Alone-esque booby traps, and entire buildings exploding like a war zone). The first three films featured Bronson fighting various thugs, rapists, muggers, and "creeps". In "Death Wish 4", he abandons the street war and starts dismantling white collar criminal drug empires.

"Death Wish 4" takes a different direction than the first three by amping up the plot and easing back on the sleazy feel that permeated through the original Michael Winner-directed trilogy. Once again Bronson is propelled to vigilante action when a loved one dies, but this time the circumstances are different. Instead of a direct rape and/or murder, it's drugs that are the killer this time, so instead of attacking lowlifes, Bronson sets to work against the drug kingpins ruling the trade in LA as a favor to Nathan White (in a performance that goes from distinguished and calm in the beginning to hilariously over-the-top in the finale....those who have seen this know what I mean). It shouldn't be spoiling anything to say that, more or less, Bronson accomplishes his goal in no time at all, but to his chagrin White is more than what he seems.... The directing of J. Lee Thompson (Guns of Navarone, Cape Fear) gets the job done and the musical score is excellent (some have complained that the excellent Jimmy Page score featured in "Death Wish 2" and "Death Wish 3" is missing, but it seems fitting as Page's score had a more discordant and twisted feel that meshed well with the films' atmospheres, whereas almost all of that scummy atmosphere is gone in "Death Wish 4").

This is an excellent 80s actioner and a definate improvement over "Death Wish 3". Bronson does what he does best and John P. Ryan gives a hilarious and memorable performance ("I warned you.....I'd kill her!!). Fans of Bronson and these types of movies should be pleased.