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DEATH WISH II
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“Death Wish” may have made the films,
but Death Wish 2 cemented them in popular culture. Death Wish 2 also
continues the trend of almost every woman in a Charles Bronson movie
coming to an untimely end. If you’re a girlfriend or female family
member in one of Bronson’s films, there is probably no way you are
going to reach the end credits intact. This is practically scripture
by now. Death Wish 2 tries to top the gang rape of Bronson’s
daughter and rape and murder of his wife from the first movie with
the rape and murder of his daughter and maid. After defiling the
housekeeper, this new band of thugs knocks the extremely unlucky
Bronson unconscious and his daughter, rendered mute and almost
child-like after the events of the first movie, is kidnapped. After
being raped in the thug’ s hideout she jumps from a window to escape
and ends up impaled The daughter Carol, played by Robin Sherwood who was also in 1979’s supremely creepy killer mannequin movie “Tourist Trap,” has to be the most unlucky woman in movie history, not only being savaged repeatedly in the first movie, but to have it happen yet again and wind up dangling from an iron fence. Talk about bad karma. The score is an amazing bit of music done by Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, which almost literally leaps out of your speakers in a prolonged growl. Never before has a musical sting ever been so appropriate. Also in the movie are James Fransiosa, best known from Dario Argento’s “Tenebrae” as a blink and you’ll miss it role as City Commissioner. Vincent Gardenia (returning from “Death Wish”) has a wasted role where he (in a useless subplot) tries to track Bronson down only to die half way through the movie during a shoot out.
Hence a remarkable scene: when then up and coming actor Laurence Fishbourne (continuing the trend of unknown actors who would eventually go on to starring roles such as Jeff Goldblum who was in the first “Death Wish”) tries to hide behind his ultra 80’s ghetto blaster, Bronson blasts the punk through the radio in what is probably the movie’s stand out death. It’s not to say that the death scenes are stale when compared to what was being seen at the time, but with a couple of decades worth of repeated viewings you can see the formula that was being followed even back then. Bronson’s acting, while well done and reputation-sealing in the action scenes, is downright wooden when he tries to show any kind of emotion. When Bronson’s daughter is unveiled at the morgue Bronson gazes with seemingly disinterest at her as if he was looking at an egg that has just rolled off his kitchen counter and onto the floor. Let’s face it, no one is watching any Charles Bronson movie for his caliber of acting; we watch to see him do what he does best which is look rugged and give it to the bad guys.
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Charles Bronson is back as semi-reluctant vigilante Paul Kersey in Death
Wish 2, the first sequel to “Death Wish.” After the events of the first
movie, all Bronson wants to do is move on with his life and take care of
his traumatized daughter. After running into a quintet of street toughs,
Bronson is roughed up and his wallet is stolen. Refusing to fight after
his murder spree in “Death Wish,” Bronson walks away but the gang has
other ideas and, using Bronson’s 
Director Winner really pushes the misogynistic sexual violence
towards the female characters in this one, seemingly trying to
surpass what happened in the first film. The events here are so
brutal and mean that they almost fall into a sort of parody of
themselves, but nevertheless are incredibly nasty. More thought
seems to go into pushing the sexual violence angle than the actual
revenge Bronson dishes out. When Bronson does emerge as a killing
machine in this movie, it is so standard and handled without any
kind of flair that the scenes could almost be copies of events in
the first film. As further installments would come out, Bronson
would be more creative with his methods, using such things as
homemade bombs and even rocket launchers to dispatch the urban bad
guys to that great ghetto in the sky. Here, he’s content to track
them down and break out his trusty .38 to finish them off.
Not perfect by any means, Death Wish 2 is a movie that quite possibly
passes its predecessor in terms of reputation and helped to carry on a
series of films that more than likely lasted longer than most critics
would have ever even imagined. Bronson is his usual dependable tough guy
here and never fails to disappoint in what his fans are looking for.
Pushing the envelope much further than it is meant to go, Death Wish 2
is an enjoyable, if filthy, piece of pure exploitation which takes the
whole “average man pushed beyond his limits” and throws it out the
window in favor of an overdrive of sexual depravity and revenge
melodrama. The movie delivers exactly what it promises and you know what
you are in store for the moment it starts.