It’s a known fact that the current legal system is flawed, and Law Abiding Citizen aims to take on those flaws. The only thing more horrific to Clyde Shelton (Gerard Butler) than watching is wife and daughter be murdered was watching the man who was responsible for their deaths receive leniency from the counts in exchange for a plea bargain. His lawyer (Jamie Foxx), afraid of losing his win/loss trail ratio tries to console him by making him understand that without the plea deal there was a change the murderer could have walked. Shelton was not easily consoled.
After years of takes years of careful planning, Shelton implements a diabolical plan aimed not only at punishing the individuals responsible for he’s family’s deaths, but also the people within the legal system that let them get off with a slap on the wrist. The poetic irony is in that he uses the very same loopholes of the legal system to keep his own name in the clear. And no this isn’t ruining the ending for anyone.
Law Abiding Citizen is a terrific movie. It starts off a little slow — I was beginning to expect CSI meets Double Jeopardy — but quickly picks up the pace and becomes a movie where you want to root for the bad guy. Both Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler play their respective roles well, and do seem to feed off each other in their shared camera time.
If there was anything I could change about the movie (without giving away any plot spoilers) it would be the ending. Compared to the rest of the well thought-out and acted parts of the film, it felt a little rushed and wasn’t exactly the ending I was hoping for. That disappointment aside, I’ll give it a strong 7/10.
February 9, 2010
Media, Thoughts