Film Review: THE EQUALIZER 2

Genre: Action, Thriller
Rating: 3/5
123 minutes
Director: Antoine Fuqua

There would have apparently  been a strong enough reason for Denzel Washington to have assented to do his first ever sequel — four years after ‘The Equalizer’ which was based upon the TV series   of the 80s. He reprises his role of Robert McCall, a retired CIA agent. He has a job driving a Lyft cab, transporting people in general and aiding the less fortunate in particular.
The film opens with McCall rushing off to Istanbul, and fighting a gang of Russians on the Istanbul Express. That sets the tone for the rest of the couple of hours where he also takes it upon himself to return to an apartment where a girl had been brutally violated and had to be taken to hospital. Back at the apartment, he takes on the group of white-collared thugs who were responsible for the attack. He also assumes responsibility for tracing a Holocaust survivor who had been separated from her brother during the war.
In short, Washington plays the good Samaritan, who also has to find the reason behind the death of his ex-colleague and best friend Susan Plummer (Melisa Leo, who also reprises her role after four years).
This last incident takes up the latter half of the film where, while investigating a case in Brussels, he comes into contact with another ex-colleague Dave York (Pedro Pascal).
Director Antoine Fuqua (The Magnificent Seven, Olympus Has Fallen) has incorporated sufficient emotional links to accompany the scores of action scenes in the film, alongwith brief backstories. The more poignant scenes are the ones with Ashton Sanders, who plays Miles Whittaker, a talented Afro-American artist who’s been dragged into bad company. After rescuing him, he tells him “I don’t want to hear that the white man won’t give me any chances” perhaps echoing his own gratitude for what Hollywood has bestowed upon him.
Washington is consummate in his role of an ex-agent who feels morally obligated to right the wrongs — to people known and unknown. It’s well worth a watch, and will particularly appeal to those interested in the action genre.