Law Abiding Citizen

Law Abiding Citizen is a film that for me at least, can only be described as a guilty pleasure. While totally preposterous and manipulative, it still works well within the context of the world it creates. Gerard Butler is Clyde Shelton, who witnesses the murder of his wife and daughter at the film's outset. Jamie Foxx is Nick Rice, a hotshot ADA, who makes a deal with one of the two home invaders responsible, in order to guarantee a conviction and a death sentence for at least one of them. This really annoys Clyde, to say the least, especially since Nick makes the deal with the more guilty of the two, who stands to only get a few years in jail. Nick feels it's the best he can do given the evidence, but, he lets us know early on how concerned he is in preserving his 96% conviction rate. The film quickly jumps ten years ahead to the scheduled execution of the unlucky perpetrator, which is when Clyde's revenge plans move into high gear. The film tries to make a serious commentary on our nation's justice system, which gets lost somewhat in the midst of stuff blowing up "real good". Clyde quickly loses most of the sympathy he had after his "torture-porn" dispatch of his family's killer. He loses the rest when he goes after everyone else. This film works quite well as a cat-mouse type thriller, and you'll spend much of it wondering how Clyde is effectuating his plans, since he's in prison for a good portion of the film. The two leads both do a solid job in roles that are not tremendously demanding, and make for an entertaining "popcorn" flick.

Rating - 3 Stars