KEVIN BACON: "Its good that you refer to it as a revenge movie because its not vigilantism, which is a totally different thing. In the original Death Wish film, he takes the law into his own hands and puts himself into situations where the bad guys are going to attack him so that he can attack them back. This is about a very specific guy going after this gang that harmed his family."
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Kevin Bacon as a vengeful father in Death Sentence (Fox)
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In Death Sentence , Bacon plays Nicholas Hume, a father who witnesses his sons brutal murder by a young man seeking initiation into a gang. When the courts offer no justice, Hume goes after the thug himself. That incurs the wrath of the other gang members.
CLIP BILLY: "Im coming for your family."
NICK: "You come after my family and I will cut out your guts. Do you hear me?"
BILLY: "You just bought a death sentence for the rest of your family."
The films director, James Wan, is best known for co-creating the horror franchise Saw . Bacon says the young filmmaker gave the character a physical dimension that was attractive.
KEVIN BACON: "Part of the reason why I wanted to do this, was because I did want to do something more physical. I had done a few very internalized roles in a row between Mystic River and The Woodsman. The thing I really liked about this was the combination: it is physical, it is kind of an ass kicking, part but its also a very emotional part, the emotional challenges to get into the head of this guy and try to portray someone whose family is threatened and whose life is spiraling out of control in a cycle of violence."
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Garrett Hedlund in Death Sentence (Fox)
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Defining a character through physicality is not new to Bacon. It goes back to the dancing he did in Footloose .
KEVIN BACON: "Its a lot of fun, I like to push myself to the edge, and physicality can trigger emotion and emotion can trigger physicality so those are two things that are very symbiotic in the way an actor performs."
Although Nick Hume gets to kick some butt, there are consequences to the violence.
KEVIN BACON: "He makes the mistake of answering violence with violence, and its that spiraling that he pretty much ends up beaten and alone and very little left to live for."
Bacon hopes the story will make us think about how far wed go if our families were threatened.
KEVIN BACON: "Its a question that you ask yourself but you dont really know the answer. I mean I dont believe in violence, Im a non-violent person yet my feelings for my wife and kids are deep. This is what the film is addressing."
CLIP FRIEND: "If anything like that happened to me, I think Id snap."
NICK: "Well, you dont know what youd do until it happens."
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John Goodman is memorable in Death Sentence (Fox)
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Death Sentence goes darker than most revenge tales in terms of suggesting that blood will only have blood, and that the good guys dont always win. Thats not the kind of reassuring message Hollywood usually likes to deliver but thats okay with Bacon.
KEVIN BACON: "Taking risks is exciting. Thats my version of jumping out of an airplane, to take risks with my work."
In the case of Death Sentence, the risk pays off for Bacon in terms of his performance but not for the film. As Humes life spirals out of control, so too does the film. Director James Wan may be good at the broad strokes of telling a story and in creating a gritty, violent style but he fails at the finer emotional details and at making the action play out believably.
In Macbeth , Shakespeare wrote, We but teach bloody instructions, which being taught return to plague the inventor. In those brief lines, Shakespeare eloquently sums up what Death Sentence tries to achieve in two hours of promising but ultimately clumsy storytelling.
Death Sentence is rated R for strong bloody brutal violence and pervasive language.
Companion viewing: Death Wish, Taxi Driver, The Brave One (coming out this month and offering a female vigilante)
