The Brave One

Pictures of The Brave One

Information about The Brave One

The Brave One is a crime-drama/psychological thriller movie released in 2007 (5 years ago), directed by Neil Jordan, produced by Joel Silver, and starring Jodie Foster. It was released in the United States on sep. 14, 2007 (5 years ago). The movie earned Foster a Golden Globe nomination for leading actress in a drama.

Trailer

Plot

As radio show host Erica Bain (Jodie Foster (6 walls)) and her fiancé David (Naveen Andrews) are walking their dog at Stranger's Gate in New York's Central Park, they are attacked by three violent criminals. David dies from his injuries, but Erica survives. Unhappy with the police response and unable to deal with the psychological trauma caused by the assault, she attempts to purchase a gun. Unwilling to wait the month required to obtain a notice of approval, she acquires a Kahr K9 illegally, and is drawn into a world of vigilantism, killing random criminals and attempting to track down the thugs who killed David.

She strikes up a friendship with Detective Mercer (Terrence Howard), who is investigating the vigilante crimes and initially unaware of her role in the deaths, though over the course of the movie he comes to suspect her as the killer. At the climax of the film, she finds and confronts the thugs responsible for the murder of David. She kills two, finding and releasing her dog in the process and struggles with the third. Mercer arrives on the scene and has the thug go prone. Erica then retrieves her weapon and attempts to execute the thug. Mercer convinces Erica to lower the gun, but hands her his own in order for her to use a legal weapon to kill the last thug.

She does and Mercer then instructs her to shoot him in the shoulder so he can make up a story that the thugs were the ones who went on the vigilante killing spree, until he tracked them down, the gunshot being a result of the confrontation. He places Erica's gun in the last thug's dead hand and Erica leaves the scene, eventually being rejoined by her dog.

Cast

• Jodie Foster (6 walls) as Erica Bain
• Naveen Andrews as David Kirmani
• Terrence Howard as Detective Sean Mercer
• Nicky Katt as Detective Vitale
• Mary Steenburgen as Carol
• Jane Adams as Nicole
• Zoë Kravitz as Chloe
• Dana Eskelson as Sketch Artist

Release

This movie was released on DVD, Blu-Ray, and Hi-Def on Feb. 5, 2008 (4 years ago).

Reception

The movie received mixed reviews from critics. As of sep. 2008 (4 years ago) on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, 43 percent of critics gave the movie positive reviews, based on 175 reviews. On Metacritic, the movie had an average score of 56 out of 100, based on 33 reviews. Yahoo! movie ratings give it a "B-" from critics (14 reviews).

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the movie 3 1/2 stars (out of 4); saying Foster and Howard "are perfectly modulated in the kinds of scenes difficult for actors to play, where they both know more than they're saying, and they both know it." Ebert adds that comparing this movie with other revenge movies like Death Wish, "now here is Jodie Foster (6 walls), with a skilled co-star and director, to give us a movie that deals, really deals, with the issues involved."

Bill Gibron of PopMatters gave the movie a 9 out of 10 and called it one of the best movies of the year and said the movie is a "startling achievement" for Foster and Howard, saying Foster deserves another Oscar for her performance. Gibron wrote, "Calling it an estrogen-laced Taxi Driver or a female fashioned Death Wish misses the point." Gibron said "on its surface, it's a standard revenge flick...but it’s also much more than that. It’s an excuse for empowerment in a post 9/11, Red State / Blue State, Yellow Alert existence." Detroit Free Press critic Terry Lawson said the movie "is as bold a movie as we are likely to see this year, a movie that has more in common with 1970 (42 years ago) provocations like Straw Dogs and Taxi Driver than the simplicities of Death Wish or its recent progeny, Death Sentence." Lawson said the movie "dares to deal with the darkest human impulses in serious ways and would rather leave us disturbed than relieved or self-satisfied." Lawson said the movie is "masterfully photographed" by Philippe Rousellot and described Foster's performance as "shattering", "wrenching", and "fierce", and said the movie would have seemed preposterous if not for her "theatrical, deeply personal and compellingly physical" performance.

LA Weekly movie critic Scott Foundas wondered, "are we really witnessing something courageous (as the title suggests) or merely an arted-up exploitation flick—Death Wish with allusions to [D. H. Lawrence and Emily Dickinson—meant to cash in on audience feelings of fear and impotence in a violent society?" Foundas said "the premise smacks of high-concept contrivance", and "taken literally, almost everything that follows...so seriously strains credibility (even by the standards of the genre) as to enter the realm of the absurd. Taken on the level of a menacing urban fairy tale [like Mona Lisa or In the Cut]—it exudes a strange fascination." Scott Foundas wrote, "Arguably, Death Wish's Paul Kersey showed more inner conflict over the taking of another human life." and said The Brave One isn't the first female-vigilante movie, referring to Ms. 45. Foundas said the movie "hangs in suspended animation between the grindhouse and the art house" but that the movie "is more ambitious and alive—more worth writing, talking and thinking about—than anything that has tumbled off the Hollywood assembly line in a good long while." Justin Chang of Variety said "Foster’s pistol-packing turn as an avenging dark angel nearly sustains director Neil Jordan’s grim vigilante drama through a string of implausibilities and occasionally trite psychological framing devices, with deft support from Terrence Howard." Chang said that Foster's performance "takes on extra-textual dimensions" thanks to her previous performances as a rape victim in The Accused, a battered child prostitute in Taxi Driver, and an FBI agent in The Silence of the Lambs. Chang said the script relies on "tidy coincidences" and plot devices that seem "awfully convenient", but that "Foster delivers a performance of astonishing physical and psychological credibility." Chang said Neil Jordan "attempts to tap into post-9/11 anxieties and comment on the very American idea of righteous payback." Justin Chang also wrote that the film's dark and grungy ambience is just right thanks to Philippe Rousselot.

Awards received

The movie received one Golden Globe nomination when the nominees for the 65th Golden Globe Awards were announced by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. Foster was nominated for Best Performance By An Actress In A Motion picture (wallpaper) - Drama.

Source: en.wikipedia.org

External links to The Brave One

Add a new link

Linked to The Brave One

• Female Celebrities / Jodie Foster