Death Wish V: The Face of Fear Review

Paul Kersey had the worst damn luck of perhaps any movie character in history. I would say tied with John McLane, but all McLane had to worry about was getting trapped in the occasional building.

Kersey repeatedly has loved ones mowed down in gruesome life scarring ways. At the time of this movie he is officially a grandpa aged gentleman looking, once again to settle down with his girlfriend, but of course said girlfriend winds up getting attacked, this time by local mobsters and left with permanent disfiguring scars.

Said mobsters must have figured that Kersey, now qualified for AARP would be less of a hassle now, but they were sadly, sadly mistaken as grandpa badass proceeds to take these goons out to the woodshed to tear them a new asshole.

Bronson at this point was clearly tired of the role. There are reports that Bronson argued for many re-writes to have the character written as more human and less of a cartoon violence machine, but by this point, the toothpaste was too far removed from the tube, and trying to ground a series like this was an exercise in futility, and only served to make this final installment perhaps the most boring of the entire series.

The only reason to see this is if you just absolutely need a fix of Bronson being the badass that only he could be.

There are some cool set pieces here and there, and a cool moment involving a pool of acid, but on the whole this is just a deflated and disinterested mess.

Death Wish V gets a one out of five: BAD.