The serious, measured atmosphere of “Harry Brown” suggests the film would prefer not to be taken as a “Death Wish” update. So we won’t.
As a study of the vigilante impulse, however, it’s a little difficult to tell exactly how this movie wants to be taken, except as a portrait of urban hell.
The title character is played by Michael Caine, an actor who knows just how to underplay a role until the precise moment when he needs to turn up the steam. Harry lives in a dismal low-rent housing project in London, a place terrorized by a roving gang of drug-peddling punks.
Traumatized by his wife’s death and concerned about the community’s bad treatment of his only friend, Harry stirs from his despair. In a long sequence, he goes to the hideout of a drug-dealer/gun-seller, determined to pick up a firearm for himself.
Although Harry is a longtime chess player, and thus ought to know about the value of thinking many steps ahead, his own planning — for whatever vigilante justice he intends — is wobbly.
In most cases, he gets himself into a situation where the gun proves handy but the exit strategy must be improvised.
A sympathetic but dogged police officer (Emily Mortimer) begins asking Harry questions, an investigation that leads to virtually no surprises or unexpected turns. Except for the details, the movie heads to the destination it was always pointed toward.
The most distinctive thing director Daniel Barber gets going is the movie’s design. Virtually every space is darkly lit and crumbling; this is life as a corner of Dante’s Inferno, with no ray of sunlight in sight.
All of which makes for a bleak viewing experience, especially when the film doesn’t encourage a sense of catharsis associated with Harry’s vigilante tendencies. That’s a civilized approach, but a somewhat flat experience.
If “Harry Brown” had come out before Clint Eastwood’s “Gran Torino,” perhaps it would arrive with more punch. But “Gran Torino” worked an intriguing variation on the vigilante formula (in some ways it was Eastwood’s rebuke to the simple revenge plots of his early career), and this film suffers by comparison.
Which leaves us to appreciate Michael Caine — easy enough to do. The veteran actor resists the temptation to go over the top and his performance stays professional throughout. Which I suppose is another way “Harry Brown” leaves you wanting more.
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