However much separates these two movies — story, craft, technique, production context, the larger world, you name it — they both hinge on a familiar American defender-savior: the resolute, physically imposing, quite possibly deranged solitary older man who sets wrongs right. In each film, the hero roughly takes a younger, less-hardened man under his wing, giving the audience a surrogate, someone to cling to when things or the avenger get too weird or uncomfortably rough. That role here is played with glimmers of feeling by Ashton Sanders, the memorably delicate teenage protagonist of “Moonlight.” In “The Equalizer 2,” Mr. Sanders plays Miles, a student and would-be artist who’s started to stray and who lives in the same homey Boston apartment complex as Mr. Washington’s character, Robert McCall. To his neighbors, McCall surely seems a good neighbor: reserved, helpful, friendly without being pushy. He watches over the building with a sharp eye — Mr. Fuqua has a serious ocular thing going on in this movie — and a secret arsenal. He draws from his stash now and again when he’s not quietly reading in his monastic apartment or driving for Lyft, picking up souls who, with one unruly exception, he benevolently observes in the rearview mirror. Written by Richard Wenk (his name can be found on some of Mr. Washington’s earlier sanguineous vehicles), “The Equalizer 2” has a whole lot going on. Mostly, it has McCall and the characters who rotate around his divine radiance, notably Miles, who’s in need of a drastic course correction. (A believer in tough love, McCall gives him a stern talking-to delivered at gunpoint and a copy of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s book “Between the World and Me.”) There’s also Sam (Orson Bean), a shameless cliché in need of rescue and a rewrite, and Susan (an effective Melissa Leo), McCall’s only friend and a retired Central Intelligence Agency officer who still takes care of classified business. The story skips from Turkey to Boston and elsewhere as McCall smoothly juggles crises, regularly pausing to break someone’s bones. Mr. Fuqua handles all this with his customary visual flamboyance, using different speeds, off-kilter angles and ophthalmological close-ups of McCall’s eyes to convey his near-mystical abilities. Mr. Washington is especially strong when he trusts his director, as he did with Tony Scott and does with Mr. Fuqua. Like all great actors, Mr. Washington commits to the performance, but every so often he also breathes fire, imbuing a scene with such shocking ferocity and bone-deep moral certitude that everything else falls blissfully away.<doc-sep>Denzel Washington has amassed more than 50 acting credits in four decades in the business. Antoine Fuqua has been a director for 20 years. Neither has ever done a sequel. Until now. “The Equalizer 2" broke the all-originals, all-the-time streak for both men, who’ve collaborated on three previous films, including Washington’s Oscar-winning “Training Day.” And to see this brooding, effective, violent, action melodrama is to understand why. It starts with the character Washington plays and what the actor brings to it, but it extends to the nature of the plot and story created by the veteran Richard Wenk, who also wrote the first “Equalizer” inspired by the 1980s TV show. Robert McCall (Washington) presents himself to all and sundry as a modest, cap-wearing Boston Lyft driver given to solitude and the reading of books, with authors such as Ta-Nehisi Coates and Marcel Proust getting pride of place. But the reality of his life is considerably different. Advertisement A onetime shadowy government agent with unmatched combat skills, McCall has taken advantage of the fact that his former bosses think he’s dead to do a very particular kind of good in the world. The loneliest and deadliest of lone wolf vigilantes, McCall is an avenger who hides his lethal abilities under that bookworm demeanor, someone who doesn’t want to be thanked or even known for the wrongs he’s righted. When someone uses the phrase “the wrath of God,” they might as well be talking about him. Indisputably one of America’s best actors, Washington clearly enjoyed playing this character in the first “Equalizer,” but it’s a mark of his dedication to craft that he’s not been content with leaving well enough alone. Instead, the actor has thrown himself more intensely into the role, using his superb gravitas and credibility to elevate and enlarge the character while still allowing McCall to be human enough for us to worry about his safety, death-dealing skills notwithstanding. In this he’s helped by the nature of Wenk’s plot, which deals with questions of the morality of violence and has the shrewd idea of making the battles that McCall fights personal in a way they have not been before. Robert McCall (Denzel Washington) and Dave York (Pedro Pascal) are reunited in “The Equalizer 2.” (Glen Wilson / Sony) As was the case with the first film, “Equalizer 2" is in no hurry to get to the heart of the matter. The story’s essence reveals itself gradually as the film takes time to bring those new to the character up to speed on who McCall is and what he can do. The opening sequence takes place out of the country, on a train in rural Turkey where McCall, disguised as an imam complete with luxuriant beard, teaches a miscreant a lesson after imparting a bit of personal philosophy: “There are two kinds of pain in the world. Pain that hurts and pain that alters.” Point taken. Advertisement In addition to warrior skills that are off the charts, McCall has an ability to see a particular situation before it unfolds, a sixth sense of how things will go down. As filmmaker Fuqua has accurately said, “Violence is a comfort zone for him.” Back in Boston, though he’s usually zealous about keeping to himself, McCall takes an interest in one of the tenants in his building, a young high school student with artistic aspirations named Miles (Ashton Sanders, memorable in the Oscar-winning “Moonlight”). McCall is also visited by an old friend from the first movie. That would be Susan Plummer (the always expert Melissa Leo), a colleague from McCall’s covert days and the only person, aside from her husband, Brian (Bill Pullman), who knows he is alive. Still active in intelligence circles, Susan goes off to Brussels with colleague Dave York (an excellent Pedro Pascal) to investigate a death that may or may not be suspicious. Advertisement Always careful to not be hemmed in and compromised by human connections, McCall finds that, in ways that are separate and linked, both Susan and Miles are in terrible jeopardy. How he responds is memorable, and, in the case of Miles, leads to a moment in a crack house hallway that provides both actors with a scene that surprises with its intensity and power. When it comes to action sequences, Fuqua is as experienced as they come, and his work here, while strong enough to earn an R rating for “brutal violence throughout,” never lingers on the carnage. Instead, it presents violence in intense bursts so crisply edited (by Oscar winner Conrad Buff) they almost feel subliminal. The director is also a fine creator of tension, insisting that the acting be low-key and, along with stunt coordinator Jeff Dashnaw, special effects coordinator Jeremy Hays and visual effects supervisor Sean Devereaux, orchestrating a corker of a finale during a Category 5 hurricane. Advertisement Not everything in “Equalizer 2" is successful, including a subplot about a Yiddish-speaking Holocaust survivor played by Orson Bean that misses the mark. But the film is effective where it needs to be, and if there is an “Equalizer 3,” in line to see it is where you’ll find me. --------------- ‘The Equalizer 2' Rating: R, for brutal violence throughout, language and some drug content Advertisement Running time: 2 hours Playing: In general release kenneth.turan@latimes.com @KennethTuran<doc-sep>
(CNN) — A sequel to a movie based on a TV show is basically the ultimate commentary on Hollywood’s infatuation with presold titles, but at least “The Equalizer 2” doesn’t harbor many pretentions about its marching orders. Anchored by Denzel Washington’s steely presence, it’s a spare, brutal vigilante exercise, with an element of righteous revenge mixed into the balance. Although there’s a larger plot woven into the movie that (eventually) unfolds, this version of the 1980s series – following the 2014 debut – actually works best when it’s behaving more like a TV show, featuring smaller moments that underscore how Robert McCall behaves as a sort of guardian angel, albeit a particularly violent one. Working as a Lyft driver (an especially good tie-in as product placement goes), McCall ferries people around the city, occasionally intervening as a shadowy dispenser of justice. Part Batman, part the Punisher, the former operative is quietly atoning for his past, one broken wrist and shattered kneecap at a time. McCall’s targets, of course, all appear much in need of a beating, and some of them are actually dumb enough to refer to the older gentleman as “Pops,” which, needless to say, does not end well for them. In the meantime, he takes an interest in his community, including the future of a young aspiring artist (“Moonlight’s” Ashton Sanders), who McCall is determined to save from heading down the wrong path. Still, all that amounts to a garnish to a more central conspiracy, one that involves McCall’s friend Susan (Melissa Leo, back for more) and his former partner (Pedro Pascal), drawing him back into a world of espionage he has sought to escape. Director Antoine Fuqua (again working with Washington and writer Richard Wenk) weaves in some understated humor, but “The Equalizer” doesn’t have much more on its mind than creating tension while giving Washington a chance to strut his stuff. Again, he brings weary gravity to a role described as his first sequel but that’s only a step or so removed from his work in “Man on Fire” (itself, incidentally, a remake). The original conceit of the TV show was a veteran agent determined to help those in need – with a new beneficiary each week – and expanding that episodic formula to a movie inevitably adds an element of bloat to the proceedings. As for quibbling about the old-style vigilante tactics, the movie’s fantastical qualities mitigate its real-world significance. That said, having Washington’s character recommend a Ta-Nehisi Coates book to his youthful charge feels like reaching for a touch of relevance that the filmmakers don’t entirely earn. Ultimately, “The Equalizer’s” theatrical incarnation offers a reminder that the movies have always been fascinated with modern-day cowboys who clean up new frontiers, whether that’s Dirty Harry or, more recently, Liam Neeson’s “Taken” trilogy. Washington’s McCall falls squarely into that basket. And while his latest adventure won’t necessarily make anyone’s day, in terms of the cathartic thrills associated with watching a good guy with a gun (and various other weapons) dispatch a whole lot of bad guys, “Equalizer 2” essentially gets the job done. “The Equalizer 2” premieres July 20 in the U.S. It’s rated R.