Jordan is no stranger to mainstream moviemaking, but even his unfairly disparaged In Dreams had a personality identifiable as his own. She picks his brain under the auspices of conducting interviews, and he, ever the detective, fires off his own questions.It hurts to see Neil Jordan’s name attached to something as deplorable as The Brave One. And wanting to know what he knows, she plays journalist.

Then, Mercer is coincidentally put on her string of killings. Words are Erica’s thing, remember? Having been assigned to her mugging case, the two strike up a bond. Because she’s right, I probably will remain a person who constantly scans the vicinity the moment I feel vulnerable.Ĭircling back to the text, though… The dialogue is expertly constructed and delivered, chiefly the scenes featuring Erica and Detective Mercer (Terrence Howard). I do, however, agree with her, “There is no going back, to that other person, that other place,” line. Granted, her attack was much worse - my boyfriend is alive, and I was never hospitalized - but I find that, on a textual level, melodramatic. More From 2007 in Film: OnceĮrica says you become “a stranger” when something traumatic happens to you. Erica’s voice is her livelihood, so the tool her attackers temporarily disarm her of (her initial, silent, return to the mic is downright painful) also becomes a weapon once her trepidation turns into focused anger. Her physical presence shifts over time to reflect Erica’s growing gravitas, but perhaps Foster’s keenest choice is the incremental changes in her voice. It’s naturalistic without sacrificing viscerality. Her cerebral technique really works here, playing a calm radio personality continually nudged into unforgiving killer territory. Now, I do and feel things that I hadn’t before: cross the street when a man approaches in the opposite direction, step aside and turn when I hear someone nearing me from behind, keep the scissors within arm’s reach when I’m alone at work with an intimidating customer… Foster tenderly shows us this delicate stage in Erica’s journey, as she believably progresses into a sidewalk warrior.įoster is a highly intelligent actor. I don’t think I’m going to become a caped crusader anytime soon. To focus on them, or for Jordan to flesh them out in any way, would distract from Erica’s gradual transformation. They’re two-dimensional caricatures - stand-ins for the concept of rampant urban criminality, plot devices put in place to deepen Erica’s compulsion to take justice into her own hands. The men Erica kills as the story plays out don’t really matter, not as people. Her terror morphs into furor, and Erica becomes an avenging angel for the powerless. In a hold-up situation, she shoots her first perpetrator dead out of necessity (he’d have shot her otherwise), and she feels… mostly good about it. Like an Agatha Christie sleuth, Erica keeps ending up amid the perilous circumstances of others.

More From 2007 in Film: Lars and the Real Girl But I haven’t - and I won’t - because it would only complicate matters, and only come in handy anyhow if I were to be carrying while finding myself in another terrible predicament. She does what so many people have told me ever since that I ought to do. In The Brave One, Foster’s Erica Bain obtains a gun, for defense, almost as soon as she’s back on her feet. This happened on our street, only a block from home, the Friday between Christmas and New Year’s. One guy with a pistol took our phones, keys, and wallets. Walking home one unseasonably warm evening from a neighborhood ramen restaurant, my boyfriend and I were robbed at gunpoint. I’d been a fan of Jordan’s Interview with the Vampire and In Dreams (don’t me) and Foster’s performances in The Silence of the Lambs and Panic Room, so this team-up was a perfect match for fourteen-year-old me.Ĭut to December 2018. Prior to my re-watch for this article series, I hadn’t seen The Brave One since it was in cinemas nearly twelve years ago.

The brave one 1957 film