The Art Of Death

I have generally never cared for remakes.  I never have, and I never will.  For every remake that gets made, there is one less original story that gets told.  However, there are a handful of remakes that I have seen that I personally think are quite good.  The 2004 film Man on Fire is one of them.

Man on Fire is the story of an assassin who seeks revenge upon those kidnapped a girl he was hired to protect.  Man on Fire is one of my favorite films from one of my favorite directors in Tony Scott.      Personally, I think this film is extraordinary.  This is an expertly crafted film, from the acting, to the action, to the details in the writing.  There are a couple issues I would like to address.  First: why are there occasional English subtitles?  I am American, therefore I understand what the people are saying.  Also, at the end of the movie John Creasy (Denzel Washington) gives himself up to rescue Lupita (Dakota Fanning).  Why does this happen?  The deal Creasy makes with "The Voice" is a life for a life.  It is not a life for two lives.  Plus, Creasy is just about dead at the end of the movie anyway.  It is not as if the bad guys can kill him again.  That decision makes no sense to me.  However, these couple of details do not at all detract from this epic, emotional, action-packed story.

Denzel Washington is one of my favorite actors, and is one of the reasons I got into movies in the first place.  In Man on Fire, he plays John Creasy.  Creasy is a drunk who has a very dark past, but it is his relationship that he forms with Lupita that rescues him from being depressed and wanting to die.  When Lupita gets kidnapped, Creasy unleashes his violent fury upon the city to get to the ones responsible.  I love characters like John Creasy who have a dark side that they are not necessarily proud of, but then are forced to show and use it through a series of circumstances.  This is one of my favorite Denzel Washington roles.  His relationship with Luptia grows over time, and she helps him see the better parts of himself.  This, I truly believe, is why Creasy stops at nothing to exact revenge (even after being shot three times).  Finding her kidnapper is literally killing him, but he does not care.  He is good at what he does, and he knows it.  He is cold, confident, and the ways in which he punishes his victims are so beautifully gruesome.  This is very much an emotional journey for Creasy, and Denzel Washington gives one of his finest performances as this character.

Tony Scott was one of my favorite directors, and he was truly under-rated and under-appreciated in his time.  He is the director of Man on Fire, and it is one of his best films.  His trademark flashy cuts are used to perfection to signify the passage of time.  The action is beautifully shot, and Scott, as I mentioned before, also makes this a very emotional movie.  The dialogue scenes, particularly between Washington and Fanning, are so well done that by the end of the movie you might be in tears because of the journey this movie takes you on.

I absolutely love Man on Fire.  It is such a shame that Tony Scott is no longer with us because there are many film fans out there who loved his movies.  If you love action movies and if you are a fan of Denzel Washington, I highly recommend watching it.