I saw the movie The Equalizer 3 and I really enjoyed it. The narrative and acting were excellent. What I really found interesting was that there were no indications of the race of the main character, Robert McCall. The village members only wanted to know if he was a good man and his enemies referred to him as an American. I would say that it was written this way because both the lead actor, Denzel Washington, and the director, Antoine Fuqua, are both Black and they are also producers of the film. This was refreshing for me and went against how I thought the movie would develop.
This movie was also consistent with other movies that try to answer the moral and philosophical question of what one person or group of people can do to stop violence inflicted on innocent people.
The philosopher Edmund Burke once said: “The only thing necessary for triumph [of evil] is for good men to do nothing.”
The philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre also said: “Man is condemned to be free, because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.” In addition, Sartre says, “in one sense choice is possible, but what is not possible is not to choose.” Sartre further states, “you’ve only got three choices in life: give up, give in or give it all you’ve got.” Finally, Sartre says that deciding a course of action, people will always choose freedom.
The two Death Wish movies released in 1974 with Charles Bronson and in 2018 with Bruce Willis presented a Sartrean answer to moral and philosophical questions: if evil is not stopped by law-abiding police or by non-corrupt politicians, how is it stopped? In both of these movies, both men wanted peace from evil and corruption. The Equalizer 3 continues this genre of cinematic narrative.
The main character, McCall, has the personality of a calm man who wants peace and has found it in this village. He was brought to this village to be cared for by a gentle village doctor who treated McCall for wounds he received in bringing forth justice for another man in a distant land.
He found this peaceful coastal village with its friendly people to his liking. But he was also a man of violence and he knew how to inflict death on those who had done evil to innocent people and who, in his mind, now deserve death at his hands.
He told one of the bad guys: “Whatever it is you and your friends do, please do it somewhere else.” That was his warning. He wanted peace for himself and for the people he now wanted to protect from gangster violence.
He reminded me of the vengeful and justice-seeking Batman. Although Washington’s main character is always dressed in Black, he is also dark skinned and a large imposing Black man. I would identify his character as Blackman. This now-named superhero, Blackman, had no inherent superpowers outside of his intelligence and his military/martial arts training and CIA background.
To me, the dialectic of Blackman is that of a man who seeks peace and will unleash his violence and his justice on those who deserve it and on those who threaten his peace.
Unlike Batman, who incapacitates wrongdoers so the police can arrest them and let the courts distribute justice, Blackman is the opposite. Blackman kills all his enemies and leaves their bodies for the police to collect. This is my kind of superhero.
He wants to get rid of the threat, eliminate the bad elements in his environment and the bad elements in the environments of those he wants to protect; because of him and his inherent ability to inflict violence and death, they will not have to deal with this evil anymore.
Blackman is also Sartrean: humans want to be free and will always choose freedom and that is a good thing. Hence, Blackman becomes a Black avenger for the protection of the poor and the weak from injustice and corruption.
It is my belief that there are a number of potential sequel narratives from The Equalizer 3. In the movie’s conclusion, McCall mails a picture to the CIA agent who interacted with him in the village of her and her family. The sequel would be a narrative of McCall’s connection to her family.
Another narrative: the little boy who shot McCall in his back returns years later to seek revenge for McCall killing his grandfather.
The most contemporary narrative would be his friendship with the African waitress in a village coffee shop that McCall befriended, that she is threatened by an African terrorist Boko Haram–type group and McCall decides to protect her and eliminate the threat.
The obvious narrative would be that the doctor who treated McCall becomes aware that there is a threat to the village and tells McCall. McCall again becomes the protector of the village and eliminates the threat in a horrific and violent manner.
Again, this Black man wanted peace. They did not listen; he then inflicted his violence upon them to restore his peace and the peace of those he has come to love and protect.
I highly recommend this movie. In an interview with Esquire magazine, Washington confirmed that he will sixreturn as McCall for both Equalizer 4 and 5. I look forward to seeing how McCall answers moral questions that affect him, his family and the community that he is a part of.
Consistent with Sartre, you also have three reactions to violence and oppression: Ignore it and become a victim, confront it nonviolently and hopefully your actions will bring about peace through a legal process, or confront it violently and once the threat is eliminated seek a peace and freedom for the community that will benefit all its members.
The existential choice is yours to make when you confront injustice and violence. This is the moral lesson, in my opinion, of all the Equalizer movies starring Washington.
