My favorite part of any action movie series is always watching the bad guys get their just desserts.
It’s a lovely bit of karma and very rewarding to experience on the big screen.
That being said, “The Equalizer 3” is supposed to cap off the entire movie trilogy and I feel like the ending was a bit weak.
Especially when you consider all of the justice Denzel Washington served piping hot to bad guys as Robert McCall.
Equalizer 3 is a 2023 American vigilante action film directed by Antoine Fuqua.
It is a sequel to The Equalizer 2 and the final installment of The Equalizer trilogy, which is loosely based on the television series of the same name.
The film stars Denzel Washington, reprising his role as retired U.S. Marine and Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) officer Robert McCall, with Dakota Fanning, David Denman, Gaia Scodellaro, Sonia Ammar, Bruno Bilotta, Eugenio Mastrandrea, Andrea Dodero, Daniel Perrone, and Remo Girone in supporting roles.
Clocking in at 109 minutes long, the film is rated R for strong bloody violence and some language.
At a secluded winery in Sicily, crime enforcer Lorenzo Vitale (Bilotta) finds that many henchmen have been brutally killed by retired U.S. Marine and DIA operative Robert McCall (Washington).
McAll is actually waiting in the winery’s basement, held at gunpoint by two of Vitale’s bodyguards.
McCall kills him and the rest of the gangsters to obtain a key to the winery’s vault and is seen exiting the building with a black backpack slung over one shoulder.
Unfortunately, he is shot in the back by Vitale’s adolescent son while leaving the winery.
McCall considers suicide due to his injury, but instead takes the ferry back to the mainland.
While driving his car on the Amalfi Coast, McCall pulls over, unconscious from shock, and is found by Gio Bonucci (Mastrandrea), a local carabiniere.
Bonucci brings him to Altamonte, a remote coastal Italian town, where he is treated by small-town doctor Enzo Arisio (Girone).
McCall makes a slow recovery, having to use a cane and struggling to use the stairs.
He gets acquainted with the locals, including a waitress named Aminah (Scodellaro), and becomes fond of the town and its people.
McCall makes an anonymous phone call to CIA agent Emma Collins (Fanning) to tip her off about the winery’s role in the illegal drug trade disguised as normal business transactions in Sicily.
Collins and other CIA operatives arrive at the winery and find millions in cash along with bags of Captagon tablets hidden in a storeroom - confirming McCall’s suspicions.
She manages to track down McCall, but he is evasive about his identity.
Meanwhile, members of the Camorra harass and kill villagers in an attempt to coerce them out of their housing and take over Altamonte for commercialization purposes.
McCall overhears Marco Quaranta (Dodero), a high-ranking Camorra member, pressure a local seafood storeowner named Angelo (Perrone) for payments.
To make an example, the Camorra firebomb Angelo’s fish store as the entire town watches.
Naturally, there are only so many instances of bad behavior that McCall will tolerate and turn a blind eye to.
Still, there is a light at the end of the tunnel and McCall does save his newfound friends and town – finally finding a place to call home.
I just think it was a poor choice to end such an epic story there, but, maybe some writer somewhere will branch off with a story featuring Collins.
