At The Movies: The Equalizer 3 still a stylish star vehicle, Shortcomings gets the job done

The Equalizer 3 (NC16)

109 minutes, opens on Thursday
4 stars

The story: American government assassin Robert McCall (Denzel Washington) has retired to southern Italy when roused back for this vigilante “threequalizer” by the Sicilian Mafia threatening his new friends.

The Equalizer 3 is Hollywood actor Washington’s fifth film under Antoine Fuqua since the director steered him to a Best Actor Academy Award for Training Day (2001).

It has a satisfying sense of closure as the trusted collaborators wrap up the nine-year trilogy – The Equalizer originated from a 1950s television series — while reuniting Washington with Man On Fire (2004) co-star Dakota Fanning in her role of a Central Intelligence Agency analyst, whose connection to McCall will be revealed in the coda.

McCall has tracked her down to alert her to the mafioso funding international terrorism.

More dastardly is the criminal organisation’s brutal tyranny over the locals. McCall is an avenger for the oppressed, and the ageing superhero makes it his mission to protect the gentle townsfolk who have become his family, especially his elderly doctor benefactor (Remo Girone) and the police chief (Eugenio Mastrandrea).

This first franchise instalment set abroad romanticises the picturesque village. Veteran cinematographer Robert Richardson (Hugo, 2011) does good work. The dazzling coastal sunlight contrasts against the anticipatory anxiety of the night, out of which McCall rises to execute by means of wine bottle, wire, knife, thumb and preternatural reflexes.

It is absurd. Regardless, Washington, son of a Pentecostal minister, stalks through the pulp revenge fantasy with a noble righteousness that is unchallenged by the absolute evil of the cookie-cutter thugs.

The 68-year-old is among the last commanding movie stars. The thrill lies not in the grisly action, but in watching him watch his enemies with a slow-burn gaze during the quiet before the storm.

Hot take: Washington dispenses menace and magnetism alongside feel-good justice in a stylish star vehicle.

Shortcomings (M18)

92 minutes, opens on Thursday exclusively at The Projector
3 stars

The story: Ben Tanaka (Justin H. Min) is a Japanese-American wannabe film-maker who manages a floundering repertory cinema in California’s Bay Area and fantasises about white women. He is left to confront his shortcomings – cynicism, narcissism and self-loathing, for starters – when his fed-up long-time girlfriend Miko (Ally Maki) decamps to New York for the summer, followed by his gay best friend Alice (Sherry Cola).

The American indie Shortcomings opens with a movie-within-a-movie spoof of Crazy Rich Asians (2018).

Ben hates the glossy mega-hit. He is ever the grinch. But there is truth in his comment about movies these days using representation to win over an audience, and this feature directing debut by Korean-American actor Randall Park best known from the sitcom Fresh Off The Boat (2015 to 2020) is itself situated among the Asian-American community and chatty with exchanges on ethnic identity, gender politics and mixed-race couplings.

Park is, fortunately, self-aware in his social commentary.

His comedy on millennial dating mores is adapted from co-writer Adrian Tomine’s 2007 same-title graphic novel and never less than an easy watch, thanks to the well-played threesome of neurotic urbanites traversing the country in search of love.

Chinese-American comic Cola, fresh off the comedy Joy Ride (2023), is the scene-stealer as the acerbic girl-chasing grad student.

Ben is meanwhile, in Miko’s absence, attempting his own pursuit of a blonde germaphobic performance artist (Tavi Gevinson), and then a bisexual brunette (Debby Ryan), before finally learning a valuable life lesson.

The characters are all flawed. Their misadventures would not be as amusing or relatable otherwise.

Hot take: Not every addition to Hollywood’s current Asian-American wave has to be a ground-breaker, and this romcom is engaging enough and insightful.