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(More customer reviews)Trauma, severe trauma, can unleash aspects of the human personality that may appear as a stranger within. Such is the premise for this well-constructed film by Neil Jordan (screenplay by Roderick Taylor and Bruce Taylor), and while the neither concept of trauma-altered personality or revenge tales is new, THE BRAVE ONE alters the vengeance idea just enough to make it credible and to even draw the viewer into believing that what the character is doing is justified and right! And that is perhaps the most frightening aspect of this terrifying film.
Erica Bain (Jodie Foster) is a night radio talk show performer, a woman who walks the city of New York gathering sounds and observing the mysteries of the 'safest big city' and relates her observations poetically to a large radio audience. Erica is engaged to young physician David (Naveen Andrews) and the couple are very much in love. One night on an evening stroll with their dog they are attacked by thugs, beaten with pipes, and David is killed while Erica narrowly survives. Upon awakening from her coma she is devastated by her loss of David and becomes a strangely haunted woman, unable to sleep, unable to get immediate help from the police, and turns to purchasing a gun in an attempt to right the wrongs she has suffered. This new 'person' or 'stranger within' happens to witness a murder in a little store and to her amazement she responds by killing the murderer. A similar situation happens on the subway where two thugs threaten people, threaten Erica, and Erica again responds by killing the thugs. She feels driven to avenge the death of her David, but at the same time fears her own inner stranger. Erica returns to her radio show, under changing instructions form her boss Carol (Mary Steenburgen), and finds the changes in her psyche result in bracing her listeners about fear on the streets. In her audience is Detective Mercer (Terrence Howard) who has personal problems related to the fact that he has been unable to arrest a known killer. Mercer connects with Erica in various ways, she interviews him for her show, and the two bond. Erica trusts Mercer, wants to share what she is doing, yet hears his frustration about not being able to seek his own brand of revenge frustration against the oily killer he pursues, and decides to eliminate that trauma for Mercer. As the tension builds, the identity of Erica's assailants is discovered, and how she deals with these thugs (and with Mercer's interaction in the solution) forms the surprising ending for the film.
Too little has been written and said about the quality of performances from both Foster and Howard in this tense thriller. These two actors deliver performances so sensitive in execution that memories of previous similar films evaporate. This is a tough film to watch for all the violence not only on the screen but from within the characterizations by the actors (with the capable direction of Neil Jordan), but it is for this viewer one of the strongest films of the year. Perhaps now that the DVD can be viewed within the safety of the home more people will pay attention to a film that deserves awards. Grady Harp, February 08
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"Why don‘t they stop me?" Erica Bain wonders. Bain, a popular N.Y radio host, watched her fiancé die and nearly lost her own life to a vicious, random attack. Now she discovers a stranger within herself, an armed wanderer in the urban night, out for vengeance and at war with her own soul. Two-time Academy Award winner Jodie Foster, as Erica, joins Oscar nominee Terrence Howard, as a determined cop hot on her trail. Erica?s future is uncertain, but one thing is not: THE BRAVE ONE is a high- tension thriller that packs a visceral and emotional punch.
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