The Brave One (2007)

New York radio host Erica Bain (Jodie Foster) has a life that she loves and a fiancé she adores. All of it is taken from her when a brutal attack leaves Erica badly wounded and her fiancé dead. Unable to move past the tragedy, Erica begins prowling the city streets at night to track down the men she holds responsible. Her dark pursuit of justice catches the public’s attention, and the city is riveted by her anonymous exploits. But with the NYPD desperate to find the culprit and a dogged police detective (Terrence Howard) hot on her trail, she must decide whether her quest for revenge is truly the right path, or if she is becoming the very thing she is trying to stop. Directed by Neil Jordan, “The Brave One” earned Jodie Foster a 2008 Golden Globe nomination for leading actress in a drama.


Reminiscent of the great vigilante films of the seventies, “The Brave One” reverberates with the fears and uncertainties of our angry age. The film is a powerful collaboration between iconoclastic Irish director Neil Jordan and risk-taking actress Jodie Foster. Together, they shape this time-honoured material in unsettling, troubling ways. (The film is also quite brutal at times, so audiences should be prepared for some ugly moments of violence.) Foster plays Erica, a gentle radio talk-show host. Giddily in love with her fiancé and satisfied with her career, she bounces through the streets of New York with little-girl energy. But disaster strikes when the couple is attacked while walking their dog in the park. Thugs beat her fiancé to death and very nearly kill her, then abduct the dog and videotape the whole thing for Internet broadcast. Erica’s recovery is slow and her psyche suffers permanent damage; she even fears opening her mouth on the radio. Soon she buys a gun. Menacing-looking men in local delis, subways and dark alleys suddenly come under her scrutiny.Her first kill is messy and uncertain – then she gets the hang of it. Her life becomes intertwined with a good-guy cop, played by the always terrific Terrence Howard. In the attendant media glare of these vigilante killings, she seeks him out to be the subject of a radio profile. Their cat-and-mouse game plays out in unanticipated and surprisingly tender ways.

This is the cinema of animal compulsion and cesspool cities made famous by Dirty Harry, Assault on Precinct 13 and all those other classics of the genre. It is no accident that the currently robust American cinema has turned to this deeply unsettled time for inspiration. Jordan and Foster spin the seventies’ libertarian revenge fantasies into something quite different, however. Erica’s choice of targets and her emotionally complex approach suggest a radical feminist militia of one; her use of media to further her ends is cynical and unfailingly modern. These are two artists with the courage to explore the grey areas of moral choice. ~Noah Cowan – Toronto International Film Festival

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