Podcast: Death Wish 3
An 80's vigilante movie that goes way out of its way to be as stupid as possible
99 Cent Rental Podcast
Episode 51: Death Wish 3
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99 Cent Rental is a comedy podcast revisiting the low-budget action, comedy, and science fiction films that clogged video store shelves throughout the 1980s and early 90s.
Every other week, hosts Bryan and Dave White, hosts of the Bring Me The Axe! horror podcast, dive deep into the nearly forgotten world of ninjas, breakdancers, skateboarders, action hero knockoffs, and Cold War paranoia that embodied the excess and over-the-top attitude of the 1980s and celebrate them for everything they were and weren’t.
This week we take a trip back to 1985 for a movie of such staggering stupidity that we can hardly believe it. Death Wish 3 is the continuing adventures of Paul Kersey, played by Charles Bronson and where the first movie is a pretty solid action movie and the second movie is dopey and mostly boring, Death Wish 3 commits to absurdity in a way that’ll really make you think. It’s a movie of such moronic prowess that the filmmakers had to go out of their way to achieve such heights of idiocy. See a crowd of children literally jump for joy over the bodies of bikers dead in the street. Marvel at a doctor doing everything he can to not break character and laugh while telling a husband that his wife died from a broken arm. This movie is truly an achievement in a year already crowded with dumb movies from Cannon.
As it happens, Paul Kersey is back home in New York City to visit an old friend but he arrives in time for the man to die in his arms when the local street gang of giggling maniacs beats him to the edge of his life. Kersey will team up with a cop to put the gang on ice in a film that was literally rushed into production to capitalize on the headlines about a subway vigilante in New York City that injured three and left one man in a wheelchair for the rest of his life. Truly, only Cannon could produce such an entertaining gem.
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The breakdown of how Death Wish 3 doubles down on absurdity is spot on. What makes it fascinating tho is that the stupidty isn't accidental, its weaponized. Cannon basicaly realized that nuance was a losing game in the 80s action market. I remember watching a similar Cannon flick with my dad and laughing at how the villain's over-the-top evil almost felt like performance art.