EQUALIZER is an action film starring Denzel Washington and directed by Antoine Foqua. Both director and actor worked on the award-winning TRAINING DAY in 2001. As the title suggests, this is the third installment in a series featuring a former CIA agent who uses his skills to help ordinary people vulnerable to the dangers of a society where crime runs rampant.

EQUALIZER is another film featuring older men with violent pasts who are forced to take matters into their own hands and fix the world with their fists. Denzel Washington plays in the same league as actors like Liam Neeson, known for their work in films with high intellectual ambitions, who over the years have found in action cinema a way to imbue complex characters with primitive behaviors but motivations that can be enriched by his acting talent. In Washington's case, as in Neeson's, theaters remain packed. The levels of explicit violence are unrestrained; however, the audience accepts them without complaint.

Films like THE EQUALIZER reveal a need for some kind of hero to solve problems that governments fail to address. Even in cultured and educated societies, these kinds of stories become a window through which viewers access a barbarity they are not permitted to witness in their daily lives. This is not trivial cinema; directors like Antoine Foqua and actors like Denzel Washington transform these films into works that withstand the scrutiny of even the most demanding critics.