Assault on Wallstreet

There's two reasons why I was intrigued by this movie. The first one is the fact that it stars Dominic Purcell. Purcell stared in Prison Break and that used to be one of my favorite shows on television. (At least the first two seasons) While Purcell wasn't the complete highlight of the show, I did enjoy him. There's also something about the title and the poster that just made the movie intriguing. Its one of those Netflix movies that you know is bad but the title and summary look like something you might want to waste a couple hours watching. I had the idea that movie wasn't going to be good when I watched it but I thought, what the hell?

Well... I was right.

Purcell plays a security guard who's wife is sick with a brain tumor... or something like that. Her medical bills and the financial crisis have made it so he is in incredible debt and left with little to no money.

Basically this guy's entire life just goes to complete shit. His broker screws him over, the banks screw him over, his lawyer screws him over and then he loses his job. In the meantime, his wife (played by Erin Karpluk) realizes that their entire life has gone to the shitter and she ends up killing herself to relieve the burden she is leaving with her husband.

Brought to the end of his rope, Purcell goes on what can only be described as a...

He begins shooting down Stock Market executives and brokers I guess to... get revenge?

As you can see the movie isn't really that spectacular of a film even in something as simple as the plot. Its about a guy who is down on his luck, everything goes to hell, and he goes on a vigilante rampage because there's suppose to be some form of justice in the fact he's killing a bunch of Wall Street executives.

 And the worst part is, (Spoilers) he gets away with it! There's a scene where just guns down random people from a parking lot with an assault rife. He runs into an office and shoots down every person in the room. And finally when everything's said and done and the shooting is done, he walks away saying, I'm going to kill again.

What kind of hero is that?

I know its really cliche but there's no moment where someone says, "Hey you know your dead wife who you're doing this for? Would she want this?" and that's usually the thing that pulls the character back and makes them see how far they've gone.

It kind of reminds me of another vigilante movie starring Kevin Bacon called Death Sentence.

Similar plot with the exception that in that movie, Kevin Bacon was going after a gang that killed his son. While that movie wasn't good, I at least understood the reasoning for it. And maybe that's the point that Assault on Wall Street is trying to make, that these people on Wall Street are just as bad as the gang member that murders Kevin Bacon's son and they deserve to die. They're not getting the justice they deserve so its time for Dominic Purcell to come in and serve that justice.

The problem with the movie is that it is so deep in the finger pointing at the fault within the 2007-2008 financial crisis. This movie is so very blatantly pointing the finger at Wall Street for being greedy and stealing money from normal everyday Joes of America. And while they probably have a point, this movie is putting a bunch of people just doing their jobs on the same level as Death Sentence puts a bunch of gang members who perform gruesome murders.

And what's more, he's not even consistent. There's a part where Purcell has killed several people at this point and he goes into the office and points a gun at one of the executives. The guy points at a picture and says, I have a wife. Purcell stops, shoots another guy and tells the guy with the wife to run. Why? How was the guy he shot before any different? Why make exceptions? And that's the weird thing, the morality of Purcell's character is just strange out out of nowhere.

Performance wise, Purcell does an okay job. Overall its just boring. He's very good at mumbling and staring blankly out into space and he does that a lot in this movie. Half the movie I swear is him staring out contemplating. No emotion, nothing besides that blank stare he has.

While the movie does an alright job at making this guy have the shittiest luck in the world and just having him get trampled on, he's actually kind of dumb. He's having all these troubles financially and when things finally are at the worst they can be, he pulls out this totally upgraded and decked out assault rifle. Like he couldn't sell that, get some money to pay for his wife medical bills? I don't know how much that rifle would go for but it would help and it would also be a good alternative to murdering a bunch of innocent people.

His wife was really boring. I'll give her some credit, she is really cute. There's no question that Purcell should be in love with this girl because she's just cute as hell. The relationship started out alright but then he's dealing with their financial issues and she's just there. She basically just sits around looking worried or sick and then she cries. There's no real interaction between Purcell and his wife after the first few scenes and then she offs herself. She doesn't get angry at Purcell for keeping her in the dark, she doesn't try to get out of debt her way, she just offs herself. The character is boring, and she dies too quickly for us to really care about her.

Purcell has some cop buddies that are concerned about him but in the end, their presence in the movie was really pointless. One of them helps him out with his financial woes for a little bit but there's only so much he can do.

Oh and John Heard is in this movie.

If you don't know who John Heard is, watch Home Alone, he's the dad. Or you'll maybe know him as that drunk guy from Sharknado. Either way, he's kind of a shitty actor, he's not very interesting, and his part in this movie is over the top and just evil for no good reason.

And that's kind of theme around this movie. Just in bad taste and falls flat on the message. I'm not quite sure if its trying to promote vigilantism or justice for the crimes that people on Wall Street have done but I think this movie was made for manly testosterone filled men who would be so bored by the first half of this movie that they wouldn't get to the part that brought them there in the first place. It doesn't work as a drama, it doesn't work as an action movie. The movie just doesn't work.

So have you seen Assault on Wall Street? What did you think? Leave your comments and discussions below in the comments.

I'll leave you with this. Because Purcell was in Prison Break, I thought I'd leave you with this video pranking people into believing a prison is escaping. Its not that good but hey neither was this movie. Enjoy!