The Vigilante in Film: The Movement from Death Wish, to Batman, to Taxi Driver

Abstract

Cinema evinces an almost schizophrenic attitude toward the figure of the vigilante. In the first place, there are those films which offer an uncritical celebration, a homily to the vigilante as a type of modern-day folk hero. Death Wish is probably the most well known of these, though others have followed suit by trading in on the same formula. Here the writer/director is at pains to show how the vigilante figure is in essence, and against all expectation, a fundamentally gentle and passive persona possessing a profound ordinariness. Charles Bronson’s character—Paul Kersey—is a mild-mannered professional who is a credulous believer in the status quo; he assumes that if he pays his taxes and behaves with civic dignity and responsibility, things will inevitably turn out for the best.