Jodie Foster, Terrence Howard, Naveen Andrews

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...( read more  read more... ) 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.

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66% liked it

256,069 ratings

Critics

43% liked it

178 critics

R, 2 hrs. 2 min.

Directed by: Neil Jordan

Release Date: September 14, 2007

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DVD Release Date: February 5, 2008

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Flixster Reviews (15,353)


  • August 22, 2009
    "the brave one" is jodie foster's latest blockbuster breakthru by some art-house director neil jordan with the helpful upstaging thru charismatic terrence howard. so would "the brave one" be a smash hit? obviously, it sells well but would its crucial viewpoint be taken without be...( read more)ing midled and over-generalized as another "chic with vengence" rehash, especially from male audience? another sort of chic/woman's flicks about strong woman risen up against all the odds just like 40s "mildred pierce"?

    it's a story about a woman and her husband-to-be being almost beaten to death in the central park. she survives but her loved one passes. so angered by the injustice and grievance as well as approaching fright, she purchases a gun for the sense of safety. then some other perilous events drive her into using her lethal pistol into immediate killings which she's obtained great kicks from until she actively sets her path into disposing of the genuine evil men that including her fiancee' murders. therefore, she's become an involuntary vigilante partially forced by circumstance.

    "the brave one" is actually a film noir to its essence but inevitably it over-lingers over the sentimentalities of a woman's traumatic pysche after the catastrophe such as the self-inflicted confession over the radio-broadcastings, and those attributes are easily categorized as "feminist refugee" like 90s "thelma and louis".

    there're four basic elements of film noirs that this flick's contour could ascribe: 1. the dark side of humanity over sex or violence. 2. anarchistic distrust over the law. 3. a vigilante to perform the justice on his own, usually private dick like philip marlowe. 4. the seedy backset of a metropolitan's shadowy retreat like raymond chandler and james m cain's frequent spots of los angels, grendale, pasadena in southern california or danshiel hammet's san fransisco. and "the brave one" is about human's potential appetite of violence being provoked by grand tragedy, and the woman protagonist's distrust over the law is so severe that she has to buy a gun to feel safe, then bang bang bang! she would do justice on her own, a vigilante! and it's about the dark corners of new york as well as her obsession over this super-metropolitan that's well-channeled by her radio-broadcastings...unfortunately these traits have been neglected by the viewers, does it occur to you that audience cannot deem it as film noir just becuz the vigilante protagonist ain't male despite jodie foster has every believable characteristic of a tough guy inside her? or it's too sentimental to be taken as noirish? or it's becuz the director hasn't toyed enough of cinematography of starkness but chose naturalistic rendering instead?

    still, it's very engrossing to put a woman into a spot in this kind of story as gender-reversal. jodie foster has a genuine grit in her and her "tough guy" ain't like uma thurman's cartoonish "kill bill"(a semi-dominatrix vixen in boyish pulp), she conveys real fragility as well as genuine toughness to win the odds. probably she's the only woman actress who could pull off the task of action heroine without taunting her sex appeal. perhaps, a woman in the main spot would bring out some feminine aspects to mellow out such material which is supposed to be harsher, rougher and more expressionistic to be considered noirish. pitifully "the brave one" would still be labelled as "chic flick", "woman's movie" or "feministic refugee".
  • August 17, 2009
    Jodie Foster gives great NPR voice. The rest of the movie is not so successful. Foster herself essays a noble performance, always interesting even when the movie is going to totally improbable narrative places. It's by her virtues that The Brave One is even watchable at all, beca...( read more)use it really doesn't offer anything else. The action isn't all that interesting, though Neil Jordan does have a knack for communicating brutality without making it feel exploitative, and there's not very much of it. I'm inclined to believe that Jordan tried to use this action/violence thematically, but it feels stitched on and sort of unnatural. We already know most of what it tells us: that Erica is frightened, that she is desperate, that she is wounded and angry and unable to help herself. It is by the grace of Foster's inventive performance that the movie avoids massive repetition, but it lands in a completely uninspiring place as a result. Terrence Howard, meanwhile, is a total disaster. Shockingly miscast, he looks and acts babyfaced and overly fresh in a part that calls for someone restricted, beaten down and morally divided. He does not project an ounce of the character's internal conflict, instead content to ride his narrative purpose throughout the movie. He's simply window dressing, an obstacle for Erica to jump over, not a complex human being. The performance is downright lazy.

    Foster hasn't been doing much work lately, presumably opting for the whole motherhood thing, but this is a disappointing return to cinema. We all know that she's never going to find another Silence of the Lambs, but I have faith; surely she can do better than THIS.
  • July 11, 2009
    Excellent thriller. Great cast. Erica (Jodie) is a radio presenter who is viciously attacked and her partner is killed in a random attack in the park. She finds herself on a killing spree, defending herself and others in a supermarket, subway and on the streets. She has a police ...( read more)officer (Terrence) on her tail as she hunts down the gang of youths who attacked her.
  • March 19, 2009
    It's Death Sentence, the female version!!! What's funny is that if those punks had tried to mug Sayid, this film would have ended before Act II.
  • January 20, 2009
    Yeah...not so much... Kill Bill Lite!!
  • November 10, 2009
    Just kind of blah. It didn't really illicit any emotional response and obviously with the story it presented, it should have. The performaces weren't great by either Jodie Foster or Terrence Howard which is unusual. Just a bad script I guess...
  • November 10, 2009
    Jodie Foster is absolutely one of the best actresses. a predictable revenge movie..
    Jodie Foster loves playing strong women and no doubt it really suits her..one of the greatest revenge films ever
  • October 29, 2009
    It was OK.Death Wish 3 is way better
  • October 24, 2009
    NO STARS!!! i soo call this movie "The Lame One" BOOM BOOM!!
  • October 21, 2009
    Un autre excellent film où Jodie Foster joue un rôle de battante, mais elle prend un rôle de justicière, ce que je crois est dépasser les limites...

Critic Reviews


September 20, 2007
Peter Travers, Rolling Stone

The fire goes out long before the film ends. full review

September 14, 2007
Claudia Puig, USA Today

Foster does her best with a flawed story whose ending rings even less true than the rest of it. full review

September 14, 2007
Pete Hammond, Maxim

A true shocker that will shatter your nerves and get you talking. full review

September 14, 2007
Amy Biancolli, Houston Chronicle

It's lily-livered narrative cowardice, and I reject it. full review

September 14, 2007
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

Psychological suspense is what makes The Brave One spellbinding. The movie doesn't dine out on action scenes, but regards with great curiosity how these two people will end up. full review

September 13, 2007
A.O. Scott, The New York Times

The Brave One, though well cast and smoothly directed, is just as crude and ugly as you want it to be.

September 13, 2007
Colin Covert, The Minneapolis Star Tribune

Foster isn't the only one abused in this film. Viewers are, too. full review

September 13, 2007
Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com

There's a lot to admire in The Brave One. It just doesn't cut as deeply as it needs to. full review

September 10, 2007
David Edelstein, New York Magazine

What could impel Jodie Foster and director Neil Jordan to whisk us back to the bad old days of Death Wish and Ms. 45? Were their credit cards maxed out? full review

View more The Brave One reviews at RottenTomatoes.com

Comments


  • perfectgentlemn
    July 20, 2008
    Very Good Movie, Don't wanna say too much & give away details... But Enjoy ! ;-)
  • pigsaidmoo
    February 24, 2008
    I curently just got done watching The Brave One! I didn't think that this movie was going to be that good. But I loved it. It was a really depressing movie that made me cry but I would recomend this movie for a action/drama movie. It was one of those sad movies that you'll want to watch more than once.
  • fer200920
    February 13, 2008
    does 2008 have to deal with this kind of movies.
    why is everyone doing the same thing...
    by the previews i expected more...
    i won't recomend it...
    is there someone with new ideas....
  • thedweeb
    February 9, 2008
    Just saw this last night. Meh..when will Jodie stop making these types of films and do something different? Typical angry female revenge flick.
  • hstoosy
    February 7, 2008
    Jodie foster!! what a great actor She is. reminded me of meg ryan at a number of seens but with her own sexy looks and charm. this movie is pictureised around a really sad incident and a piece of reality from someone's life. which could happen to anyone and God forbids if it happens to anyone it will surely ruins one's life and way he/she persevies the world. that would result in the failure to acknowledge the boundries of human law and order and the world and will have only one purpose in life and that is will be to take revenge. its human nature we cant denie from it. its our nature to take revenge on whom has done wrong to us or our hurt our loved ones. i litterally cried at the end of the movie..i didnt know what to do or say. Only faith in God allmight and his plan made me stop the way i was thinking and that was what ever happens it happens for a reason and is a test in this life of our allegence and obedience to God and his commenmends. a must see and i would reoommend that movie to audience above 16 cause it has violence sex and facts of life that are way to complex for kids. the moral is taking revenge is human and its a slap on all the human right activists in favour of its violators. the the nature of punishment for cruelty is not to be decided by anyother than the victim and his family. and the justic dept has the obligatin of presenting the choice to the victims family and the victim.
  • muckleeck89
    December 7, 2007
    i love it ! .. i loved the story .. not every killer is devil !
  • BelinRd
    September 25, 2007
    Okay...as soon as I left the theatre I wanted to purchase a hand gun. Uhm...why? Could think of a number of idiots that deserved to be popped off. Maybe I got the wrong message of the flick...maybe not.
  • girlybat
    September 24, 2007
    (spoiler alert!) in response to the previous comment, i have to say that that scene felt really weird to me at first too, but when i saw what they were doing with it, contrasting the beauty and intimacy that the two had shared with the horror and abuse of their attack... it is one of the scenes that has really stuck with me. incredible. HIGHLY recommended.
  • nakedspace
    September 19, 2007
    What was up with that really weird montage of emergency room footage interspersed with sex scene?
    That was really hard to watch.
  • brandyindia
    September 14, 2007
    I am desperate to watch this movie. Jodie is one classy intellegent actress and intense. I watched her in flightplan and I was sitting at the edge of my chair because you didn't really know if what you saw when she was boarding the plane was real or in her imagination. I won't say anymore in case you haven't seen flightplan yet. Her roles always show the dark side of her and it makes you wonder, lol.

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The Brave One Trivia


  • To date Johnny Depp has only directed one film, what is it called?  Answer »
  • What actor starred in Superman, The Brave, One Eyed Jacks, and Guys and Dolls?  Answer »
  • Of all the films Kirk Douglas has made - he is proudest of this one  Answer »
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