When an ambitious high school graduate--the valedictorian with her sights set on Northwestern--is killed in a head-on collision by the gin-soaked owner of a construction company, the latter walks away unharmed and saddles himself with the best lawyer money can buy. The girl's family struggles to stay together in the aftershock: the mother, Judith (Penny Fuller), seeks solace in the church, while the father, John (James Farentino), seeks it in the courthouse, dead-set on getting justice for his daughter.
The film takes us to the other side, too. We listen to the guilty man lament that he'll lose everything: "It was an accident! Why should a guy have to give up his life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for something that wasn't even his fault?" he ponders, a vodka glass in hand. He's completely serious, too.
There's nothing truly remarkable nor particularly unforgettable about the film. It's not a technical marvel; rather, it's shot in a style typical of made-for-television movies, with flat lighting, standard shot composition and very little camera movement. Perhaps its most shocking moment arrives in the instant the two cars collide, freezing on a blurred motion of the girl in mid-scream, as the sound of the tires squealing, chrome crumpling and glass crunching roars underneath. It's a haunting shot that adds dramatic flair to the film.
What will keep this film on radars is the performance of one of its supporting actors, a young Denzel Washington. Despite having a fairly low-key role as the prosecutor (he arrives about 40 minutes into the film), he manages to lend his lines the electrifying gravitas and sharpened delivery that would define his career. Other performances of note include that of TV actor Don Murray as the drunk driver--there's something about his expressions that are just strangely magnifying--and Donald Moffat.
License to Kill is dated and at its at its weakest when using its piano-heavy soundtrack that lacks true emotion, but it's at its best when it allows silence to carry the weight of the characters' grief. We don't need the musical cues, and the film's strength comes when it keeps those at bay. The film drives home its message with the battering-ram directness of a PSA made for a driver's ed class, and we can only hope that it helped to turn someone's life around or helped someone work through a similar tragedy. But the unfortunate fact is that License to Kill (1984) still remains all too relevant to this day.
By Thomas Davant
