The Brave One can at times be a brutal, violent and harrowing portrait of an over burdened system, where thugs rule the streets and the corrupt contaminate the upper echelon of society. It is also an un-original revenge/vigilante story which borrows heavily from the likes of Monster, and especially Taxi Driver.

Jodie Foster star as Erica Baine,  a DJ who lives in New York City. When she and her fiancé David (Naveen Andrews) decide to take their dog for a walk in Central Park, they are brutally attacked by a gang of Latino thugs. Erica is placed in a coma for three weeks, and when she awakens is informed that David has died.

Overcome with grief and emotionally paralysed by the attack, Erica decides to protect herself by purchasing a gun. But it is not long until she is confronted by another life threatening situation, and uses the gun to kill an armed man who had just murdered a convenience store clerk. Empowered by her own sense of vigilante justice, Erica takes to the streets protecting the innocent and punishing the guilty.

On her trail is Police Detective Mercer (Terrence Howard), who believes that a man is responsible for the crimes. An unexpected friendship develops between Baine and Mercer.        

Neil Jordan provides tense direction draws out great performances from Jodie Foster and Terrence Howard.

Erica Baine is the type of tortured victim which Foster excels at playing, and for the most part she does create empathy for her character. The duality found within Erica makes for interesting viewing, yet neither Foster nor Jordan can stop the film from turning into a vigilante flick farce, thus turning Erica into a revenge seeking brute, equipped with a number of catch phrases ala Dirty Harry as she rubs out her attackers.     

Terrence Howard’s Detective Mercer follows many of the usual cop clichés. Endured a messy divorce? Check. Loss of faith in humanity? Check. But despite these factors, Mercer does contain a strong moral fibre, and a compassion which shines on screen.

Howard portrays these convictions very well. He is an actor who exudes courage, dignity and strength through every pore, much like Henry Fonda and Denzel Washington before him. Together with Foster a great chemistry is established, and there performances are the backbone of this film.  

The films achillis heal is its moronic ending, which not only quickly erases any feeling of credibility established by its actors, but also eradicates any sense of moral virtue that separates the good guys from the bad guys.     

If it were not for the great performances from Foster and Howard, The Brave One would not have much going for it. As it stands, this is a good if not incredibly flawed movie which would have benefited from some common sense and foresight with which direction it was headed.