"I'm Erica Bain. And as you know, I walk the city."
Erica Bain (Jodie Foster) is a confident, content, reasonably left-wing radio host, madly in love with the city of New York and her fiancee David (Naveen Andrews). Sadly, he is killed and she is beaten within an inch of her life by a gang of thugs in Central Park one night. Emotionally shattered and incapable of feeling safe in the city she once adored, Erica buys a gun and attempts to move on. Fate has other plans, however, as she begins to encounter situation after situation that leave her with no choice but to blow somebody away. As the reputation of the mysterious vigilante begins to rise, Erica is torn between genuine disgust at her reluctant actions and the savage pleasure of dealing out first-hand justice to the blatantly deserving.A touching and painful variation of the well-known Vigilante Man subgenre (Taxi Driver, Death Wish), due only in part to the vigilante not being a man at all.Tropes:
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking - Erica wants to kill those who do wrong, get revenge on the thugs that killed her husband and get her dog back.
- Dead Air - When New York DJ Erica Bane resumes her first radio broadcast after her vicious attack (and subsequent vigilante slaying), she falls silent in the middle of reading her opening monologue. Her savvy producer decides to let the scene play out, and a few seconds later Erica starts over with a raw and emotional impromptu dialogue about how terrifying the once familiar city can become after being victimized for the first time.
- Determinator - Erica is hellbent on killing those who do wrong, along with the thugs who killed her husband and getting her dog back.
- Dueling Movies - With Death Sentence, released two weeks earlier.
- Gender-Inverted Trope - It's a very typical "good man gone vigilante" story, only from a female perspective, focusing more on emotion.
- Might Makes Right - Erica REALLY tries not to subscribe to this.... and is repeatedly left with few other options.
- Pre-Mortem One-Liner - "I want my dog back!" *Boom Head Shot*
- Sean Connery Is About to Shoot You - The DVD cover, as shown above. However, in yet another subversion of the genre, her stare is far more focal than the barrel of the gun.
- Shout-Out: The subway scene is almost identical to one from Death Wish.
- Show Within A Film - Erica hosts a radio call-in one.
- It only became a call in show after her killings gained notoriety.
- Smoking Gun Control - To Erica's disbelief when it comes to both her enemies, and later herself.
