Antoine Fuqua Ranked

Welcome to "Ranked", a weekly series where I rank a franchise or filmography from worst to best and hand out assorted related superlatives. This week, I'm profiling the work of Antoine Fuqua-whose latest project "The Equalizer 3" is in theaters now. 

Antoine Fuqua's Filmography Ranked:

13.King Arthur (C-)

12.Infinite (C)

11.The Equalizer 2 (C)

10.The Replacement Killers (C+)

9.Brooklyn's Finest (C+)

8.Tears of the Sun (B-)

7.The Equalizer (B-)

6.Southpaw (B-)

5.Olympus Has Fallen (B)

4.Shooter (B)

3.The Guilty (B+)

2.The Magnificent Seven (A-)

1.Training Day (A+)

Top Dog: Training Day (2001)

While Fuqua has made a number of commercial hits and cult favorites over his 25-year feature directorial career, none of his other films have come close to matching the cultural impact or awe-inspiring brilliance of Training Day. It's such a tense, menacing and unapologetically nasty corrupt cop thriller that it permanently reset the bar for the entire subgenre. This incredible accomplishment wouldn't have been possible if not for Fuqua's kinetic direction, Ethan Hawke's terrific performance as the ambitious and even-keeled yet naïve LAPD officer Jake Hoyt-whose interest in transferring to the narcotics department leads to the most consequential day of his entire career and most notably, Denzel Washington's work as the unhinged, arrogant and superhumanly intimidating villain Det. Alonzo Harris will be the stuff of legend for the rest of time.  

Bottom Feeder: King Arthur (2004)

Fuqua's take on this legendary folk tale is really done in by the stiff lead performances from Clive Owen, Keira Knightley and Ioan Gruffudd and some questionable pacing for an action-heavy medieval adventure flick. Other than that, it's a similarly mediocre, "gritty" take on King Arthur as the one Guy Ritchie delivered over a decade later in Legend of the Sword that really only shows signs of life when Stellan Skarsgard is on the screen fulfilling his Skarsgard duty of being an entertainingly detestable villain that the audience can't wait to see die.  

Most Underrated: The Magnificent Seven (2016)

This one gets a lot of heat for being a remake of a remake, but I sincerely believe it's among the best westerns the 21st century has produced to date. The heroes (Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D'onofrio, Byung-hun Lee, Manuel Garcia-Ruflo, Martin Sensmeier) bring the charisma, the villains (Peter Sarsgaard, Cam Gigandet, Jonathan Joss) chew the scenery, the shootouts are immense, Mauro Fiore's cinematography is stylish and Fuqua directs with energy and gusto galore.  

Most Overrated: The Equalizer (2014)

American action movies released over the last 30-40 years is probably the only area of film history that I feel really well-versed in since I've logged an unholy amount of hours watching and obsessing over them. When it comes to the 2010's specifically, a film that is often listed as a standout among the general public is The Equalizer.  For me, it's not even the best action vehicle that Fuqua and Denzel Washington made during this decade (my preferred Fuqua/Washington vehicle of the 2010's may or may not be the one I just gushed about above). While Washington gives a seriously awesome performance as retired government assassin Robert McCall-whose forced back into action when he kills the Russian mobster pimp (David Meunier) of a teenage prostitute (Chloe Grace Moretz) he knows from a local diner after finding out she was in the ICU after being beaten within an inch of her life and the action has a gnarly slasher-esque brutality to it-particularly in its hardware store-set finale- that allows it to standout from other films in the genre, some shockingly slow  pacing and a puzzling decision to spend more time developing the Russian mob aspects of the story over focusing on McCall and his reluctant return to the killing business downgrade it from a good to passable action movie.