Law Abiding Citizen

F. Gary Gray’s 2009 film has a man whose family was killed come back years later for the deal the prosecutor made. Kurt Wimmer wrote it. Frank Darabont was to direct and left over creative differences with the producers. The leads also changed places: Gerard Butler first signed to play the prosecutor and Jamie Foxx the man in the cell, and the two swapped. The result is on screen: after the opening, Butler is nearly always in a closed room while Foxx does the running. The British company Warp Films is among the production outfits. Filming started on 17 January 2009 around Philadelphia: City Hall, Laurel Hill Cemetery and the by then closed Holmesburg Prison, whose Thunderdome section appears on screen. The 109 minute theatrical version is a trimmed one, cut back after an NC-17 threat over the violence; the uncut version came out on Blu-ray as the Unrated Director’s Cut, running longer. A sequel written by Wimmer was announced in May 2022 and was still in limbo by June 2025. A good fit if you take Butler’s time inside a cell as the design rather than a loss, and check which cut you have before pressing play. Not for anyone expecting the violence to be kept off screen: even the theatrical version only reached an R by being shortened.