In issue #7 of Cinema Retro, Paul Talbot, author of Bronson's Loose: The Making of the Death Wish Films, revisited the 1974 film that started the franchise. He now brings us interviews with actresses Robin Sherwood and Silvana Gallardo who appeared in the the film's controversial sequel, Death Wish II.
In 1981 star Charles Bronson and director Michael Winner
reunited for Death Wish II, a follow-up to one of the highest grossing
and most discussed films of 1974. In Death Wish II, vigilante Paul
Kersey hits the streets to avenge the brutal rape and murder of his daughter
(who had already been rendered comatose after an attack in the first film) and
his Hispanic housekeeper. The sequel became not only another box-office hit,
but the most-controversial film in the five-title series and the lone entry
that alienates even the most diehard Bronson fans. Death Wish II owes
most of its notoriety to two brutal and vicious rape scenes that were so grisly
that they had to be extensively edited to achieve an R rating in the United
States and were cut even further for England.