“Stressed to Kill” is paced way too slowly for a film that relies so much on slapstick and shocking violence. But if writer-director Mark Savage and co-writer Tom Parnell have anything clever to say, their broad characters and crude gags keep them from articulating it. In craftier hands, the semi-comic revenge thriller “Stressed to Kill” might have been a minor treat: a riff on ‘70s vigilante classics like “Death Wish” that redefines unacceptable outrage for the thin-skinned 21st century. Bill Oberst Jr. stars as Bill, a perpetually angry middle-aged man who suffers a near-fatal heart attack and is ordered to find a way to relieve stress. It’s also more than a little disturbing that so many of the folks Bill targets are either obese or ethnic minorities (or both).

Source: Los Angeles Times May 27, 2016 07:37 UTC