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 Gary
Oldman (Dracula, Lost in Space, The Professional) is the only one that makes it
out of this film unscathed. He's a great actor and often is able to bring any
terrible film from the trenches, and he shines in this film doing what he does
best: playing a villain. My favorite scene in the film is when he disguises
himself as a mechanic coming face to face with Rhames' character who doesn't
know who he is yet. It's a good moment where Oldman flexes his acting muscles
and becomes the most memorable aspect of the film. So -- what's he doing in this
lemon of a flick?
 You
know, ever since I was a child I always assumed that straight to video films
were movies too bad to be at theaters that often featured casts of failed
actors, has been's, or porno stars trying to make it legitimate as an actor. But
I've been educated since then and I now know that: 1. Not all straight to
video films are bad (ala "Ginger Snaps", and "If I Die before I wake"), and
2. 98 percent of straight to video films are bad whether they have a small
cast or a big cast, like this film does. What becomes a crime
about this film or a "Sin" if you will (I crack myself up!), is that this film
has such a cast of excellent actors yet completely wastes them in the process
because of its horrible script and incredibly bad job of directing and editing.
There's the quintessential cookie cutter plotline that you see in an action
movie but immediately broadly establishes the characters from the get go. I was
never sure if Ving Rhames' character is a farmer or Amish because in the opening
sequences he's at a farm he obviously bought.
But we go into the story right away,
he's an ex-cop whose sister, who is a drug addict was nearly killed by a drug
lord (though its all assumption, we're never told he is a drug lord because he's
so broadly developed), and now he's on the quest for vengeance despite the
warnings of his ex-partner and grizzled ex-boss played by the always great Brian
Cox (X2: X-men United, 25th Hour) in a small thankless role. He shouldn't
even be considered a part of the cast because he is so wasted in this film it
goes beyond unfunny. The story is your usual cookie cutter plotline for the
ex-cop avenging a relative yadda, yadda. The somewhat talented Ving Rhames is
terrible in this as the lead character Eddie. I'm not sure if its the hackneyed
writing or his acting alone, but he's bad.
When he's supposed to be emotional,
he's as stale as a cardboard cut out, and when he's supposed to be mean and
heroic, he either overplays his part spouting his awkward lines or he chews the
scenery like a rat. His character is a one dimensional generic caricature of a
typical action film, except he walks around with an arm that he never uses
because he lost use of it attempting to save his partner from a falling engine
block. It would never occur to the hospital to simply amputate it, but then it
would probably go over the low-budget to use special effects. Throughout the
entire film we're supposed to believe he's a really strong person, but it
becomes a bit far-fetched watching him lift people with one arm. At one point
his ex-partner and boss consider putting him in jail but realize how pointless
it would be due to his immense strength.
He wears usual superhero attire: a
cowboy hat, trench coat and dark clothing. I wonder if there's a store specially
customized for movie heroes, because they always wear the same thing in these
films. I still love trench coats, but how about some new form of wardrobe?
Suffice to say Rhames talks with an almost Southern accent considering he was a
street cop and tramples around like a raging bull hitting anyone and everyone
who gets in his way. Director Michael Stevens creates an overtly grim and
atmospheric movie with tedious attempts at philosophy, never considering that
philosophy has no place in such a terrible film like this.
The acting by Rhames wouldn't be so
hard to endure if the film were written, directed, and edited better, but all of
it is a mess.
There is an inadvertent ironic twist
during the film in which Rhames' character attempts to discover the identity of
the men who raped his sister on an amateur porn film, but has trouble because of
the bad editing, something this film conveys. The worst aspect of this has to be
the incredibly sloppy and slapdash editing. There are scenes that cut away too
fast from an action scene, cut too fast for the audience to comprehend what's
happening before their eyes, or completely ruin an emotion intense moment. At
one point where Rhames' character shoots a man who attempts to sneak up on him,
he shoots the man, the guy falls to the floor on-screen, and then we hear the
sound of his body dropping off-screen five seconds later. It's almost too crude
to ignore, which I attempted to do while watching this.
The ending is drawn out and
long-winded to the point where they attempt stretch out the material and it
becomes tiresome. There's this horrible car chase scene in the climax of the
film that makes entirely no sense at all where, for some reason, Oldman's
character is caught in quicksand and begins to sink and Rhames' character makes
him recite a ridiculous poem; another attempt a philosophy shot down.
 This is
yet another cookie cutter straight to video action flick with a wasted cast of
talented actors attempting to pass itself off as original and philosophical.
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