This is like the action masterpiece “The Rock”, except for the fact that “The Rock” was original, and this is just as awful as anything I’ve ever seen. After being busted in a car theft ring, two gangster friends Nick (rapper Ja Rule) and Sasha (Steven Seagal) are jailed in New Alcatraz prison where mercenaries break in and storm the prison to hold a prisoner ransom who knows the location of a secret stash of over two hundred million dollars in gold. Now they must team up with other prisoners and beat the mercenaries before they kill everyone. I got the sense this is supposed to be a futuristic film, but there’s never truly verification. The prison is re-opened due to overcrowding and it’s supposedly advanced but shockingly stone age. The prison is supposed to be state of the art and advanced but there’s a shockingly low head count when it comes to prisoners (I counted twenty-five).
Tag Archives: Martial Arts
Spy Kids 2: Island of Lost Dreams (2002)
After a raid by armed soldiers during a party with the world’s top agents and their kids, Juni Cortez (Daryl Sabara), the youngest of the Cortez spy family is accused of stealing the high powered super weapon The Transmooker Device. Now Carmen (Alexa Vega) and Juni Cortez must travel to the island of lost dreams and face off against monsters, soldiers, and rival agents Girti (Emily Osment) and Gary Giggles and find the real transmooker device before the evil Donnagon (Mike Judge) gets a hold of it and prove Juni’s innocence. But their parents and meddlesome grandparents are on the hunt for the kids before they’re killed. I tend to easily grow tired of family movies if they’re either too hokey or corny; most of the time, they’re both.
Equilibrium (2002)
If I was to explain this movie to someone in one sentence it would be this: “George Orwell meets John Woo”. I thought about Orwell he’d probably approve of this film. The center for which all the soldiers come from is called “Equilibrium” or balance as it is layman’s terms; they’re all injected with an opium drug that they carry that numbs their emotions and sense of guilt while they’re controlled by the heavily armed heavily secure government facility. Paired with incredible direction and writing by Kurt Wimmer and sleek stylish cinematography by Dion Beebe, we’re given a glimpse into a world that’s still imperfect despite it being under control.
The Tuxedo (2002)
Jackie Chan seems often bored and detached from this film, never giving the charisma he displays in his movies. It dawned upon me that he might be aging or running out of ideas as he starts using wires to help with most of his stunts. We open with him attempting to ask a sexy art dealer on a date and ultimately screw it up. I found it hard to believe that an art dealer would go out with a creepy stuttering taxi driver, so I wasn’t surprised when she rejected him like a bad habit.
Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever (2002)
“Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever” sways the general public into thinking this is a sort of “Spy vs. Spy” film, but it’s not. It’s not “Ecks vs. Sever”, it’s “Ecks fights Sever for a while and then they become allies when they discover they’re fighting for the same cause”. But that would be a stupid long title, not like “Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever” which is… never mind. The film is chock full of clichés, meaningless violence, lapses in pure logic and plausibility, little to no character emphases, and plot holes galore. Antonio Banderas’ character Jeremiah Ecks is a mix of many, many tired and generic hero elements from previous action movies starring Sylvester Stallone, Schwarzenegger, and a lot of other people.
Spy Kids (2001)
Two kids discover their supposedly uncool parents are famous secret spies. When the parents get caught by an evil genius, they must band together and rescue their parents. This is such a nice movie. Not for its action or acting, but for its simplicity. It makes so many attempts at being nonviolent even though there is a lot of martial-arts scenes, and no guns. James Bond would be proud of these kids. The two offspring of enemy secret spies turned lovers obtain the elements of being a spy, though they don’t know it yet. Alexa Vega’s character is the oldest sister and contains the physical abilities and ferocity of a spy, and Daryl Sabara’s character obtains the mental and technological abilities it takes to be a spy.
Blade II (2002)
We meet Blade again, back from the original blockbuster hit from ’98 and he’s still kicking undead ass as much as ever, except now he’s in Europe. In the movie, there are these new evolved vampires called “Reapers” on the loose that are stronger, faster, smarter, cooler, and a lot more scarier than regular vampires. The thing with this species is that they don’t only feed on humans but on vampires as well. Now, a group of trained vampires called the “Blood Pack” enlists blade in helping them eliminate the potential threat. But is there more to their offer than meets the eye?