Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! (2015)

We kick off our first annual Shark Week celebration with the third installment in The Asylum's Sharknado series. Though these are technically TV movies due to the deal The Asylum has with SyFy to release them, to me they've always been DTV in spirit, and the kind of film the site was made for, so worth us checking them out. In addition to us, our friend Fred the Wolf at Full Moon Reviews has covered this, so you can go to his site to see what he thought of it.

Sharknado 3 picks up where part 2 left off. In the aftermath of the last Sharknado, Ian Ziering is hailed as a hero and is honored in a ceremony at the White House with the Golden Chainsaw. As luck would have it, another Sharknado is building off the East Coast just in time to attack the White House and ruin the ceremony. This storm is headed to Florida, where his family is vacationing, so he needs to shoot down there and save them. In the process, he and his team discover that this is bigger than the other ones, perhaps becoming a Sharkicane! The only person who can help now is Ziering's estranged father, played by the Hoff.

The natural go to here is to say the franchise is jumping the shark, but I have a feeling that's exactly what The Asylum and everyone involved with making this want us to say when we see this, so I'm not taking the bait. (Though I guess I already did just by writing what I wrote...) When I looked it up, this one didn't do as well as part 2 did when it aired, so we could already see the wave cresting and the enthusiasm waning, yet they still did three more. It makes sense, because, with a $2.4 million budget, if over 2 million people watched it, those are a lot of eyes seeing advertisements, which necessitates at least a 4th to see how much further they can take it. And the next thing you know we've got six. For The Asylum as newly inducted members into the 30 Club--and the only non-Hall of Famer to be in--these Sharknadoes represent their biggest successes, and while there are others, like Android Cop, that I prefer, it's still nice to see The Asylum reach these heights, coming from where they did when we started this blog, covering films like Snakes on a Train and Transmorphers. In that sense, I feel like it's worth celebrating their success overall, no matter how one feels about whether or not by part 3 they've jumped the shark--but I get it too if you don't have that soft spot in your heart and you're thinking "enough already" by part 3.

Still the most fascinating aspect of this for me is Ian Ziering. Loved Steve Sanders on 90210, despite the fact that I think I was supposed to like Dylan or Brandon more. There are still shades of Steve Sanders in Ziering's Fin here, which makes it that much more fun to watch--not to mention the added touch of the car he's driving in this having the same license plates that his Corvette on the show had. Seeing him do well in this franchise post-90210 is as good a reason as any for me to root for this series to succeed, it's just hard with the rinse-repeat nature of it to keep the novelty going. But, as you can imagine, I'll still be back here at some point for number 4, and will still be reminiscing about 90210.

We did have a Hall of Famer in our midst, 30 Club member Lorenzo Lamas has a short cameo--so short, he didn't even have a still frame of just his head in the shot for me to get a good screen. True to our rule though, except for the time we couldn't find Don "The Dragon" Wilson in Siege of Firebase Gloria, we always get the Hall of Famer's shot in the review, so here was the best I could do. If you follow Lamas on Instagram, you'll see that he's looking to become a pilot, so this cameo role was made for him. I also like that he played a character named Sergeant Rock, both in reference to the great comic book of the past, but also to Lamas's role as Chilly D (short for "Chilliam Davis" I believe) in the film Body Rock. For a short cameo, this was a fun one.

We can now add Mark Cuban to the list of names who have played the President of the United States in a film we've reviewed here on the site, joining Roy Scheider, Rutger Hauer, Vivica A. Fox, Mel Novak, Charlie Sheen, and Jerry Springer. I know of him mostly as the owner of the Mavericks, but recently he's receded a bit from being the more outspoken and controversial owner he was when he first bought the team. In 2011 his Mavericks won the NBA Championship, the biggest irony of that being, before 2011 he was the guy fans most loved to see fail; but in 2011 LeBron went to the Miami Heat to form a super team, which made them the schadenfreude darlings of the league, so by the time the Mavericks made the Finals against the Heat, sentiment had done a 180 and everyone was rooting for Cuban and his Mavs, and I don't think he ever lost that luster fully after. All of that made his appearance as the President here much more fun.

That was probably more basketball talk than anyone would have wanted, but when a film intentionally jumps the shark like this one did, sometimes you run out of things to discuss. The thing is, when I compare this to some other DTV franchises we've looked at on the site, is it really any worse? By Bloodfist VIII they had devolved into just actioners featuring Don "The Dragon" as a guy taking on the world--and not even the same guy in each film either! The Kickboxers featured Sasha Mitchell in 2-4, with two and four directed by Albert Pyun, and then 5 had Marc Dacascos. By the time you hit that fifth one, we have a baddie from Space Mutiny forming his own kickboxing league, and killing anyone who doesn't join. And with the Bloodsports, by Bloodsport 4 we had Daniel Bernhardt fighting in a Dark Kumite run by Benjamin Franklin. I think the big difference between those and the Sharknado franchise, is those other ones played it straight, where as these ones they're in on the joke. I get it, how can you play a tornado of sharks straight? It just means the shelf life may not be as long.

And with that, I think this is a good time to wrap this one up. Right now you can stream it, and the rest of the Sharknado films on Prime. I don't know if they're binge-worthy, but consumed as one-offs, they can be a fun time. As you can imagine, we'll be back here at some point in the future to cover part 4.

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3899796

Savage Dog (2017)

When I had Simon from Explosive Action on the pod to discuss Avengement, he had this right up there as another favorite Adkins flick of his. Hearing that I knew I had to make this happen. In addition to us, our friends Ty and Brett at Comeuppance Reviews, and Mitch at the Video Vacuum have looked at this, so you can go to their sites to see what they thought.

Savage Dog takes place in 1950s French Indochina (which might make the title Chien Savage?), where Scott Adkins is a prisoner forced to fight other prisoners by an evil Nazi warden (Vladimir Kulich, who played Tommy in the Debt Collector films--though not taking any cream off the vig in this one). When he gets his release, he goes to work at Keith David's bar, where he meets JuJu Chen and falls in love with her. To make extra cash, he fights in the Nazi warden's underground fight club, which, as you can imagine, doesn't end well. This is all in the first half of the movie. In the second half, Adkins is unleashed on a revenge quest against the Nazi warden and his crew.

As we were discussing Avengement more, Simon decided he preferred it to Savage Dog, but he was torn. For me, I wasn't torn, I liked Avengement more than this, but that doesn't mean this wasn't fantastic either. I think the beginning of this is a bit more of a slow burner--not without its moments though--but then it goes ape shit. Avengement is ape shit from the beginning, and just gives us breathers from time to time to collect ourselves. But man, when this get kicks it into that next gear, it really gets there. When it is slower at the beginning though, we have performances by Adkins, Chen, David, and Kulich; plus, among Kulich's gang are Cung Le and Marko Zaror, so the slower opening is really just preparing us for Adkins's eventual fights with both, which don't disappoint. In their review on Comeuppance, Ty and Brett were saying that this is one of those few modern DTV flicks that meets the standard set by those great DTV flicks of the 80s and 90s, and I agree with them on that. Adkins and Jesse V. Johnson have done it again.

Recently Adkins was on our friend Jon Cross's Booth Talk podcast (which if you aren't subscribed you really should be!) to discuss his latest film, Legacy of Lies, and on that one he mentions that people doubt his acting ability. First off, if that were true then neither Debt Collector would have worked, because part of the charm of that is his interplay with Louis Mandylor; but also, here he has many scenes with Keith David, who's an excellent actor, and he holds his own in all of them. While we don't come to an Adkins action film for his acting, we're coming for his explosive, high-octane martial arts, if he couldn't act these films wouldn't quite be what they are, so he does deserve credit for that. I don't know that anyone is killing it the way Adkins is right now, and it's exciting to see him get after it in film after film. This is just another we can add to that great list.

I recently watched Wu Assassins on Netflix, and while the show itself fell into the classic Netflix show trap where I feel like I'm watching a 10-hour movie and I get burned out, JuJu Chen was amazing in it as the Triad enforcer for Byron Mann's character. We talk about Adkins getting after it, but Chen really got after it in that show, and it's a shame we didn't see any of that here. Just the same, she turns in a great performance alongside Adkins, and it works for what it was; but one fight scene would have been great too. She did a film recently with Luke Goss called Hollow Point, where not only does she get to fight, but Luke Goss doesn't affect an American accent, so that's definitely on the list to check out once it's available.

This is our seventh Keith David film on the site, and like those others, he doesn't disappoint. I think the thing with him is, he's usually not the lead, and I usually don't seek out films for him specifically, but if I'm torn between a couple films, and he's in the cast of one, it's definitely a selling point that will lean me in that film's direction. One aspect I thought they did really well with here too is they leaned on his great voice work by having him be the narrator as well as part of the cast. Another film we did with him in it, Dirty, didn't make the same choice, instead opting for another cast member to do it, and the film suffered. Here's to you Keith David, you're one of the great ones.

Finally, this film features Cung Le and Marko Zaror, two excellent fighters that we can't wait to see Adkins get after it with. For me, this is part of what makes Jesse V. Johnson so great in the action realm right now, because the temptation is probably to have Adkins fight either or both of them sooner in the film, and he ignored that and left it until the end. It's a lot of trust in the audience, because that first half isn't as action-packed as the second, and with all the options at our fingertips on streaming sites, if we're bored we'll find something else. There was just enough there in that first half for me to keep me watching, and I was rewarded with the payoff of two great scenes, one each with Le and Zaror--plus so many other great scenes as Adkins was unleashed on his road to revenge.

And that's as good a note to end this on as any. I put this right behind Avengement on my list of Adkins/Johnson collaborations, right above Accident Man. To go back to my mention of the Comeuppance review, this is the action that will keep you from saying "man, they just don't make them like they did in the 80s and 90s"--at least for 90 minutes.

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5851014

Hellbound (1994)

Recently I made a post for Street Knight, and realized that that was the 40th post of a Cannon film. It was kind of an after the fact thing, so I felt like I should give them a fuller post to commemorate their entrance into the 40 Club. They join Dolph, Gary Daniels, Art Camacho, and Albert Pyun in that exclusive group. In trying to think of the right thing to watch, Osvaldo Neto of Toca Terror mentioned this, because it was the last film from the Cannon Group--plus he got me a YouTube link for it so I could check it out! A lot of people have covered this, including, Mitch at the Video Vacuum and robotGEEK's Cult Cinema, so you can go there to see what they thought.

Hellbound is about an ancient demon that was locked in a coffin a thousand years or so ago, and then in the 1990s it was unleashed. When it's unleashed, it ends up in Chicago, where it runs afoul of Chuck Norris. He's the wrong guy to run afoul of. Chuck and his partner (Calvin Jackson), chase the demon all the way to Israel to try and take him down and send him back to hell. The demon won't know what hit it.

And neither will we with all the padding to get us there. I think that's the problem with this movie, it doesn't know if it wants to be a cop actioner, a martial arts flick, a supernatural/religious thriller, or a mix of all of the above, but it ends up struggling on all fronts, which is too bad. This is not the Cannon/Norris classics we're used to, but in a way is a fitting end to the Cannon run, to go out with one of their biggest stars in something that, to a large extent was sauteed in wrong sauce. I think on the other hand, as the Cannon Group's last film (Street Knight was the film produced by Cannon), it's an interesting artifact in and of itself. Like a piece of pottery found at the baddie's archaeological site in this film, we can look at this as a piece of something bigger, a wave that crested in the history of the action movie world, and to that extent I think it's worth checking out.

This marks 41 Cannon films here at the DTVC, and so not only getting them into the 40 Club, but also giving them a post to fully honor them, is very necessary. That feeling we get when we see that Cannon logo flash onto the screen is something that all of us who like the kinds of movies we like know and understand. It's like the smell of comfort food cooking in the kitchen, or the opening chords to a song we love. Even when it's a film like this, which I didn't enjoy as much as some of their others, the mere sight of the logo gets me in a mindset to at least think I'm going to like it. And what's fascinating is, as this wave was cresting, in the late 80s/early 90s, a new wave was forming behind it, PM Entertainment, and by 1994 we could see that one building further out to sea. When you think about it, between Cannon in the 80s to early 90s, and then PM from the early 90s through to 2000, we in the DTV action world had it pretty good.

Chuck Norris turned 80 this year. That means he was already in his 50s when he made this. That might explain the lack of fight scenes, but it's also crazy to think that he's 80 now! It was also fitting that it was his film that was the last from The Cannon Group, because he was such a staple of their films in the 80s. I think my personal favorite of his Cannon flicks is Invasion USA, which I did review here. Whatever your thoughts on Norris's extreme right wing views, he was one of the most influential action stars ever, and his 80s Cannon stuff was some of the best ever.

So why didn't this work then, if Cannon and Norris were such a great team? The thing is, it does have its moments, but it tries to do too much, and when that happens, often it ends up doing too little. The going to Israel part is filled with things like a crazy driver driving them through the city, a kid pickpocketing the partner--because Norris would never let a kid pick his pocket. In Invasion USA we had pitched battles everywhere, a suburban family trimming the tree getting their house blown up by an RPG, just tons of amazing stuff. This may have been trying to be something different, which I respect, but sometimes different isn't always better.

As we move Cannon into the 40 Club, I feel like it's best to wrap this up by talking about their influence on me and ultimately creating this site. The 80s were my formative years on the planet. It was a time of big hair, big music, and big movies, but there was something about the Cannon action flick that stood out for me, whether it was the American Ninja series, the Stallone and Norris actioners, or even the Pyun flicks that I didn't know at the time were Pyun flicks. It's fitting then that they're the first studio/production company to get into the 40 Club.

It's time to wrap this one up. I think for me, it really is the novelty that this is the last Cannon Group film. It feels like you're moving, and you're cleaning up the house and taking one last look around, going through some of those last memories. For me as a movie it has its flaws, kind of like when you have that one last meal at that place before you move, and they get the order wrong, but you're enjoying the company and the people you're with before you leave the next day.

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107101

The Wrong Child (2016)

While I was doing my Gary Daniels list for Letterboxd, I saw this come up on the Lifetime Movie Network in a search for him on cable, so I figured I'd DVR it and give it a shot. It kind of brought me back to the old days when I first started the blog when streaming services weren't quite a thing yet, when DVR was a major tool in my arsenal to get movies for the site. Now I never do it beyond a situation like this where the film isn't available anywhere else. Let's see how it did.

The Wrong Child is one in a series of stand-alone "wrong" movies often directed by David DeCoteau and starring Vivica A. Fox. This one features Fox as a bookstore owner married to architect Gary Daniels, living in a posh lifestyle in LA with her daughter Amy. When a young man shows up seemingly out of nowhere claiming Daniels is his father, Daniels is dubious, but Fox wants to take this possible son into her home and welcome him into the family. If there were nothing wrong though, we'd have no movie, and eventually the cracks in the young man's story start to show, and he's having trouble killing people in time to keep it from unraveling. Will Fox figure it out in time to save her family?

This movie was fun in that William R. Moses-Joanna Kerns kind of way. And to have DTVC Hall of Famer Gary Daniels in that William R. Moses part is even better. You can tell that DeCoteau and Fox are more at home in this environment, which gives it almost like a comic book crossover or Laff-A-Lympics quality to it, like William R. Moses is off in another film in wearing all black, carrying a gun, and sneaking into an abandoned factory to take out a bunch of baddies, while Daniels is here making this. Beyond that, I love a good Lifetime movie, and DeCoteau and Fox seem to get what makes those fun for people, which makes this even better. For Daniels fans, this is an enjoyable change of pace.

49 movies at the DTVC for Gary Daniels. 50 is so close now. It's like watching ESPN and them cutting into a regular program to show a player's at-bat when he's sitting on a milestone home run--and being only the second person in the 50 Club along with Dolph Lundgren is like Hank Aaron hitting his 700th home run to join Babe Ruth (and of course, we call Dolph the Babe Ruth of DTV), so this is a big deal. Before I say this is the most unique film we've seen Daniels do, he also did a Lifetime-esque movie, Dark Secrets aka Cold Earth. That one was nowhere near as fun as this one was though. If you look at my Gary Daniels list on Letterboxd, I actually have this one one ahead of I Am Vengeanace. I think the latter may have been better overall, but from a Daniels standpoint, I liked what he did here slightly more. We've seen him play a kickass baddie before, but to do William R. Moses as well as he did here was a different story, but cool to see happen.

The real star of the film of course is Vivica A. Fox. When we last saw her here at the DTVC she was making history as the first black woman playing the President in a live-action feature film. While she was making history in that one, this movie required more work on her part, and she delivers. You get the sense that DeCoteau leans on her because she knows what he wants almost intuitively, which I imagine would be enormous when making a film like this on short time and a short budget. As the film is wrapping up, and loose ends are flying at us from all over the place, Fox is acting her way through it effortlessly, like Neo in the Matrix. It's a thing to behold as a fan of low-budget films or films made on a shortened schedule like I am. For them to really work, we need a cast and crew who don't betray that it's done quickly and maybe without a lot of resources, and Fox is a master at it. A lot of accolades are given to Eric Roberts for his work in the "Stalked by My Doctor" films, but I think Fox deserves that same praise, if not more, because it's just as impressive what she's done with these "The Wrong" movies.

I'm not entirely sure, but I think this is our first David DeCoteau film at the DTVC. I don't know how that happened though, considering he's done over 160, you'd think we'd have walked into at least one other out of the 1000+ we've done. That's the hard part though, with over 160 movies to page through, it's not easy to find one to see if I've reviewed it. I think the same way I'm giving Fox praise for her performance, I have to do the same with DeCoteau's ability to land this plane in the allotted time, again while these loose ends of the plot are flying together in the last ten minutes or so; and know too that he has someone in Fox who can help him land it. Look at that picture below. That's the daughter, apparently bound and gagged under that sack, we don't really know, and Fox has to act like that's not the most ridiculous thing ever, and DeCoteau has to create the atmosphere that isn't saying "that's gotta be the most ridiculous thing ever," which then enhances our fun with it when they're playing it straight like that. And then they're each going to do another 6 or 7 movies that year too. It's amazing.

One thing that has changed between when I started the blog and now, is I can access my DVR on my computer. When I first started, I had no way of getting images off the DVR, so I either took them from the trailer, or hotlinked them from other sites (which I learned early on was a no-no). From there, I got software that allowed me to run either my VCR or my cable box through my computer, so I got images that way. Now, Xfinity allows me to access both my DVR and their OnDemand library through my browser, so I don't need any of that. It's a pretty sweet deal. On the other hand, because LMN had that watermark up the whole time, my screens from this one all have that, which I don't like. I've come a long way from the old hotlinking days.

And after that walk down memory lane, it's time to wrap this one up. As far as I can tell, this is only available on the Lifetime Movie Network whenever they decide to show it. I'd keep an eye out for it and record it, because it is a real fun one, even if you're not a Lifetime movie fan, just for the Daniels factor. Next time we see him here, he'll be in the 50 Club.

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5538912

Don't Kill It (2016)

Since I've gotten the site back up after my hiatus, among all the Dolph flicks that came out in between, this is one that I've been hearing a lot about. When I had Sean Malloy of the Dolph podcast "I Must Break This Podcast" on a little while back, I figured this would be the perfect one for us to cover. In addition to us, our friend Mitch at the Video Vacuum has covered this as well, so you can go to his site to see what he thinks about it.

Don't Kill It is a Minion-esque thriller that follows Dolph as a demon hunter on the search for a demon that inhabits people's bodies and goes on a killing spree. The catch: if you kill the person whom the demon is inhabiting, it will then inhabit you. There's actually another catch: getting people to believe him when he tells them why there's been a string of recent murders. But when one of the survivors of the killing spree describes to the FBI agent assigned to the case, Kristina Klebe, exactly what Dolph was telling her, she starts to believe. Belief isn't enough though, the next part is how do you stop it?

I really enjoyed this one. This is up there as one of my favorite Dolph DTV flicks from the decade, which is saying a lot considering how many he's had! (I think I counted 28 DTV flicks alone, so that's not counting the big screen ones or made for TV ones.) It had the feel of a Marx Brothers movie where there was a secret package or briefcase that was being passed around while the guys tried to get it. In one scene in the town hall, that element really came through in a way that I hadn't seen done before. By the same token, that element of keeping the package away from Dolph did get repetitive after a bit, especially when it seemed like one annoying character after another standing in his way, but just when it felt like too much, the movie would do something fun to bring us back. To almost quote a Beatles song, sometimes fun is all you need.

The obvious comparison here is with 1998's The Minion--which has the distinction of being the only movie that I know of that has had my review of it quoted on the box. The big difference between the two: this one is played up more intentionally to be fun, whereas The Minion wasn't so much on purpose; and the other is The Minion has more sentimental value as one my friends and I have enjoyed on multiple viewings. The late 90s was not as good as the first half of the decade for DTV flicks, but The Minion was one of the fun stand-outs, and overall it's hard for movies of the 2010s to stand-up to the standard of the 90s, but I think Don't Kill It is one that works even by that lofty bar--but because the 2010s overall wasn't as good, when we see something like Don't Kill It the tendency is to think it's even better than it is as a result.

When Sean and I were discussing Dolph's career, one thing that came up was how the late 90s/early 2000s was not a great time for his movies. If you go from '95's Hidden Assassin to '04's Retrograde, there are a lot of ones like The Minion and Bridge of Dragons that my friends and I had fun with, but not a lot of quality. I feel like you could make an even stronger point about his 2010s post-Expendables DTV output, only the bad ones weren't as fun either. Films like Ambushed, Stash House, The Package, and Legendary didn't even have the kind of fun rewatchability of The Minion or Bridge of Dragons. I think that's another area where something like this, or Altitude or Battle of the Damned, stands out even more, because we've wanted something fun from him akin to those 90s and 2000s ones we loved so much. By the same token, what made the 2010s unique from the '95-'04 period was Dolph's big screen successes. He stole The Expendables at the beginning of the decade, gave a great performance is Creed II, and had a fun turn in a supporting role in Aquaman. He also had some TV appearances--including a role in Arrow which I haven't gotten to yet--I'm only on season 3 as I'm writing this--so we can't judge his decade on solely his DTV output like we can the 90s and 2000s.

Dolph's costar in this is Kristina Klebe, and like Altitude and Acceleration, it felt like another good instance where Dolph's female lead wasn't simply there to be a love interest and/or damsel in distress, but rather a real character with agency who wasn't just waiting for Dolph to swoop in and save the day. This one's a little different from those two, in that in those two Denise Richards and Natalie Burn were the films' main protagonists; but it was still good to see that, even with Dolph being the main hero, that they could cast Klebe and write the part to have her be Dolph's partner, and not simply be there for a couple love scenes and a rescue at the end.

Speaking of costars, this one features Dolph film mainstay James Chalke, for the second time as a man of the cloth--the other being Dead Trigger. If you go on his IMDb, he has 24 credits, of which 10 are Dolph flicks--and of those 10, we've reviewed all of them here at the DTVC except for Larceny and Shark Lake--we've also done one of his non-Dolphs, 1993's Gunmen. I wonder if we're going to have to start tagging him...

On that note, let's wrap this one up. As of writing this, you can stream it on Prime, which I think is a good deal. It's definitely one of the most fun recent Dolph flicks. Also, check out the podcast episode Sean Malloy and I did on this one, and check out his podcast on all things Dolph at https://imustbreakthispodcast.wordpress.com/

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3113696

The Siege of Firebase Gloria (1989)

This is another one of those that I had been meaning to do for a long time, and as I was looking at Don "The Dragon" Wilson's filmography to see what else we could review, this one came up on IMDb, and it was on Prime, so I figured I'd give it a shot--not to mention, it features DTVC Hall of Famer and Wings Hauser, whom we haven't seen in a long time either, so it moved to the top of the list. This has also been covered by Ty and Brett at Comeuppance, Will at Exploding Helicopter, Mitch at the Video Vacuum, Jack at When the Vietnam War Raged... in the Philippines, and Ninja Dixon, so you can check out their sites to see what they thought as well.

The Siege of Firebase Gloria features R. Lee Emery as a sergeant leading his men in Vietnam, only to discover that the Viet Cong are planning a big move. He gets his men as far as Firebase Gloria, which is undermanned and under-supplied. Among his men is his second in command, Di Nardo (Hauser), who is a great soldier but is also cracking a bit due to the stress of war. Emery's going to need everything, including a Wings at 100%, if this small firebase is going to hold off looming the attacks from the Viet Cong.

This was a good one. Not your standard 'Namsploitation of huts exploding and Reb Brown screaming; but also not your Full Metal Jacket or Platoon examination of the war and the people in it. This is just a bloody fight for survival, kill or be killed, it's either him or me. Gory, action packed, not pulling any punches, just getting after it for 90 minutes and not letting up. The other thing is, while this is DTV and done on a budget by exploitation master Brian Trenchard-Smith, it feels closer to its cinematic counterparts than your usual Japanese VHS 'Namspoiltation shot in the Philippines that we're used to seeing. If you haven't seen this one yet, it's definitely worth checking out.

This is my first Wings Hauser flick since I've come back from hiatus, so shame on me. I do think to some extent absence has made the heart grow fonder, because, between this and a few other Wings flicks I've watched recently, I realize why I enjoy his work so much and why he was an inaugural Hall of Famer. Beyond the fact that he's invested in this role and is really digging in to play this part, I saw on IMDb that he said, as an actor who grew up in Hollywood, he was more about the entertainment part of acting than the craft part that New York actors tended to get hung up on. You definitely get that here, as much as he's giving us the stern, dramatic aspects, he's also wanting us to be entertained, which makes this work on a different level. In "An Oral History of PM Entertainment" from Joe Yanick for Hopes & Fears magazine, Kathleen Kinmont said Wings was a Vietnam vet. I couldn't find that anywhere in his bio, but he does have a huge gap in his filmography between 1967 and 1975, so it would make sense. If that's the case, you could tell he drew on that to round out this performance. I know, whenever I do a review of someone who I haven't reviewed in a while, I say I'll make sure I get more of their stuff up, but there's a lot more Wings out there to get to, so hopefully we'll make it happen.

Speaking of authenticity, R. Lee Emery definitely has that. You almost get the sense that he's not acting when he does these roles, which may be the case, but still, to do it on camera takes a special talent. It's like Tony Sirico playing mob guys, yes, he has that experience, but he's also an actor who can draw on that to make something compelling onscreen. If it was just having been in the military that would make Emery work in these roles, all the Navy Seals movies that use real Navy Seals would work, which isn't the case. Emery was able to take that experience and make a movie like this work better because of his acting talent, which he coupled with his military experience.

I learned a big lesson from watching this: I don't always pay attention to the movies I review as well as I should. I totally missed the helicopter explosion, and had to go back to Exploding Helicopter's review to find out where it was, then go back in the movie and see it. It turned out I had seen it, but it didn't register because I was either playing around on my phone or looking at something else. It's embarrassing, and probably something I shouldn't be admitting here, but this is the modern age, where kids post videos on YouTube saying all kinds of personal things, so why not expose my own flaws as a human with the readers of this post?

We're onto the seventh paragraph, and this may be the latest I've ever brought up a DTVC Hall of Famer before, but that's because I also missed Don "The Dragon" Wilson's small part in this. I went back through a few areas where I thought he might be, but didn't see him. IMDb says he's in it as "Donald Wilson," so I'm taking their word for it and tagging him, which is now 33 for him--still a ways out from the 40 Club, but on his way for sure. When I looked at the other sites I listed above who had reviewed this, none of them mentioned Wilson either, so maybe I wasn't the only one who missed it. It's because I missed it though that I put Wilson's paragraph at the bottom. This may also be the first time a DTVC Hall of Famer got a tag for a role that I totally missed in watching it.

With that, it's time to wrap this up. You can get this on Prime as of my writing, which I think is a great way to make this happen. 90+ minutes of blood and guts kill or be killed military action. We always applaud movies when they get after it on here, and this one definitely does that.

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0098328

Abstruse (2019)

After reviewing Eternal Code, one of the film's producers, Joe Williamson, asked me if I could do another one of writer/director/actor Harley Wallen's films, and I was all for it. Seeing Tom Sizemore's name on the tin, and being a big Saved by the Bell fan and wanting to get Dennis Haskins on the site, really sold it; plus, it's always good to get the word out on another indie project. On the other hand, when I jumped into the screener, I saw that the runtime was 1 hour 56 minutes. Gasp!

Abstruse follows Kaiti Wallen as Amanda, a bartender whose coworker is killed by a local rich kid and senator's son (Kris Reilly) during an erotic asphyxia moment gone wrong. The police don't believe her, and it looks like someone is covering up for the senator (Haskins). As luck would have it, Wallen's father, Sizemore, is getting out of prison, and he's happy to get his daughter out of this mess and bring this kid down. But the question is, is the rich kid so far gone that he brings himself down first? And how many other people with him?

Our number one rule at the DTVC is anything over 88 minutes is borrowed time. The thing is though, it's not just our rule, it's pretty consistent among bloggers in our community. I remember talking to Jacob Gustafson, who wrote Awful Awesome Action, Vol. 1, and he talked about being scared when he sees a 100-minute runtime. Ty from Comeuppance Reviews and I discuss how sweet a nice 80-minute flick is. Even taking a sample of the external reviews of this film, whether people loved it or killed it, the common complaint either way was the length.  Unfortunately this detracts from some really great stuff that I'll be discussing in the following paragraphs, like the performances or the great shots, because the story tends to get in the way of that. I don't agree with the people who killed this film, it's not a one-star or anything bad like that. It's an earnest independent project that had some really good points, and I'm going to make sure my review reflects my respect for that overall.

This begs the question, what would I have cut or how would I have done it differently? For me, this had elements that reminded me of the early 90s erotic thrillers I'd catch on cable at that time. The killing of the friend in particular really brought me back to those. In that space, maybe the thing is Kaiti Wallen's character witnesses her friend's murder--or even just suspects it if the friend goes missing--then goes to the police, and by the time they get to the killer's apartment, he's cleaned it all up, and they don't believe her. Except for grizzled veteran detective, Tom Sizemore, his gut is telling him she's telling the truth. Maybe he has an estranged daughter that Wallen reminds him of. But the thing is, even with Sizemore's help, ultimately the job of investigating falls on Wallen. She's our hero, and we could lean on her great performance and Kris Reilly's as the killer to have this tense game of cat and mouse. What happens in the film that we have though, is instead Sizemore takes over for Wallen as the hero, and to some extent Haskins and the crooked cops try to take over for Reilly as the baddies. 90 minutes; taut, tense, sexual thriller; baddie who oozes death and menace in every scene, juxtaposed by a heroine we want to root for--this formula worked well for Shannon Tweed in 1994, and with Harley Wallen's direction and Michael Kettenbeil's cinematography, this could have even exceeded what those early 90s erotic thrillers were.

Look at that shot there. You wouldn't have known that that was preceded by a lot of back-and-forth of dialog between the two that we didn't need. The shot does it all. The thing is, like Eternal Code, Harley Wallen had a message he wanted to give, about how the rich and powerful can play with the lives of those less fortunate; but also that you have Haskins, the senator, who's a horrible father and essentially leads to his son being a sociopathic killer by how poorly he raised him, but society applauds him as a great man; versus Sizemore as the felon who's a great father and raises a great daughter in Kaiti Wallen's character, but society shames him. In Eternal Code, the message made sense about the rich and powerful--that some lives are worth more than others in our society--because that was literally the movie; but here it felt grafted on and weighed the film down for me. Sometimes a shot like this is all you need.

When Kris Reilly as the baddie captures Kaiti Wallen's other friend, played by Jesi Jensen, that interplay also reminded me a lot of those old 90s erotic thrillers on cable. It was a common device: maybe the hero/heroine thinks one guy is the killer, so they hone in on them, only to discover that it's this person they were close to all along and they realize that person is with the friend! Here it wasn't like that at all though, Reilly actually threatened Jensen's character earlier on, and while the tension of him having captured her is there, it's also diminished by all the other loose ends needing to be tied up. The usual way to pull this off in a 90-minute film is have her get captured around the 70-75-minute mark, and we're able to really focus on her danger plus the heroine's race against time; but here it happens around the 90 minute mark with another half-hour to go, and we have to deal with Reilly taking care of his father, his father's fixer, and the detectives. Again, if you look at that shot below, it's tense, scary stuff, but we as the audience just don't get the chance we need to lean into it with everything else going on.

As much as I liked Tom Sizemore in this, and as much as you could really tell how good he was as an actor compared to everyone else, I do feel like it's important to give credit to Kaiti Wallen and Kris Reilly. Had this been a smaller-scale film, I think the two of them combined with Wallen's direction and Kettenbeil's cinematography could have carried it. Kris Reilly was chilling as the killer, and Kaiti Wallen was lead that you could root for. The problem is, Wallen's character isn't established well to start, it's actually the friend who's murdered, Jessika Johnson, who gets established at the beginning instead; and then she gets diminished further by the way Sizemore almost takes over the hero role. And then I think Reilly also gets diminished, because we end up with too many baddies: Haskins as his father, Cody, his father's fixer, and the crooked cops, one of which was played by Harley Wallen. Despite the fact that the roles may have been diminished though, the performances weren't, and I think it will be cool to see if Wallen goes back to them in future films.

I think it's time to wrap this up. There were some real bright moments in this, but ultimately for me, that near two-hour runtime overshadows it. Looking at it from an independent production standpoint though, I would hate for people to miss out on Harley Wallen's direction, Michael Kettenbeil's work as director of photography, and the performances by Kris Reilly and Kaiti Wallen. I think it's just always a harder ask of people in a two-hour package. I want to thank Joe Williamson again for giving me the screener for this and having me check it out, as I always appreciate the opportunity to do that!

For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6271432