S.W.A.T.: FIREFIGHT is the straight to video sequel to the movie everybody kinda forgot about, based on the TV show that people only know of if they know the fucking awesome theme song. So before we get into this particular movie, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the one and only reason for the continued existence of the S.W.A.T. franchise of trademarked intellectual properties and likenesses and what not: (read the rest of this shit…)
Archive for the ‘Action’ Category
S.W.A.T. Firefight
Wednesday, March 30th, 2011Sucker Punch
Saturday, March 26th, 2011
SUCKER PUNCH is such an extreme movie stylistically that I feel like I oughta have an extreme reaction to it. Something along the lines of either I want to set up a bunch of traps to torture this movie while I preach to it through a series of self-aggrandizing recordings and puppet displays or I am currently giving this movie an erotic massage and we’ll see where it goes next but spoiler alert it’s not gonna be Biblically approved. Unfortunately I am too much of a centrist. Actually I feel kinda similar about all of Zack Snyder’s movies so far: it doesn’t entirely work, but it’s kind of awesome, I enjoyed it. I guess he’s consistently inconsistent. (read the rest of this shit…)
Merantau
Friday, March 25th, 2011
MERANTAU is a simple, straight forward martial arts movie from Indonesia. Iko Uwais plays a young man named Yuda (I know, make a Yoda joke, or “Yuda man” or something) who goes on his merantau, his journey to find himself and become a man. He lives out in the boonies practicing his silat, he figures he’ll take a bus into Jakarta and try to get a job teaching it, see how that goes. But he gets sidetracked.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Kill Zone (SPL: Sha Po Lang)
Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011
Before Wilson Yip directed Donnie Yen in the IP MAN series the two had already done a bunch of movies together. Their first collaboration was the 2005 crime movie SPL: SHA PO LANG. The title has to do with Chinese mythology and every man’s capacity for both good and evil. That’s hard to translate for Americans so the Weinsteins called it KILL ZONE. It’s about a zone of killing.
(read the rest of this shit…)
Besouro
Friday, March 18th, 2011
Here’s a nice surprise, just something I found at the video store that I never heard of before, sounded interesting from the description on the box and it turned out it was. BESOURO is another movie based on the life of a legendary martial artist, except not an Asian one. This is a Brazilian film about a capoeira fighter.
The movie takes place in 1924. A narrator tells us that it’s less than 40 years after slavery ended in Brazil, that Africans are still treated like shit, that their religions and the practice of capoeira are outlawed. The setting is a small settlement where mostly African-Brazilians live, but they work in the sugar cane fields for an asshole white Colonel who uses the n-word more than 50 Cent does (played by Michael Richards [no, not really, but wouldn’t that be weird though?]). (read the rest of this shit…)
Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen
Wednesday, March 16th, 2011
LEGEND OF THE FIST: THE RETURN OF CHEN ZHEN is the latest in Hong Kong’s prestigious line of FIST movies. If you’re not familiar with the saga it’s very simple: Chen Zhen is a vengeful kung fu master who was played by Bruce Lee in FIST OF FURY (1976), Jet Li in FIST OF LEGEND (1994), Donnie Yen in the FIST OF LEGEND tv series (1995), and Donnie Yen again in this movie based on his tv series adapted from Bruce Lee’s movie because of the popularity of Jet Li’s movie. The fictional Chen Zhen is supposed to be a student of the historical Huo Yuanjia, who was played by Jet Li in FEARLESS (2006). So keep in mind while watching that movie that Jet Li is playing teacher to himself and Bruce Lee and Donnie Yen, who of course played teacher to Bruce Lee in IP MAN 1-2. The Bruce Lee movie FISTS OF FURY is not related to these movies, that’s just another name for THE BIG BOSS. The Chen Zhen movies are only singular FIST and not plural FISTS. Also Chen Zhen is not related to the historical figure from the Han Dynasty, he is instead portrayed as living in the Republican era before the Second Sino-Japanese War although Huo Yuanjia lived during the late Qing Dynasty. So you see there is nothing to be confused about here. (read the rest of this shit…)
A Bittersweet Life
Tuesday, March 15th, 2011
Kim Sun-Woo (Lee Byung-hun, the ninja-in-white from GI JOE) is the liver of the titular life, and at first I gotta say it mostly seems sweet. He works at a hotel (but really he’s an enforcer) and he seems to be very good at his job. In fact he’s very good at other people’s jobs too, because when some slacker isn’t there to take care of some rowdy guests from a rival gang Kim goes downstairs and personally martial arts the shit out of them.
(read the rest of this shit…)
The Man From Nowhere
Sunday, March 13th, 2011
THE MAN FROM NOWHERE is a Korean crime picture that was Korea’s highest grossing movie in 2010 and is new to DVD here in North America. The region free male of the title is Cha Tae-Sik (Won Bin), a young handsome dude who runs a pawn shop. He lives next door to a single mother who unbeknownsted to him has just stolen a big bag of heroin from a dude.
Drive Angry 3D
Thursday, March 3rd, 2011
Did you guys know that Tim Burton’s ALICE IN WONDERLAND is the #6 highest grossing movie of all time? It’s literally made over a billion dollars. Just seems weird to me, because I don’t know anybody that liked that movie. I thought it was pretty terrible but keep finding myself “defending” it trying to convince people that at least it was cool looking. Except for the Mad Hatter.
When I mention that somehow it made that much money everybody says “Well, because the 3D tickets cost more.” I’m sure that was part of it. But it’s not like every 3D movie makes a ton of money.
Case in point: DRIVE ANGRY 3D (read the rest of this shit…)
Leon (aka The Professional)
Tuesday, March 1st, 2011
These days Luc Besson is mostly thought of as a producer of action movies (DISTRICT B13, TAKEN, THE TRANSPORTER, UNLEASHED). But man, there was a time there a while back when his heart was in being a writer/director, and LEON aka THE PROFESSIONAL is a hell of a good action movie he did.
The year was 1994 and American crime movies were having sort of a resurgence. Young men with movie cameras were reading the Psalms of John Woo and rediscovering the joys of onscreen bullet discharge. It was the year of KILLING ZOE, THE LAST SEDUCTION, FRESH, the Alec Baldwin version of THE GETAWAY and of course DEATH WISH V: THE FACE OF DEATH.
(read the rest of this shit…)
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