Action

Independence Day: 20th Anniversary Edition (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on May 18th, 2016

“Hello boys…I’m baaaaaack!”

You probably know that Independence Day — the spectacular, shameless sci-fi smash that introduced the world to “Will Smith, Global Superstar” — has a sequel coming out next month. What you may not know is that the original film has been granted a 20th Anniversary Blu-ray release. I was 13 when ID4 came out in the summer of 1996, which means the movie’s deluxe destruction and alien shoot-em-up antics were right in my wheelhouse. So I was curious as to how an older and wiser, um, taller version of me would feel watching it with a critical eye.
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Expendables 3 (UHD Blu-ray) (4K)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on April 6th, 2016

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“Welcome to the 21st century!”

Welcome to the world of 4K UHD Blu-ray. This is our first 4k review. It won’t be the last.

Sylvester Stallone has dedicated the better part of the last decade to giving moviegoers what they wanted 20 years ago. It started with 2006’s Rocky Balboa, which closed out Stallone’s signature franchise in the satisfying manner fans have been craving since 1990’s Rocky V debacle. We’ve also gotten another Rambo sequel, as well as long-awaited team ups with icons both real (Schwarzenegger in Escape Plan) and cinematic (Grudge Match was “Rocky vs. Raging Bull”). But Stallone’s biggest recent success is the veritable fantasy team of action stars he’s assembled for the Expendables films.
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Weaponized (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on March 4th, 2016

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Weaponized can’t seem to make up its mind about what kind of action flick it wants to be. It appears to be the story of a grief-stricken military contractor who obsessively pursues a dangerous experimental program, but instead the film focuses on a brawny, brooding homicide detective. On top of that, the Blu-ray’s cover art prominently features an imposing robot that doesn’t even factor into the plot until about 10 minutes before the credits roll. Most importantly, the movie totally ignores the schlockiness of its botched, cliche-ridden plot and plays everything distressingly straight, which makes Weaponized a pretty joyless trip to the near future.
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Extraction (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on February 25th, 2016

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“Don’t ever threaten my family again.”

In Extraction, a government analyst embarks on an unsanctioned rescue mission after his father — an over-the-hill CIA field operative — is kidnapped by a shadowy group of bad guys. In a related story, I think I got my dad a CD for Father’s Day last year. But while the hero of Extraction might edge me out in the Son of the Year race, the rest of this crummy actioner is basically a harmless debacle.
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Falling Skies: The Complete Fifth Season

Posted in No Huddle by J C on February 5th, 2016

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“Our final fight didn’t go as planned. But one thing was clear…this would be the bloodiest battle yet.”

TNT’s post-apocalyptic, alien invasion war drama has never been short on casualties. So hearing that the last episodes in the show’s run would result in even more losses — human and otherwise — wasn’t exactly a shock. Following a fairly ludicrous cliffhanger, the final season starts off quite promisingly before falling back on some bad habits. Unfortunately, it all culminates with a semi-disastrous series finale.
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12 Rounds 3: Lockdown (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on December 25th, 2015

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With their impossibly beefy frames, larger-than-life personas, and familiarity with staged combat (sorry, buddy), pro wrestlers fit the old-school action star mold perfectly. Unfortunately for them, Hollywood isn’t nearly as interested in action flicks that don’t have superheroes, dinosaurs, or Liam Neeson. And while interconnected cinematic universes are all the rage at the moment, Lionsgate and World Wrestling Entertainment have a pretty interesting partnership themselves. Their latest offering is the dopey, compulsively watchable 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown, which is considerably more entertaining than it has any right to be.
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Mission: Impossible — Rogue Nation (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on December 14th, 2015

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“This may very well be our last mission, Ethan…make it count.”

You wouldn’t know it from looking at him, but Tom Cruise is now 53 years old. So it’s only natural to wonder how many more Missions the indomitable superstar has left in him. Well if Rogue Nation is any indication, the above quote is meant to be more winking than prophetic. Just like its tireless star, the fifth installment of the 19-year-old Mission: Impossible film franchise is sprier, tighter, and more energetic than its age might suggest.
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War Pigs (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on December 10th, 2015

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“In a war, there’s really only two things that are gonna ruin your day…officers and orders.”

The concept of duty — particularly giving and following orders that will almost certainly result in death — is at the forefront of War Pigs, a straight-to-DVD actioner that doesn’t actually have that much action in it. For a movie with the likes of Dolph Lundgren and Chuck Lidell gracing its Blu-ray cover, scaling back on the butt-kicking seems like a death sentence. However, I was surprised to find the action sequences were actually the weak link in this limited but reasonably entertaining World War II yarn.
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American Ultra (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on November 30th, 2015

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“Why are people trying to stab you?”

People in action movies aren’t usually inclined to stop and ask that question out loud. In American Ultra, a small army of CIA operatives repeatedly try to stab, shoot, gas, and blow up an underachieving slacker and his girlfriend. Seems like a lot of trouble for a panic attack-prone convenience store clerk who sketches a goofy graphic novel about an adventurous ape on his downtime. American Ultra is funny, violent, and tonally-jarring at times. However, it’s also a fun subversion of the action genre and (more specifically) “supersoldier” movies.
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San Andreas (Blu-ray)

Posted in No Huddle by J C on October 14th, 2015

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“We’ll get hit again…and it’s going to be a bigger monster.”

The character who utters these words in San Andreas is referring to an impending earthquake that could literally rip California apart. But he could just as easily be talking about the summer movie season, when audiences who have just been rocked by a catastrophic quake have to deal with something called “Indominus Rex” a mere two weeks later. San Andreas almost certainly won’t end up as the biggest bully on the Hollywood block, but it’s a big, dumb, fun disaster flick the whole family can enjoy.
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Chain of Command (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on October 7th, 2015

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“Man, they killed my brother…you think I’m gonna let that slide?”

Even if you haven’t sat through a ton of revenge-minded pulp, you won’t be surprised to hear the answer to the above question is a resounding, “No!” The good(ish) news is that Chain of Command manages to stand out from a pretty crowded straight-to-DVD action pack. The disastrous news is that this laughably bad, shoddily-made debacle is likely to stick in your memory for all the wrong reasons.
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American Heist (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on September 10th, 2015

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American Heist is an independent action flick that eventually nods to Michael Mann’s Heat and Sidney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon. (Along with Ben Affleck’s The Town, if you’re interested in a 21st century doppelganger.) However, the movie’s action-packed finale can’t completely disguise the fact that this is actually a dour family tragedy masquerading as a heist film. But if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, at least the makers of American Heist know who to rip off flatter.
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Hot Pursuit (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on August 11th, 2015

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I realized Hot Pursuit was in big trouble during the sequence when intensely by-the-book Officer Cooper (Reese Witherspoon) accidentally ingests cocaine. The joke is supposed to be that the drug sends Cooper into a comically manic, frenzied state; the problem is the way Witherspoon behaves during this sequence isn’t all that different from the way she’s played Cooper up to that point. And that’s the problem with Hot Pursuit: it’s the movie equivalent of someone who types in ALL CAPS all the time. Even worse, it’s an unholy (and unfunny) mash-up of Midnight Run and Thelma & Louise that shines a blazing spotlight on its leading ladies’ worst qualities.
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Barely Lethal (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on August 4th, 2015

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“Who would ever suspect a kid?”

When I glanced at the Blu-ray cover for Barely Lethal — with its groan-worthy pun of a title, girl power, and generous splashes of hot pink — I didn’t really expect it to be my thing. (Ok, fine…groan-worthy puns are *totally* my thing.) So while I may not be the intended audience for this independent action/comedy, I have to admit its charms snuck up on me the same way one of the film’s disarming young killers might catch a target by surprise.
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Absolution (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on July 13th, 2015

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“I wanna tell you something. I’ve been a bad man…I’ve been a very bad man most of my life. So, I decided I want to do one thing in my life. One good thing in my life before I die.”

Those words are spoken by elite contract killer John Alexander at the start of Absolution, a straight-to-DVD offering that is largely cobbled together from the spare parts of other junky action flicks. The film stars Steven Seagal, who was a very bad man on-screen during his early ’90s heyday. John wants to do one good thing before his time is up; coincidentally, all I want is for Seagal to make one action movie that at least comes close to recapturing the spark that made him a star. Absolution is not that film.
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Tracers (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on May 11th, 2015

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“It’s like being kids again. The streets are our playground.”

The above quote refers to parkour, the art and discipline of moving through urban spaces that was popularized in France. French practitioners of parkour are called “traceurs,” which gives this totally clichéd, consistently ridiculous, but occasionally breathtaking action flick its title. You’ve seen the plot before (many times), but Tracers still vaults itself above the straight-to-DVD pack thanks to its freewheeling free-running sequences.
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Taken 3 (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on April 29th, 2015

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“You do know the combination, don’t you?”

It’s a Taken film, and the third one in the series. You should have the ingredients down by now. Let’s run through the checklist, shall we? You’ve got your daring escapes, check. You have some awesome car chases with a lot of mashed-up metal, check. You’ve got some torture, of course. Waterboarding is in these days. You have the standard carnage level, check. And check. It’s all there, but credit the folks behind the franchise for finding ways to deliver every last drop of the expected stuff and still turn the third part of a trilogy on its head enough to make it more interesting than the previous two films.
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John Doe: Vigilante

Posted in No Huddle by J C on April 22nd, 2015

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“A vigilante is simply somebody who violates the law in order to punish a criminal for what they believe is right, for what they believe is justice.”

It’s easy to understand the appeal of big screen vigilante justice. We’ve all gotten tangled up in red tape, which is why it’s so gratifying to watch somebody tear through it. (And often spray some red elsewhere.) John Doe: Vigilante ends up being as ludicrous as any of the 17 Death Wish movies, but it also goes beyond putting the entire blame on “the system.” There are some interesting ideas at play here, including the notion that there’s a little Vigilante in all of us.
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Diamond Heist

Posted in No Huddle by J C on March 27th, 2015

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There’s a mile-long list of Hollywood movies that have been re-titled in foreign countries to hilarious effect. I’ve personally had much less experience with foreign productions being re-branded for American audiences, but Diamond Heist seems like one of the more egregious examples you’re likely to find. The DVD cover has professional tough guys/straight-to-DVD MVPs Michael Madsen and Vinnie Jones brandishing weapons while accompanied by a vague explosion and the wonderfully generic tagline, “Payday is only a bullet away.” In other words, there’s nothing here that suggests this Hungarian import is actually an action/comedy about male strippers.
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L.A. Apocalypse

Posted in No Huddle by J C on March 25th, 2015

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“The recent earthquakes in Los Angeles: facts of life or foreshadowing the big one?”

I’m not saying the makers of L.A. Apocalypse — a SyFy-level TV movie centered on catastrophic earthquakes in California — timed the release of their low-budget action flick so it premiered well ahead of San Andreas, the would-be summer blockbuster starring Dwayne Johnson about catastrophic earthquakes in California. It’s just funny how things often work out that way. L.A. Apocalypse doesn’t have The Rock (or anyone you’ve likely heard of) and is working with a very small fraction of San Andreas‘ budget. The result is as underwhelming as you’d expect.
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Halo: Nightfall

Posted in No Huddle by J C on March 18th, 2015

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It’s been about a decade since Hollywood first tried to make a movie out of Halo, the blockbuster Xbox videogame series. The closest fans came to seeing Master Chief on the big screen was a 2006 adaptation with Peter Jackson serving as executive producer and his then-protégé Neill Blomkamp directing. Unfortunately, development costs started to skyrocket and the duo opted to make District 9 instead. Meanwhile, Halo remained a potentially-lucrative multimedia property. So Microsoft, which owns Xbox, finally decided that if they wanted a Halo movie done, they had to do it themselves.
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Viktor

Posted in No Huddle by J C on January 20th, 2015

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We can blame thank Liam Neeson — or “Liam Neesons” — for this recent run of action movies about men of a certain age who tear their way through some part of Europe in the name of their missing or dead children. Viktor — a French/Russian production starring Gerard Depardieu and Elizabeth Hurley — is one of these latest Taken take-offs. Unfortunately, it’s also one of the more inert revenge films you’re likely to see.
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The Expendables 3 (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on November 24th, 2014

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“Welcome to the 21st century!”

Into the Storm (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by J C on November 21st, 2014

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Breaking news: anyone who goes to see movie called Into the Storm is probably more interested in “the Storm” than they are in any of the people running away from it. The good news is the film understands this, to an extent, and clocks in at a slender 89 minutes. Of course, the titular Storm doesn’t appear for every one of those 89 minutes. This is very bad news because Into the Storm is populated with characters and storylines that are both forgettable and irritating. It’s basically Twister with somewhat better effects, but much less interesting people.
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Drive Hard (Blu-ray)

Posted in Disc Reviews by Brent Lorentson on November 11th, 2014

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Personally I’m not a fan of the Fast and Furious franchise, despite the fact that I tend to enjoy films from the genre. For me, I’ll take the old school films like Vanishing Point, Two-Lane Blacktop, and the original Gone in 60 Seconds over these big budget productions any day. All I can figure is that these films that I do enjoy are working with budgets that force the directors to be creative and understand most of their elaborate stunts only get one take and are not polished with CGI, but instead whatever the camera captures that is what we see on the big screen. The stunts are simply incredible, and the cars in my humblest opinion were simply cooler back then.
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