Reaction & Review | Double Impact

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering an action flick from 1991. That movie is "Double Impact".

Yes, guys, this is the second movie I promised I'd cover that stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, and it's also the other movie that was featured on the combo pack that also had "Death Warrant" attached to it. Now if you didn't read my review for "Death Warrant", long story short, I thought the movie was okay, even though it was pretty flawed. But I still did kind of enjoy it for the most part.

Now as for the other movie I'm about to cover, this one is actually rather interesting. You see, this is the first film where Van Damme is playing both main characters in dual roles. Which sounds really cool, at least until you stop and think about it for a second. See, as I just mentioned a moment ago, "Death Warrant" was pretty flawed, and one of the major flaws with it was the acting. More specifically, it was mainly Van Damme's acting. He sounded horrible in that movie, which I know probably isn't a huge shocker, considering how limited his acting ability is, but the very fact that he's given himself two roles to play with here both intrigues me and concerns me because of his limited acting skills. And I can say that he gave himself those roles because not only does he get top billing for this movie, he also co-produced it, he also partly came up with the story, *and* co-wrote it with the director as well. I'm just shocked he didn't direct the damme thing himself.

But hey, who knows? Maybe he can actually do something halfway interesting here now that he's playing dual roles. I'm hoping for this one to be interesting. I'm not expecting it to be "good", but it could still be fun on a cheesy sort of level that Van Damme usually sorta brings. Really, guys, the only way I'm gonna find out if this movie is interesting at all is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Double Impact".

17 minutes later

So, the way Chad meets his twin brother here is when he headbutts him so hard that he knocks him out. You know, out of all the ways to meet your twin brother for the first time in 25 years, headbutting and knocking them out was not my first choice.

9 minutes later

Wait, so the Hong Kong Police are chasing down our protagonists. I should mention that they're chasing them on water. And the plan was by both Chad and Alex to push both Mercedes cars out into the water so that Frank can shoot the cars, causing them to blow up and stop the police in their tracks. I will say that, while that is a very impromptu plan, can't the police just turn their boats over to the side of the explosions and continue chasing them? I'm asking this because there's a huge land of water between them and our protagonists, and I feel like they could still go after them even if they may be slightly stalled at the moment. I understand that I'm probably putting a little too much thought into this, but it's just something that sorta came to me, you know what I mean?

11 minutes later

OK, guys, I need to comment on this, and I'll talk more about it later in the review, but the way that they have both characters played by Van Damme here in the same shot looks horrible. And I say this mainly for him playing Chad, because the way that they had to composite him in that shot there just a moment ago looked *really* bad. And I'm hoping that we don't see much more of those two together like that, because that scene alone made it look fucking horrible.

18 minutes later

Wait, hold up a second here. So Chad, pretending to be Alex, gives one of Zhang's men a wooden box that says it's "French Cognac". And instead of asking if he could see what's inside the box, he's just going to take it to his boss without even looking inside of it?! I'm sorry, but if I was a member of some drug ring, I would ask to see what the contents of a box are *before* I deliver it to my boss so that they might not be murdered. I guess some of Zhang's men aren't very bright here, are they?

16 minutes later

You know, guys, I understand that this is suppose to be a serious moment where Alex believes that Chad went off with his girl to go and bang her. However, what I find funny about all this is that it's basically just Van Damme envisioning himself thinking about banging his own girl and getting angry about it for no reason. At least, when you take this scene out of context anyways. It's really funny that way.

20 minutes later

OK, that shot of Van Damme kicking a drum barrel out of the air like that was fucking awesome. I loved that.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Double Impact". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So, where to begin here?

I might as well just start with the writing, which is gonna be an easy task here because there's really not much here in terms of plot. And considering it's an action movie, plot is the last thing people come here for when watching said action film. Our two main characters, both played by Jean-Claude Van Damme, were separated as babies after their parents were killed by some Hong Kong syndicate. And years later, they end up meeting each other after Chad discovers he has a twin brother by his mentor Frank, and after a slight misunderstanding when Alex headbutts Chad, Frank tells them about what happened to their parents, which then begrudgingly gets the two together to take down the syndicate that killed their parents. And that's pretty much the entire plot for you guys in a nutshell because everything is pretty much what you come to expect from an action movie.

Now normally, when it comes characters in an action film, I would normally say that you wouldn't get very much of that here either. However, I can't quite do that this time, because the main gimmick of the film is Van Damme playing two different characters. And both of their personalities are a stark contrast. With Chad, he's more the happy-go-lucky kind of guy who is also a fitness trainer in the U.S. and seems more down to earth with other people. And when it comes Alex, he was raised in an orphanage in China and he grew up more with the tougher crowd, which is why you see him getting more involved with illegal drug rings and is more in your face and rougher with his actions more than his words. Now that's not to say that Chad can't defend himself in fight, however, Alex has had more experience with it than Chad did. At least, from what I got out of this movie anyways.

Other characters such as Frank and Danielle, the blond chick, don't have very much going on here. You have Frank, who is one of the people that ended up saving Chad as a baby from right after his parents were killed and he's been looking after him as a father figure of sorts. And he's really just there to keep the tension between Chad and Frank to a minimum. And as for Danielle, she really has no defining character trait other than being Alex's girl. The only thing that stands out the most about her is when Alex starts drinking and thinks that Chad is taking his girl away from him, which is when he gets these visions of Chad and Danielle making out with each other. Which I know was probably suppose to be taken seriously, however, you can't really do that the moment that you realize that Van Damme is essentially getting mad about making out with a woman that he loves, and him getting pissed off and angry about it for no reason. Maybe, out of context, you could argue that he's envisioning that he wants to make out with his girl, but he hasn't, and he's gets so angry to a point where he just starts drinking. I don't know, maybe I'm just putting too much thought into this, but still, it's just something that you could put your own input on if you really wanted to.

But getting back on track here, the writing in this movie is ultimately nothing special. It's a plot that we've seen done many times beforehand, even for an action film of this caliber, and the characters are mostly paper thin, save for Van Damme's characters. And speaking of, that greatly transitions over into the acting. Now earlier, I commented about how horrible Van Damme's acting was in "Death Warrant", and I feared going into this one where he has dual lead roles, that he was going to suck even more here. And while I will say that his acting here is still the same kind of acting you've come to expect from him, I will say that this is probably one of his stronger roles, in both instances. When it comes to Chad, it's not really all that much different than how he usually plays a standard solo protagonist, but when it comes to Alex, he has to sound more tougher and angrier and it's actually not too bad here. He has more wiggle room to work with, especially during the moment where he becomes drunk and angry. It's probably one of the reasons why he's my favorite of the two here.

One other actor I wanted to bring up is someone that I kinda didn't recognize by name, but the moment that I saw his face, I instantly recognized who he was. He goes by the name of Bolo Yeung. And if you don't know who that is, it's the same guy who played Chong-Li from "Bloodsport", which I thought was pretty cool because, spoiler here, he and Van Damme have a final confrontation between the two, and it almost felt like an unofficial sequel to "Bloodsport". Now I know "Bloodsport" does have a few sequels, however, as far as I know, Van Damme is not in any of them. And while I'm on this subject, the actor who plays Zhang is the same actor who played the police chief in "Bloodsport" as well. So, there's at least a few alumni actors from that movie that transitioned over to this one. Which, again, is really cool to see. In fact, I kinda want to watch "Bloodsport" again now after seeing these actors all together again. But I'll hold that off for now and continue talking about the rest of the movie. The rest of the acting, I will say, is pretty decent. It's nothing amazing, but most of the acting is still at least competent, which is better than nothing.

I might as well talk about the action scenes next, since there's not much here in terms of special effects worth commenting on, outside of practical blood effects and pyrotechnics, both of which are pretty standard but still is pretty decent. But all of that doesn't really matter if the action scenes aren't at least interesting. And I'm happy to say that all of the action scenes in this movie are very entertaining. All of the fight choreography here is really good. Now mind you, considering it's starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, it would be sorta difficult for him to screw that up. And while it's admittedly very standard for action movies, it's still very entertaining as a whole, which is one of the most important things when it comes to action movies.

Now let's talk about the camerawork. And I'm gonna give this one a special mention because, again, this movie stars Van Damme in two different leading roles here. So you kinda have to be observant when filming this sort of concept because you could easily fuck this up if you're not careful. And I will say, for the most part, the camerawork in this movie is really solid when it comes to filming scenes with both of Van Damme's characters on screen. And one of the tricks that they use to do this is whenever one of Van Damme's characters have to look at each other, and the camera will point to the back of their head, giving you the illusion that both characters are together at the same time. Which is a neat camera angle, and while it's nothing revolutionary, I have to give the camerawork here extra credit for going the extra mile to try and make this whole concept work.

Now that's not to say that it doesn't have it's flaws. Because there's one scene in particular that stands out easily. So, as I mentioned earlier, there's a scene where both of Van Damme's characters share the screen together, and when Alex sits down next to his brother, you'll notice on Chad that there's a bright green glow coming from his hair, which leads me to believe that Van Damme was chroma-keyed into that shot. In other words, it was filmed on a blue screen, or green screen. Whichever one you prefer. Either way, that shot looked horrible, and it stands out as one of the worst effects in the entire movie. Now like I said earlier, it's not as noticeable as when they're filming from the back of Van Damme's head, or if they're some distance away from each other. But when you have them together like the way they shot it there, it looks horrible. Now thankfully, it's really one of the only bad shots in the entire film, but it does serve as a lesson to any filmmakers that want to do this sort of concept of having your main character playing dual roles. At least, that's my thought process anyway.

So yeah, camerawork here is mostly pretty good, minus some hiccups here and there. Lighting here is lit fine. The sound-mixing here is good. And the music, while ultimately nothing special, is still very serviceable.

So when all is said and done, guys, when it comes down to it, can I recommend "Double Impact"? If you're a fan of action movies that have little to no plot, then yes, this will totally be worth checking out. If you're a fan of Van Damme's movies, then this will totally be right up your alley as well. If you're not into those things, however, then this you can just skip this one. It doesn't have very much plot, although I think the people who worked on this movie, especially Van Damme, knew that as well. It's just there to be a cheesy action film with very little substance. And while I'm normally not into these films myself, I actually kinda enjoyed this one. Also, one other thing I forgot to mention, the pacing here is really tight, despite being an hour and 50 minutes long. It actually has rather good pacing, which is something that I wasn't expecting from an action movie starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, but hey, at least it's something kinda surprising to me. And as for whether or not this combo pack is worth it, well, like I said, if you're a fan of Van Damme's movies, then I would totally say go check it out. It's rather cheap to find, whether it be on DVD or Blu-ray. I'm not sure if I'll be keeping it around for myself, but I can at least say that it didn't waste my time. Now...seeing as how there were a bunch of stars that came from "Bloodsport", I think I'm gonna go and watch that again because why the hell not? So, I'll go and do that next once this review gets uploaded.

And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Robowar

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be gonna covering an Italian sci-fi action movie from 1988. That movie is "Robowar". And I'm being a bit cautious with that year because Wikipedia is saying that the movie came out in 1989, yet almost every other website I've come across says that it came out in 88. So, just for safety's sake, I'm gonna put the more popular one on here and hope that they're right and that Wikipedia just made a mistake with their year choice.

So anyway, moving right along here, I do know a couple of things about this movie. First of all, I do know that this movie was directed by infamous filmmaker Bruno Mattei. Now, what's strange here is that even though he's listed in the synopsis on the back of the DVD case I have here, his name is not listed in the director's credit. Instead, the name I got here is listed as Vincent Dawn, which I'm going to assume is his surname, maybe. I don't really know why they had to list his name that way. I mean, the guy was still well known, even back then, so I guess maybe it was either his request that he wanted his own named removed or something to that effect. Again, I don't know why exactly his name is not listed here in the director's credit, but I'm going to assume that there had to be a reason for it.

But setting that little issue aside, I can also tell you guys the plot to this movie. According to what I read on the back of the DVD case here, the plot is essentially about a team of commando's performing a rescue operation in the jungle, and they're also being a pursued and hunted by a robot that is also apparently half-man. Now you're probably reading that little synopsis I just gave out and it sounds really familiar to you. And you'd be right on that, because this movie basically just comes out and says that it's a mashup between "Predator" and "Robocop". Mind you, I've never seen either one of those movies, yet I am familiar with their plotlines. So for this movie to mix and match both together here might be kinda interesting, even if the plot is more or less just a knockoff of "Predator".

Now I'm hoping that this movie is at least sorta decent. I don't know if it's gonna be any good. Although considering that it is from Bruno Mattei, it could lean either way here. So, I'm just gonna dive right into this one here and see how it plays itself out. The only way I'm gonna know for sure if this movie is at all watchable is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Robowar".

2 minutes later

OK, guys, I know it's very early, but I feel the need to address this. Now I'm going to assume that this orange filter I'm seeing here is suppose to be this robot's vision. Except, it's vision entirely pixelated, which makes some things hard to see. Also, this robot voice, I guess, sounds incredibly garbled and kind of annoying, too, since I can't understand what the hell it's trying to say. So far, guys, we're off to a little bit of a rocky start here.

3 minutes later

Wait, so our team of commandos is called "BAM", which, according to this officer, is known as "Big Ass Motherfuckers". OK, that is hilarious as shit. I really was not expecting that at all.

13 minutes later

Well, guys, I am willing to say that while the movie is a little bit dull right now, I am willing to say that the music here is pretty decent. You guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but this little track here that's currently playing is not too bad. So, I can give one positive to this movie so far.

8 minutes later

Oh my god, is that the actual robot that's been tracking them?! That looks more like over-bulked dude wearing black and is wearing a motorcycle helmet that's also spray-painted black. My god, that looks so fucking stupid, and yet, I kinda sorta like it. Well, the design anyway. Still not a fan of the garbled robot voice and orange pixelated vision that it has going on. But at least the design is sorta cool in a goofy sort of way.

5 minutes later

OK, I have a dumb question that is too late to be asking now, but where did all those people come from? You know, the bandits that were chasing after these people and killing them. Where they hell did they come from? Moreover, since this robot occupies this island, you would think that it probably would've discovered them sooner. Then again, I honestly don't know how long this robot has been on this island by itself, so it's very well possible that it hasn't been there for too long. But still, I would like my first question to be answered. Is there a village of sorts that I'm unaware of? I'm really sorta curious here.

12 minutes later

Well, guys, it took well over 40 minutes, but we actually have one of our soldiers finally killed off. Granted, considering he had a bad leg from earlier, I'm kinda surprised he wasn't killed off much sooner. But hey, at least we can add one to the kill count. Well, unless you don't count all of the foreign soldiers that were just slaughtered by our commandos anyway.

10 minutes later

Bray: There's no blood, there's no body, there's no traces at all! We didn't hit a damn thing!

Well, no shit you didn't hit a damn thing! You and your commandos spent half a minute shooting at the same spot that Corey saw the robot from earlier. And instead of pursuing it, again, you spent the last half minute hoping for some kind of results to happen as you were shooting at the same damn spot! My god...guys, this movie is becoming stupider with each passing minute and I'm not really sure if I'll be to handle more of this stupidity.

20 minutes later

Well, Mascher is now dead, and probably the device he had with him is also gone, too. That totally wasn't a waste of fucking time. God damn, this movie is slowly becoming worse, guys, and I'm honestly glad there's only over a little over 20 minutes left to go here. Maybe something interesting will happen then, but at this point, I seriously doubt that.

3 minutes later

So Quang just literally stood there and, instead of actually going out fighting, he just screamed as the robot, or the Omega-1 as it's actually called, kills him off screen. Wow, that was just fucking stupid as hell. Guys, at this point, I want this robot want to win and just wipe out the remaining two left. That's how much I'm beginning to despise this movie.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Robowar". I'm gonna go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Wow, um...it's safe to say, guys, that I'm quite disappointed in this one. I mean, sure, I wasn't expecting it to be good, but part of me was hoping that this thing was going to be at least fun on a cheesy sort of level. And there are instances of that sort of cheesiness in here. Unfortunately, however, this film is plagued with a lot of problems that stops this thing from being fun to watch.

Let's start with the writing. Now as I mentioned earlier, this film claims to be a mashup of "Predator" and "Robocop". And sure enough, this movie is pretty much just that. You have our company of commandos traversing through the jungle while being stalked by the Omega-1. While at the same time, you also have our robot, which is pretty much just a fourth-rate knock off of "Robocop". So yeah, originality isn't strong with this one. However, I still think this movie could've done something decent with it, since it isn't really hard to ripoff "Predator" and "Robocop". The latter, in my opinion, I've seen done quite a bit. So this movie could've done interesting, but unfortunately, like I just said earlier, this movie has a lot of problems that stops it from becoming so bad it's good.

To start with, the pacing here is really uneven at times. There are quite a few scenes in this movie where you will see our soldiers walking through the jungle trying to track down the Omega-1. Unfortunately, these scenes just do nothing pad out the runtime. The only thing that kinda saves it is the music, which I'll talk about later on when I get to it. But still, we have those kinds of scenes where it'll just slow the film down to a crawl. OK yes, it's very possible that those kind of scenes were in "Predator" as well, but if I had to wager a guess, I would say that "Predator" somehow did this better. And my theory is that they kept you on your toes as the tension builds. And while I can see minor glimpses of tension going on in this movie, it's not nearly enough to make it interesting, nor does it make you care about any of these characters.

Which then brings me to my next point: All of the characters in this movie are bland and shallow as shit. Nobody here has an interesting personality, nor do most of them have any sort of depth that makes you want to care about them. The closest that you get is with Marphy, because you later find out that one of the soldiers that was killed in the jungle was Marphy's close friend and comrade. And while I could go further into it, I won't do that for the sake of spoilers because, well, it's not really that difficult to put two and two together. Another one would be the blonde-haired chick named Virgin. Because Virgin was one of the people that was being chased down by this gang of foreign soldiers I mentioned earlier. And while you don't learn anything about where they came from, you do at least learn that she, and a few other people, were sent in as volunteers from the U.N. to help out the people at remote villages and they had built hospitals there to treat the wounded.

Unfortunately, however, that really isn't enough to make you want to care about her, because she, along with Marphy, are also bland as all hell. The only one who came close to having a personality of sorts was Mascher, the guy who was sent along with Marphy's commandos because, apparently, you learn that he was the one who was involved in the development of Omega-1, and throughout the movie, he becomes more of a selfish asshole. Which may not sound like much, but he honestly was the only one who had a semblance of personality to him. Everyone else, however, not really. These commandos may be known as "Big Ass Motherfuckers", but they're completely fucking boring at the same time since none of them have any sort of depth to them at all.

So yes, guys, writing here is a complete disappointment. Despite this being a mashup of "Robocop" and "Predator" it really doesn't pull this concept off very well. And while it's certainly far from the worst thing I've seen all year, it's still poorly written, even for a movie that was meant to be a cheesy sci-fi action flick. And as for the acting, well, it's kind of a mixed bag here. I wouldn't really call any of the acting here "good", but it actually does have a semblance of it being so bad, it's funny. It ranges on either being over-the-top or hammy. Which might sound like it's the same thing, however, I don't entirely see it that way because as long as you're not overdoing one or the other, it actually ends up being kinda funny. And I will say that, again, none of the acting here is good, but it still retains that B movie level of hammy acting that I actually do enjoy. So, as much as I would like to dump the acting here, I'm actually going to give it a bit of a pass here because it's the kind of acting I do enjoy.

Special effects are actually pretty decent. Mind you, this is a movie from Bruno Mattei, and that generally means that you're working with a low budget movie no matter what. This movie has a lot of pyrotechnic explosions that would make Michael Bay cream himself with. It also has visual effects every time our robot shoots his laser gun, and that actually looks really cool. The gun itself is also pretty cool, too. I wouldn't mind having a replica of one of those myself. As for the costuming, well, it's overdone, especially with the soldiers pads, because they're the kind of shoulder pads you would see football players wear. At least, that's I want to say, however, these kinds of shoulder pads that the robot wears are pretty damn huge, which would make it difficult for actual football players to wear while they're running out on the field. At least, that's what I would envision anyway. But yeah, the costuming on our robot is mostly black-looking. I have to imagine that some of it had to have been spray-painted black. Otherwise, I would be genuinely shocked if all of that was pure black from the start. But anyway, the costuming, I will say that I do like it for how goofy it looks, though it is a little bit overly bulky and overdone, as well.

Let's talk about camerawork next, because there's two things I need to bring up here when it comes to this film's camerawork. See, as I mentioned earlier, the orange pixelated vision you see is suppose to be the robot's vision, and it obviously looks terrible because you can barely see shit. And I still stand by that, however, there is one brief moment where that actually could've been helpful. Because there's a scene in the film where you are in the robot's POV as it's walking through the jungle. And as it turns it's position, you briefly get to see a person, possibly a man, wearing a brightly colored suit and tie and I have no idea who the fuck that was. My guess is that it's suppose to be the guy who's either operating our robot from behind the scenes or he was put in that shot without realizing it and it made that brief moment look incredibly awkward, and I'm shocked that nobody happened to notice that during editing because it's too fucking easy to notice! How the fuck anyone got away with that shit is fucking my brain here. It's so simple to edit that out and you could *still* have your robot walking and turning it's head without that random stranger in the shot. But no, it's in the film unedited, and it looks so out of place here.

Lighting here is actually really good, because a lot of this movie was obviously shot outdoors in the jungle, so I kinda expected the lighting to be really good here. Sound-mixing here is mostly pretty decent. The music here is actually pretty decent, too. It has a lot of late 80's trashy sounding rock music and some synth as well, and it's actually not too bad here, which is what also what helps accompany those scenes I mentioned earlier where our commandos are just traversing through the forest. Unfortunately, however, there is one track that gets played on a loop about 3 times and it kinda tells me that they extend it in a way to where it didn't cut off awkwardly. But outside of that, though, the music here is still decent, so at least its kinda something.

So, guys, when all is said and done, am I able to recommend "Robowar"? Well...I'm inclined to say no. However, if you're somebody that likes these sort of B movies, and you don't care that if it's taking concepts from "Robocop" and "Predator", then sure, I could probably say it's worth checking out at least once. And once is being generous, because I personally don't see myself ever watching this one again. Which is really disappointing to say because I wanted to like this movie. I wanted to like it enough to where I could watch it again and again for a good laugh. Unfortunately, however, there's not enough of it here. And also, this movie has too many problems for me to not overlook it, so I'm probably not gonna end up watching this one again. That being said, though, it could be decent enough to where you could watch it and riff on it with friends on a bad movie night. If you're not into that, however, you can probably skip this and stick with movies like "Predator" or "Robocop", or both if you have them together. For me, though, I'm gonna go and watch another low budget B movie, and the first thing I'm thinking of is "Chopping Mall". I'm gonna go and watch that next as soon as I get done with this review.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | VFW

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be checking out a splatter film from 2019. That movie is "VFW".

Now I remember seeing a trailer for this movie whenever I would pop in my copy of "Christmas Bloody Christmas" to watch every other Christmas. And the trailer looked rather interesting, so much so that I was lucky to find a copy of this movie at one of my local video stores for about $5. Which is totally cool because now I can actually cover this film for this series.

Now as for what I know about it, I do know it was made by and put out by the same distribution company that also put out "Christmas Bloody Christmas". Speaking of, I also know that it was directed and produced by a man named Joe Begos, who also wrote, produced, and directed "Christmas Bloody Christmas" as well. He doesn't have writing credit here, however. Which is probably for the best because, in case you never read my review for "Christmas Bloody Christmas", one of my main issues with that movie was the fact that the writing was basically just the characters swearing a lot by mainly just saying "fuck" and "shit". As long as this movie doesn't run into that same problem, the writing will probably be fine. Well, at least I hope so anyway.

I don't know if this movie is going to be any good, but I do have hopes that it will be at least decent. So, I may as well find out for myself if this film is worth watching at all. And the only way I'm gonna know that for sure is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "VFW".

18 minutes later

Well, guys, I don't really have a whole lot to say so far, because this movie hasn't given me much to work with. But I will say that I am really digging the atmosphere of this bar here. And this is coming from someone who almost never goes to bars, because they're so fucking noisy. But if more bars were like this, I would love to go to one and just chill out there for a while. It's actually really cool.

5 minutes later

OK, I have a rather dumb question here. So this girl here discovers the drugs inside a safe. And I should mention the safe is half open where anyone can take it. And sure enough, she's taking it for herself. Maybe not for the obvious reasons, but more so just to get away from whoever's controlling it. Why would you leave your safe open like that? I would think, maybe, these people had some kind of functioning brain and keep it locked up tight. Oh, and this head honcho finally discovers his stash is gone from the safe. Well dude, that probably wouldn't have happened if you kept the safe shut! Just saying, a little common sense wouldn't hurt none.

7 minutes later

Well, holy shit, it took him a bit, but that dude just crushed that other guy's head clean off! And I thought that shotgun blast from earlier when it exploded a head was brutal, but that one was definitely more brutal than I thought. Damn.

2 minutes later

Oh, and now George Wendt is dead. I mean, granted, he *is* actually gone, but I obviously meant his character in the movie's now dead. Kind of a shame, really, but then again, that was kind of his fault for walking without backup.

10 minutes later

You know, I was actually really curious as to what the title of this movie actually stood for, but the movie just explain that. The title is basically an abbreviation for "Veterans of Foreign Wars". OK, that actually makes sense what with Fred running it and all. So, good to know.

7 minutes later

OK, that's definitely a rather creative way to barge inside a door. Just use one of your own guys, who was also banging on the door, and use their head to beat the door down. Granted, you're already killing one of your own by doing this, but I guess the numbers are still in their favor. For now, anyway.

15 minutes later

Well...it kinda sucks now that Lou's dead. But at the same time, at least he kinda fought off a few of them after his negotiation deal failed. So, at least the guy went out a hero.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "VFW". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off now...OK. Well, what to say here? I am gonna go ahead and say, guys, that this movie is really solid. It's not quite perfect. There are a couple of areas where the movie sorta falters a bit. And surprisingly enough, most of that revolves around technical work, which I'll talk about later on.

So let's talk more about the movie itself here and go through the motions. Let's start with writing, which is really solid. And the best part about it is that it's really easy to follow, as well. Essentially, guys, I want you to take the concept of "Home Alone" and you replace it with a bar made for veterans. And our veterans of this movie are basically trying to fight off this gang of drug dealers, as they are trying to get back the last few stashes that they have left after a girl named Lizard steals it and tries to make a break for it. And while she technically gets away, she ends up in the bar as the leader of the gang, and a few others tracks her down and all hell starts breaking loose between some of the gang members and the veterans. Which basically turns into a war of survival between the two groups. One for the drugs, and the other side who are just trying to survive the night by bunkering themselves inside their bar.

Now I will say that while the writing here is not very story-driven, what helps make this stand out is our characters. Not so much our villain of junkies, since they really don't have anything resembling character depth. It's the veterans who you're going to care about. Every single one of these characters has depth and personality that makes them incredibly likable. And the one that surprises me the most is Lou, who is Martin Kove's character. Because with Lou, the movie almost seems like it's hinting that he'll be a turncoat and try to fight for the other side. And while they sorta hint that, ultimately, he doesn't go through with it. He remains loyal to his fellow veterans and while his negotiation tactics don't exactly work, he still goes out with some dignity. He is kind of an asshole, but a very likable kind of asshole. Although considering that it is Martin Kove who's playing him, I think he has a well established history of playing the asshole in whatever movie he appears in.

Other characters such as our main character, Fred, who is the owner of V.F.W., is one of the better standouts when it comes to our male leads. Because, unlike the trend that was going on within the last few years of making a famous male hero be overshadowed by some fucking Mary-Sue who has to be better than them in every way, this one has it where the male lead actually does carry their own weight without being talked down to by any female character. The only instance where you get something close to that is when Lizard is trying to talk to Fred out of drinking because his friends are getting lopped off one by one. But the difference here is that she's not trying to talk down to him, she's trying to talk to him to help get back in the fight. Now admittedly, Lizard doesn't really have much depth to her character. The only thing that you do know is that her sister was killed by the junkie leader and she stole the remaining drugs as revenge and what ultimately leads up to our main plot of the movie. So while she's the only one who doesn't have much character to her, the rest of the veterans carry that weight across the entire board.

So yeah, guys, our characters here are all very likable. And you're guaranteed to find a favorite here out of this entire cast. The writing here is very simplistic, which is great, because sometimes less is indeed more. You don't always need a story-driven arc to make a movie great, as long as you have likable characters that you can care about, then you really don't need much else. And what makes these characters help stand out is the acting. The acting here is really solid. Everyone here is turning in an excellent showing. The only two I recognized were Martin Kove and George Wendt. I've already mentioned Kove a few times in my previous reviews, so I'm not gonna bring up that again. And for those of you who don't know anything about George Wendt, he was one of the many cast members from a sitcom in the 80's called "Cheers", where he played the character Norm Peterson. And even though the screentime he had in this movie was cut short, he still puts on a rather good performance here. And even though Lizard had the weakest in terms of personality, her actress still puts on a decent performance here. So, I can give her that much. And ultimately, overall, the acting here is very good.

Special effects in this movie are also really solid as well. Just about all of the effects in this movie were done with practical effects, which I'm a huge fan of because I usually prefer them over CG. And since this is a splatter film, I think it would be a horrible crime if they tried to push more for digital effects over practical effects. Thankfully, that's not the case here. All of the blood effects are really good. And the kills are also really well done, too. Well, for some of them, at least, when you can see them properly. I'll talk about that in just a moment, but what you do see here in terms of all the kills here is great. I still can remember the brutal stomping of a corpses head, which is more visceral than that shotgun blast to the head I briefly mentioned earlier. The rest I won't spoil, but overall, the special effects are mostly really good.

Now we come to the two biggest problems with this movie, which is both the camerawork and lighting. In terms of camerawork, it's actually not too bad. It's really only whenever fight scenes happen up close, because the camerawork can become really wonky at times and it's sorta hard to follow what is going on. Now it's very well possible that they were using an Hi-8 camera to help film some of their scenes. It's very noticeable towards the end when you get to see our final showdown between Fred and the junkie leader where the camera will move around a lot and become very shaky. Now like I said a moment ago, it's not all that bad. It's really only apparent when it comes to fight scenes that are shot up close and personal, and it doesn't always work.

The same could be said for the lighting. Now this isn't actually the first time I ever had to comment on a lighting from a movie by Joe Begos, because it was also a bit of an issue I had with "Christmas Bloody Christmas" because there was one type of purple lighting that you see a lot throughout the movie and depending on how much you like the color purple, it was going to be a little bit of a distraction for you. This movie also has a similar problem, although admittedly, it's more of a mixed bag here. See, I actually do like how the bar looks whenever the lights are dimmed out and you don't get to see much other than a dark-red color. And while that is cool-looking, it also hurts the fight scenes a bit because whenever a fight scene is shot inside the bar, the dark red lighting will obscure a lot of what's going on. Add on to the fact that there are also a few times where the movie will jump cut quite a bit when it comes the action scenes. Admittedly, it's not as bad as it was in other movies like "Valentine: The Dark Avenger" and "Chinese-Speaking Vampires", but it is still a bit of an issue that could've been fined tuned a bit here and there.

But beyond that, guys, camerawork and lighting here is pretty decent, aside from some of the issues I already touched upon. Sound-mixing here is pretty good. And the music here is mainly just synth music. It actually reminds me a bit of what I heard in "Escape From New York", since John Carpenter is also a musician in his own right. And while I wouldn't say it's as good as it was there, or any of Carpenter's music work for that matter, it's still at least decent. So I can give the music here that much.

So, guys, when everything is said and done, am I able to recommend "VFW". Oh yes, guys, most certainly. It is a really good film and I would say it's much better than "Christmas Bloody Christmas", mostly because the characters aren't swearing as much here as they did in "Christmas Bloody Christmas". If you're a fan of old-school horror movies, then this movie is more or less an homage to how some of those movies operated back then. I myself really enjoyed this thing, although I can't say that it's perfect, or will end up being in my Top 5 this year. But still, I enjoyed this movie immensely, guys, and I'll certainly be adding it to my DVD collection. And since I just mentioned "Escape From New York", I'm gonna go and watch that next as soon I get done with this review.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Monsterland

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering a horror anthology film from 2016. That movie is "Monsterland".

Now I do know a little bit about the premise of this movie. And I'm not talking about it being another anthology film, I mean I know about the framing device for it. Some guy is taking shelter inside of an abandoned movie theater while there's a "Monster Apocalypse" going on outside, and he's taking refuge to what'll ultimately be his last movie viewing experience. Now I do like that sort of premise, however, when it comes to anthology films, those things can be a mixed bag at best, as has this series has proven before.

And while I still want to like this film, I'm also expecting the worst out of it too because I've run into quite a bit of bad anthology films for this series. "Fright House", to me, is easily the top spot for the worst anthology film I've seen period. Now I'm hoping that this film won't reach that level, even if it does suck. However, I won't know if this thing is actually any good or not unless I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Monsterland".

6 minutes later

Wait, that was it?! That whole first story was just a bunch of idiot teenagers/adults just being killed off by something underwater and nothing else. At least, that's what I'm going to assume anyways. And if it was, then that "story" was complete shit. Now if there's more to it here than maybe I'll take back what I said, unless this is a completely different story and that first one was just basically a waste of time. I'll find out soon enough.

30 seconds later

OK, never mind, we're *now* starting the first story of this anthology. So basically, I was right the first time, that prologue segment, or lack thereof, was just filler and nothing more. That was kinda bullshit, guys.

7 minutes later

The fuck is that thing?! It only appeared for a second, but apparently, this, uh, "thing" appeared in the back of Simon's head after his head got fucked up. I hope this movie will attempt to explain what the hell that is, otherwise, I'm just gonna be left wondering without getting any actual answers here.

3 minutes later

OK, guys, so, apparently, this maggot has a name. It's Brian. And for some reason, Simon hasn't attempted to kill this fucking abomination and somehow seems OK with him hanging out at his place. And also, I should mention, the way that they're digitally moving Brian's mouth here looks horrible. I'm kinda hoping that this story here either ends really quickly or they actually attempt to make some sense of it because I'm totally fucking lost here.

6 minutes later

Thank god, that story's fucking over. That was almost completely retarded. I hope that the rest of the stories here aren't nearly as stupid as that first one was.

6 minutes later

So apparently, this kid's pet mouse can glow green after he "experimented" by pouring down two different kinds of chemicals in his bowl. If it were me, I probably wouldn't even attempt to touch the mouse with my bare hands because I have no idea how infectious it really is because this kid is too stupid to even do something such as wearing gloves. But again, that's probably just me.

6 minutes later

OK, you know what? That was a hilarious way to end that second story. I actually really liked that one.

3 minutes later

Wait, so this guy's wife has been having nightmares for over a year now and *this* was the moment where they finally speak to a psychiatrist? Then what the fuck has this guy done for the past year to control his wife's nightmares? Unless stuff like sleeping pills or some kind of medicine didn't do the trick, then I have a little bit of a hard time believing that this guy has done shit while his wife was having nightmares. But then again, I haven't been married before, so what the hell do I know?

3 minutes later

You know, guys, I find it really kinda funny how he's been looking into what's causing his sleeping problems. And you wanna know where he's getting his information from? Fucking Wikipedia! Guys, I don't think I should have to tell you this, but Wikipedia isn't always the most reliable source when it comes to information. Granted, I only use Wikipedia to look up what year certain movies I cover for this series came out in, but other than that, I wouldn't fully trust getting your sources from mainly Wikipedia. Just saying.

9 minutes later

So, guys, we're now jumping into a new story here, and it's done with animation, too. Interesting. At least, I would say it's interesting, however, the animation in this segment looks like one of those flash games you play for free online. And it looks really stiff, too. I'm not totally sure how to feel about this one, guys.

3 minutes later

OK, never mind. Once again, that was just a random segment that was added in there just to fill time. And I'm thankful that one was real short, too, because the voice acting in that one was awful. But I'll get more into that later when I eventually cover this film.

7 minutes later

So let me see if I understand this. This psychotic idiot thinks he's turning into a vampire. And the first thing he does with our doctor, besides threatening him with a gun, he asks to pull his teeth out because they might be growing into vampire's teeth. Even though he just admitted earlier that he was "bitten" by a vampire. And I use the quotations there because we haven't even seen this bite of his, and yet, we're supposed to take this guy's word because fuck you, that is why. But even if it actually *does* exist, don't you think maybe you ought to focus on that first before you go for the teeth? I'm just saying, guys, it might be more helpful.

8 minutes later

I have no clue what the fuck I'm seeing here, guys. Apparently this whole thing is done with puppetry and I don't even know what the fuck's happening here. Oh, and one of them is actually King Ghidorah with Mothra's wings. Again, I have no clue what the fuck is going on here, guys. It's really more of a mindfuck.

3 minutes later

OK, and now we have an actual human actor in this thing. Granted, I don't know why that is considering everything else in this segment is not making any fucking sense. Then again, I don't know if there's even an actual story here and they just decided to say "fuck it" and let's just improvise shit as we go along. Oh, and now he just lost his fake beard as it turned into this weird-looking puppet with many eyes and colors...and it's shooting really shitty-looking rainbow beams at him. And now, he has the head of a pie...seriously, what the fuck am I watching?!

5 minutes later

So our next, and possibly last, story features our main character growing surgically implanted breasts because he answered an ad in the paper to be a stay at home Dad and get paid for it. This story is shit, guys. I don't even care if it even gets better. That concept alone already makes me hate this story more so than I did with the first one. I didn't even think that was fucking possible, but this story found a way to instantly be worse than all the stories in this entire anthology. That is almost terrifying, guys.

13 minutes later

Well, guys, for the third time this review, I was totally fucking wrong. We actually got one more story out of this anthology, and already, I believe I've found a big problem with this anthology. And I'll talk more about it later in the review, but the pacing in this movie is just really bad.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Monsterland". Thank fucking god, it's done. I'm just gonna shut this movie off here...dear lord. Sorry, guys, but this is probably the first film that has completely fried my brain. I don't even know where to fucking start with this film because I fear I'd be here for at least a week trying to explain what the fuck I just watched.

Well, before I actually do talk about the issues that this movie has, I'm gonna talk about the biggest problem with this movie as a whole. The pacing here is just really bad. To start with, this anthology has a total of 7 stories. Which, normally, I would say is almost heard of. However, I do remember watching "HI-8 (Horror Independent 8)" earlier this year, which had a total of about 8 stories. So I'm not gonna complain about the number of segments in this film. What I am gonna complain about, however, are the in-between segments that occasionally appear throughout the movie. All the unnamed segments in this film are a complete waste of filler. These segments do nothing to help enhance the overall movie, which in turn brings the entire pacing down to a screeching halt. And I have no idea if this was a way to showcase potential segments that couldn't get turned into actual stories for this anthology, or if they just need them in here to pad out the runtime, which runs about an hour and 40 minutes. And that, guys, to me, is just way too fucking long. They could cut out all of the unnamed segments and the movie could've flowed a whole lot better.

Now while on I'm this subject, for this review, I'm not going to count any of the unnamed segments because, again, they just exist as filler. I'm only gonna be focusing on the 7 stories that do have titles to them, and see how they fare with their writing. And to start with, I'm gonna focus on the two worst segments first because both of them are fucking terrible. "Stay at Home Dad" is easily the worst segment simply because of it's premise alone. And normally, I wouldn't bash at a bad premise so long as they could make it work. But guess what? They didn't. The idea of an idiot Dad getting surgically implanted breasts so that he can get paid as a stay at home Dad is fucking retarded. That, plus I'm not a fan of children, so this segment was already dead on arrival to begin with. The first story "The Grey Matter" just ends up being some stupid romantic horror comedy where a maggot that came out of a guy's massively exposed head is giving love advice on how to score with a girl. And just to let you guys also know, in case you're new here, I hate romantic comedies. And this story ended up becoming shit the moment that stupid maggot started talking. So yeah, we have two awful stories. One at the beginning, and the other which was the second to last one of the anthology.

"Hellyfish" is also terrible as well, but I also have a feeling that one was to be intentionally bad, where it tried to parody all of those terrible shark movies that you would see on the Sy-Fy channel. Which probably would've been fine, except I'm not a fan of shark movies because I find the concepts to be completely stupid and not worth the time. And instead of sharks, we have killer jellyfish, all of which are terribly rendered in CG, but I'll get into that later when I cover special effects. And then we get to "Happy Memories", AKA the puppet segment. Now there's probably gonna be that one person who's seen this movie and says that there's some "deeper meaning" that I missed from that segment, and I don't want to hear it. Because there was no story there at all. It didn't even attempt to try and make some sense and just made it's own shit up as it progressed. The last time I watched a movie that came close to being a mindfuck was the 1989 horror film called "Dr. Caligari". At least there, however, it had a more coherent story when compared to...whatever the fuck this segment was trying to do. "Happy Memories" is not a story, and yet, somebody approved of this being in the actual film. And to that person, you can rightfully go fuck yourself.

Now, with all that being said, are there any segments here that are good? Yes, actually. The best story, at least to me, goes to "Curiosity Kills". And what makes this one so unique is the fact that the entire segment is done with almost no dialogue. The most dialogue you might get is if the kid's family is watching TV and you can hear a bit of the audio from it, or if someone's screaming. Beyond that, though, the most acting you get from this segment is done through body language and facial expressions. And it's really well done. The only slight problem with this approach is that you don't get to see or hear anyone's names. So, it's a slight downgrade, but the story itself is really funny. I want you to imagine an episode of "Tom and Jerry", but in this short film, Jerry got infected with radioactive waste and ends up killing almost the entire family that is represented by Tom. It's really a unique and funny story that I actually wound up laughing by the time it was finished. It is easily the best story of the entire anthology. Second place would have to go to "Hag", where the husband of this wife ends up having sleeping problems that ends up with a demon lurking over him. It's a pretty decent segment, overall. "House Call" I would've liked, if not for the execution of the story being really kinda stupid.

So overall, guys, I'm gonna shorten the whole thing for you. Out of the 7 stories in this anthology film, I only liked 2 of them. Which is a really bad batting average. Add on to the fact that this anthology film has terrible pacing, which makes this anthology a little bit more of a chore to watch. So...yeah, writing for most of the segments could've been a whole lot better. Now as for the acting, oh lord, where do I start? Well...I can say the acting here is OK. It's certainly not great, or even good for that matter, but it's far from the worst thing I've heard in a low budget horror movie of any kind. Really, guys, it's hard for me to pinpoint which was good or which was worst here because there's a lot of it that I can't really pin down. The only one I can think of is the unnamed segment with the stiff flash animation, where one of the actors sounded like he was recording it with his phone. But I can't really count that one because it's not part of any of the named segments here. So with that being said, I'm going to give the acting a pass here because I really can't pick which ones had the better acting, and which ones had the worst.

Special effects in this film are a giant mixed bag. Now obviously, since this is a low budget film, we're not aiming for the stars here. And rather than just talking about the effects for each of the segments, I'm going to summarize most of it for you here. The CG in this film is horrible. Most of that comes from the last segment "Hellyfish", which has all of the killer jellyfish rendered in terrible CG. It's the kind of CG that you would see on a Sy-Fy Channel Original Movie. Which, maybe that was the intention by the filmmakers of this segment, but that doesn't mean that I can't still criticize it. So yeah, the CG in that one was terrible. There's also kind of a cheap effect in "Curiosity Kills" where the mouse is glowing green and it's more or less just a cheap-looking visual effect. Also, at certain points, the camera will position itself in a first person view from the mouse's perspective and you can kinda notice how the mouse is more of a hand puppet. Which, again, looks really cheap, but it's actually cheap on a laughably bad level. I actually really dug the effects in that one.

Practical effects, like the makeup effects in "Hag" look decent. And as for the, uh, "creativeness" in "Happy Memories", well, a lot of the puppetwork and artistry looks...fine, I guess. The backgrounds in the segments look mostly done in green-screen, which does also add to the cheapness of the movie in a so bad, it's good kind of way. But yeah, guys, overall, the special effects in this thing are a mixed bag at best. Camerawork here is fine. The lighting here is fine. Sound-mixing here is also competent. The music, though, I really can't remember a single thing about this movie's music, so I'll just write it as passable. That's really the best way I can summarize because, again, I don't remember a single thing about it. So yes, guys, technical work here is fine.

So now, comes the hard part. When all is said and done, guys, am I able to recommend "Monsterland"? It's actually really tough to say. Because even though I only liked 2 of the 7 short films in this movie, I can't entirely deny that there is some merit in watching this movie. If you can find it cheap for about $5, go for it. Especially if you're somebody who's really into horror films, and you also like anthology films on top of that as well. And hey, you know what? If you somehow liked any of the other segments that I didn't like here, then that's great. More power to you if you enjoyed them. However, as for me, personally speaking, I can't really say that I'll be watching this film again because, as I just said, I only liked 2 out of the 7 short films here, and that's not good enough for me to keep this movie around in my DVD collection. I'm definitely going to be trading it in. Though before I do that, I do know an associate from work who might be interested in this movie because they're a big fan of horror films. So I'm gonna see if she wants it before I decide to trade it in officially. Now...I'm gonna go and watch something a little bit better. And you know what? I see my copy of "Chillerama" sitting on my DVD shelf and I need to rewatch it again after skipping out on it last year, because I really liked that film. So I'm gonna go and do that next as soon as I get done here.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Death Warrant

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering one of two films this month, both of which star Jean-Claude Van Damme. And this first came out in 1990. That movie is "Death Warrant".

Now the reason why I say that I'm covering two films with Van Damme in them is because I found a DVD combo pack that has two of his films together, and I found it for pretty cheap, so why the hell not? And also, I don't believe I've covered any other film with Mr. Van Damme in it since I reviewed "Bloodsport", which was a long time ago. I believe it might've been either my 4th or 5th episode back then. Not totally sure which to be exact. But yeah, I figured that if I gave Chuck Norris two chances for this series, I don't see why I can't give Van Damme here some spotlight also.

Now I'd love to tell you guys everything I know about this movie, but unfortunately, I don't really know much. I know it stars Jean-Claude Van Damme, and from what little I skimmed on the back here, it mentions something about him posing as a prisoner in order to investigate some killings that have been going on inside the prison. Which could be interesting, although considering that Van Damme is flying solo here, it could go either way. I'm saying this mainly because I've only seen two films starring the guy. One of which is "Bloodsport", which I really enjoyed. The other film was "Double Team", and that film really sucked. So I'm not expecting anything amazing here.

Still though, I am curious to see if this movie is actually any good. I'm not totally sure if it will be, but it does have a chance here. So the only way I'm gonna know if this movie is any good at all is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Death Warrant".

5 minutes later

Wait, so this Sandman guy says to Van Damme that he can't kill him. Van Damme shoots him four times and Sandman crumples to the ground, presumably already dead. And then Van Damme finishes it off by saying that he's "under arrest". Um...I think he's already dead, dude. Unless he's wearing some kind of body armor, then I don't think arresting him is gonna do much for you in the end. Just saying.

9 minutes later

OK, I have a dumb question here that's probably not gonna get answered, but I still want to ask this. So, as I mentioned earlier, Burke is being sent to this prison to pose as a prisoner and get information about what the hell's been going on there. Isn't it possible some of the people running the prison might recognize Burke and the position that he's been handed to? I'm only asking because it's possible that if anyone of them recognizes him, then they could use that information to send someone to kill him and cover it up as a prisoner's own doing and leaving the officials clean as a whistle. I'm just saying that you gotta know the risks of what you're getting yourself into is all.

10 minutes later

OK, so Burke had just finished talking with Beckett in the visitor's room, and he says to her that he needs cash to do stuff inside the prison, even though she tells him it's illegal to do a thing like that during visits. And as he's leaving, there's a security camera watching the whole thing. Wouldn't they be able to pick up what they were talking about through the security camera's footage? I'm just saying that maybe it wouldn't be the best idea to talk about it, even if you are trying to be secretive about it. But maybe that's just me.

8 minutes later

So the priest here actually has a decent-looking cell. Granted, I could ask where the hell all these women came from, unless they are also in prison too for whatever reasoning. Which that raises a whole mountain of questions in itself, but you know what? I'm not going to question it because I feel I won't get the answers if even I did attempt to ask them.

16 minutes later

So, even though Burke now knows there's someone from outside the prison who's out to kill him, he still couldn't stop two people in time from killing his cellmate. I would've thought he might have a plan to trap his two assassins, but no, he instead gets his friend killed by them, even if it was by accident. So...great job, Burke, I'm sure your prison mate is happy to know that he's dead. But yeah, that scene was a little bit stupid.

4 minutes later

O...K, well, the guy that Burke was secretly talking to is also dead. And holy shit, that actually was pretty hardcore. Incredibly fucked up, mind you, but still, that was definitely a brutal way to die.

6 minutes later

All right, well, I guess was wrong into thinking that Sandman was dead from way early on. I guess, maybe, he *was* wearing some type of body armor that I wasn't made aware of. I'm curious to know what the hell he's been doing for the last 16 months since he was shot "dead" by Burke. I'm hoping, maybe, the film will explain that bit at some point before it ends.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Death Warrant". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. So, where to begin with this one? Well, I will say that, despite me sorta nitpicking this movie to pieces, I actually did rather enjoy this one. Mind you, it's not a film that's going to set the world on fire, but it is pretty much what you would come to expect when it comes to an action thriller starring Jean-Claude Van Damme.

Let's start this review off here by first talking about the writing. Now, a couple of years ago, I reviewed a movie that had a similar setting like this one did. The movie was called "Lock Up", in which Sylvester Stallone was in prison and had to deal with corrupt guards and certain prison inmates that are secretly working together. This movie is almost similar to that, with the only difference in it's plot. With "Lock Up", Sylvester Stallone was transferred over to the prison by the warden, who personally despises him and wants to see him fight back so that he can keep him in prison forever before Stallone got out. In this film, Van Damme is sent there as an undercover prisoner to find out the secret behind all the murders that have been going on at the prison while also dealing with the same thing Stallone did in "Lock Up". At least, on the surface anyway. You find out later that someone on the outside is intentionally trying to keep Burke, Van Damme's character, in prison. I won't say who exactly, but let's just say that it's not a real big surprise.

So, premise wise, the films are almost identical in that regard. However, in terms of characters, that's where we start to get another big difference. See, whenever you're watching an action film starring Jean-Claude Van Damme, 9 times out of 10, you're not going to get a character piece out of him whatsoever. The closest you might get that is in "Bloodsport", where he was trying to win the Kumite in honor of his teacher. But even that's kinda stretching it since he doesn't go through a whole lot of changes there. This movie, in terms of character development, has almost nothing going for him. The only thing you know about Burke is that he's a cop who's trying to figure out, not only the killings of inside the prison, but also how and why his partner was killed at the beginning of the movie. You know who it is, since this movie is not trying to be subtle about it, but still, beyond his motivations, you get absolutely nothing in terms of character development. You're here to watch Van Damme kick tons of ass and also get out of prison in the end.

As for the other characters that are present here, you got Beckett, who's the chick who's been assigned to work with Burke to try and get information about the killings while he's in prison. She really doesn't have much of a character to her, and considering that she's the only female lead in this movie, there's a big chance that she and Burke will hook up in the end, which they obviously do. You have our villain, Sandman, who's barely in the movie at all, and he's evil because, well, he's evil. There's not much of a reason why he is. He's just out of his fucking mind. You also don't learn about anything about what happened between the 16 months after he was supposedly "killed". I think they mentioned a little after the prologue that he was already in another prison while before and after Burke gets infiltrated inside the prison to investigate. But I'm not sure if that's truly the case or not.

The only two other characters I can mention real quick are Hawkins and Priest. Which, neither one of them have much development either. You learn that Hawkins has a glass eye, which is clearly visible, and he says that he's in prison for murder. And as for Priest...well, I really can't tell you much about him other than that he has a decent-looking cell that apparently none of the guards know about. Also, he has women joining him in his cell. So either they're prisoners as well and they're the only ones that exist in the prison, or there actually is a prison for women somewhere that the movie never makes aware of and they just want you to kinda roll along with it. I'm guessing it's a little bit of both, since it's neither really important to the overall story. Well, except for one who gets offed by the assassins, though I won't say who here.

But overall, guys, the story here, while ultimately nothing special, is still sorta decent for what it is. It might not make a whole lot of sense at times, but what is here is still fine for what they had to work with. Now as for the acting, most of it is actually pretty good with the one lone exception being Jean-Claude Van Damme. His acting is horrible here. Which probably isn't too surprising considering the man has limited acting skills to begin with, but it's very clear in this movie that he didn't really have very much to work with in terms of acting. And just to compare with somebody like Sylvester Stallone from earlier, Stallone might have a bit of a deep voice at times, but with him, he can pull off a decent range of acting skills thanks to movies like the Rambo series and even "Lock Up". But with Van Damme, he doesn't have that sort of luxury. And unlike his performances in "Street Fighter" and "Bloodsport", where he had more material to work with, this one doesn't give him much to do and he sounds completely flat in almost all of his delivery, save for one time however when he has to yell and it sounded unintentionally hilarious. Aside from that, however, his acting here is terrible. But thankfully, most of the other cast is able to carry the movie even though he's suppose to be the star of it. So it's just something you have to take for what it's worth when it comes to Van Damme in this movie.

There really isn't a whole lot here in terms of special effects. There are some practical effects, which look decent. There's also quite a bit of pyrotechnics and fire going in this movie, and it is easily the best part of the special effects. It isn't saying much, and it's certainly not on the level of Michael Bay for better or worse, but at least it's still pretty good here. Our sets and costuming is also pretty good, too, as most of the costuming comes from the prisoner outfits or even the guard uniforms. Again, it might not be saying very much, but at least it's still good enough considering the setting and all.

Camerawork here is pretty good. Lighting here is lit very well. Sound-mixing here is good. The music here is completely forgettable. I don't remember a single piece of music that was memorable in any way, but what is here is still competent enough all things considered.

So, with all that being said, guys, when it comes down to it, am I able to recommend "Death Warrant"? If you're a fan of Jean-Claude Van Damme and you want to see every movie that he's ever been in, then sure, I could probably say this is worth checking out, if at least just once. If you're someone who's into these sorts of movies where there's a prison setting and you're a fan of movies like "Lock Up", then sure, I could probably recommend it on that end as well. Just don't expect anything amazing here, as the plot is ultimately nothing special. As for me, well, I still did enjoy it, despite its flaws. And I still have the other movie on this 2 pack that I'll cover later this month and see if it's just as decent as this movie was. But in the meantime, I'm gonna go and watch another movie with Van Damme in it. I'm gonna go and watch "Bloodsport" again because I really enjoy that film a lot. So I'm gonna go and do that next once I get done with this review.

Anyway, guys, with that, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.

Reaction & Review | Bartok The Magnificent

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to an all new Reaction & Review. Tonight, guys, I'm gonna be covering an animated movie from 1999. That movie is "Bartok The Magnificent".

Now, this film is a bit of a special case for me because it's the final film from legendary animation director, Don Bluth, that I haven't seen yet. And before anyone might comment that there is his pitch for a "Dragon's Lair" movie, I'm not going to count it until I see it actually being theatrically released. And until that happens, this film is the last one he ever produced.

Now as for what I know about this movie, well, I do know a couple of things about it. First off, I do know that this movie was released as direct-to-video. And also, this is the only sequel film that both Don Bluth and Gary Goldman ever worked on. And it's funny to me because Bluth has stated before that he didn't like *any* sequels to his movies that were made. And to an extent, I can't necessarily blame the man for it, especially when you consider how many fucking sequels were made to "The Land Before Time" and almost never stopped. Thankfully, they finally stopped that shit because the last sequel film was released in 2016 and I think it's best just to let it die peacefully before some numbnuts over at Universal even consider bringing back this franchise again.

But setting aside that, as I just stated, this is the only sequel film that Bluth had a hand in directing, and this one features a minor character from "Anastasia". And I should mention that I have begun to really enjoy it with each viewing, especially around Christmas time, because it really is a good film. Not quite my favorite, but it's certainly climbing up there in the ranks. But yeah, this movie stars the character Bartok, the little albino bat that was a lackey to Rasputin from "Anastasia". Now I didn't mind Bartok at all, it's just I find it a little strange that you would focus your sequel film on him of all characters.

But hey, I have been surprised beforehand by Bluth's films, and this one could actually be rather decent. I don't know if it will actually be any good, but that's what I'm here to find out. I'm here to find out if the last film from Bluth will end up being a good one. And the only way I'm gonna know that answer is if I shut up and I push play, and I'm gonna do that right now. So, without further ado, it's time to kick back, relax, and check out "Bartok The Magnificent".

3 minutes later

OK, guys, I know this is early, but I need to comment on this. Now I have nothing against Hank Azaria as a voice actor, but his singing here really fucking sucks. You guys can't hear it for obvious reasons, but him attempting to sing is really kinda shit. And now I know why Bartok never actually got a song in "Anastasia" if his singing here is anything to go by. Just my own theory, really.

13 minutes later

So when this obviously not evil advisor offers gold and riches to Bartok in order to save the prince from Baba Yaga, he ends up refusing, though not necessarily by his own choosing. Yet, when two children ask him to save the Prince, he ends up saying yes thanks to child manipulation. Honestly, if it were me, I would totally do it for the treasure. But then again, I'm not a fan of children, so perhaps my priorities are a little more organized, shall we say.

6 minutes later

All right, guys, I'm gonna talk more about this in the review, but the CG in this movie looks terrible. OK sure, I know this is a direct-to-video film, but still, this CG here is just noticeably awful. Just thought I'd let you guys know beforehand.

9 minutes later

Wow, guys, I may have just found the most annoying character in a Don Bluth film to date. Piloff is fucking annoying as shit and it also doesn't help the fact that she's voiced by Jennifer Tilly, who's also equally as annoying as the character she's voicing. But then again, that goes for about 99% of every character that she's ever done voicework for, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised by this.

11 minutes later

So Bartok actually has an autograph photo of Ivan the Terrible, which is also signed by him as well. That's actually really funny, I will grant the movie that much.

8 minutes later

OK, you know what? As much as this character is completely bland and generic, Catherine O'Hara's voice cracks is making it a little bit more tolerable. It's actually very impressive.

The Review

Well, guys, that was "Bartok The Magnificent". Let me go ahead and shut the movie off here...OK. Well, I can now officially say that I have seen all of Don Bluth's films that he produced. So how does this one fare up with all of his other movies? Honestly, the film is just kinda average. It's certainly not great, but I still don't find it to be terrible either. In fact, I would still that it's better than "Thumbelina" and "A Troll In Central Park". But that's just me, personally speaking.

So now, let's dive right into this film here and talk a little bit more about it. I'm gonna start with the writing. Now, seeing as how this movie stars a minor supporting character from "Anastasia", you're probably thinking that this movie is suppose to be a sequel to it, right? Well...I actually don't know myself. Because this movie doesn't really reference anything from the first film, and it's really just more so doing it's own thing. Which I actually don't mind it too much here. But then again, I'm also somebody that let continuity issues pass when it came to the "All Dogs Go To Heaven" sequels and animated series. I'm kinda weird like that, but I also saw them when I was younger, too. So I can't really complain about it as much as others would. And I'm letting it pass with this movie because, honestly, there's not much you can follow up from "Anastasia" because it ended perfectly. Now I know the actual history is totally different from the movie, but again, I think this movie doing it's own thing without referencing what happened is actually a smart move on the writers part.

Now what about the actual story itself here? How does the plot fare? Well, honestly, there really isn't much of a story here. The most you get out of it is that the young prince Ivan was kidnapped by a witch known as Baba Yaga. And Ivan's advisor, who's totally not fucking evil, sends Bartok out on a quest to search for the missing prince, and he, along with his bear friend Zozi, goes to the witches tower to confront her and get the prince back. Which ultimately turns out to be pointless because he's not at her home. Instead, she sends Bartok out on fetch quest to search for three items and bring them back to her so that she can reveal the location of the missing prince. And that's basically the whole plot in a nutshell for you, because nothing much else really happens here, at least not until the last 20 minutes or so. Before that, it's just a "Legend of Zelda" fetch quest and nothing much else beyond that.

Now there is one catch to all this, which is gonna result in a slight logic issue. See, before the fetch quest begins, Baba Yaga specifically tells Bartok that only he can get the items that she needs, and he can't have any help. Otherwise, both he and Zozi die. Yet, when Bartok returns with Piloff, the skull stops them and says that he won't pass until Bartok answers his riddle. I don't exactly remember what the riddle was, but basically, what happens here is that, instead of Bartok answering the riddle, Zozi actually does it instead and Bartok passes to be allowed through to the witches home. Which basically means that Zozi actually helped his friend, so doesn't that mean that they both die on the spot? Now it's very well possible that Baba Yaga only meant that he can retrieve the items she specifically requested by himself without any help, but I still think a technically like that shouldn't have gotten him a pass. But that's probably just me putting too much logic into a children's film.

Now as for the characters, I may as well just start off by talking about the star of the film, Bartok. Now, as I said earlier, I liked Bartok in "Anastasia", but I didn't think much else of him then, other than just being a lackey to Rasputin. In this movie, he actually has his own travel wagon and he performs as an entertainer. Which is kinda interesting, because at the end of "Anastasia", a female bat runs into him and apparently he found his mate. But yet, nothing like that is here. Again, I know I said that it's fine that this movie is doing it's own thing, but I still think a little continuity hiccup like that could raise an eyebrow, especially if you did watch "Anastasia" all the way through. But anyway, leaving that aside, Bartok is actually still very likable, and I'm glad they didn't really change very much about his personality. It's still very much intact and that's always cool to see.

As for the other characters, you have Zozi, the brown bear who accompanies Bartok on his journey. Which is a little bit odd to me because, as I said earlier, when Bartok was suppose to go on his fetch quest, he's not allowed help from anyone. And yet, Zozi still accompanies him on his entire fetch quest. I'm guessing he's only there as moral support, but really doesn't do very much here until near the very end where he saves the prince and a guard from drowning. Aside from that, and him also being an entertainer along with Bartok, he really doesn't have much else going for him. Lindlum, the advisor, I thought was going to play a bigger role here, but she really doesn't have much of a screen presence for a good majority of the film. It's not until after Bartok returns to find out that the prince was locked up in the tower, and also, as I just stated, she basically wants the thrown for herself. Basically, she's a discount version of Jaffar from "Aladdin", only she doesn't have to marry anyone to get the throne. And also, she's nowhere near as interesting as Jaffar was, though I will grant her two things that saves her from being completely boring. One, her voice actress is fantastic here. And two, her villain song is actually pretty catchy, too. I just wish her actual character was more interesting, but oh well, a couple of redeeming things about her is better than nothing.

Overall, guys, the writing here is certainly not on the level of Bluth's other works like "The Secret of NIMH" or even "Anastasia". However, I can't really say that it's awful either. Sure, it's more less just a by the numbers direct-to-video sequel from the late 90's. However, I will say that, if given a choice, I would rather watch this film over the mountain of crap Disney shat out when it came to it's direct-to-video sequels. Though that's just me speaking on a personal level. Now with that said, let's talk about the acting. And I will say that what helps this film stand out is definitely it's cast. Every actor here turns in a great showing. Hank Azaria, once again, reprises his role as Bartok, and it's still pretty much the same kind of enthusiasm he gave to the character back in "Anastasia". Zozi the bear is voiced by Kelsey Grammar, which is funny, because he also provided the voice of Vladimir from "Anastasia". I thought that was sort of an interesting choice there. Catherine O'Hara as Lindlum is probably one of the only things that makes her character redeemable because of how over-the-top she plays her, especially after you learn about what happened to the prince. And also, the late Tim Curry also has a minor role as the skeleton who tells riddles. And yeah, I really can't say anything more positive about the voice acting here other than that it's fantastic.

Let's talk about the animation. Now, admittedly, this one's gonna be a bit harder to talk about because this is still a Don Bluth and Gary Goldman production. And the reason why I say all that is because the animation is still really good for the most part, however, when you watch this movie for the first time, you can totally tell that it looks like what a direct-to-video animated film would look like from the late 90's, and it also looks rather cheap at times. Now I am gonna start by saying that when it comes to the traditional hand-drawn animation from a Don Bluth film, it looks great. However, that still isn't to say that there is quite a bit of cheapness here to be found. It's especially noticeable during the opening song at the beginning of the movie. Because some characters who are watching Bartok perform don't look like they have been animated thoroughly. And what I mean by that is some characters animation looks really unfinished because it looks as though some in-between phases seems really wonky. An example would be if a character is clapping their hands in the air, and you'll notice about a second or two delay whenever a character is clapping their hands. I don't know if that was just because the animation was cutting some corners there, but it still looks really awkward and you're bound to notice more than just that when it comes to some of the cheapness of the traditional hand-drawn animation.

But that's nothing in comparison to the CG. And there is quite a bit of CG in this movie. The most noticeable thing you'll happen to see quite a bit of is Bartok's wagon. The entire wagon is rendered in CG and it just looks terrible. Now again, I understand that this is still a direct-to-video animated film, so I'm not expecting great things when it comes to implementing CG in these sort of films, but whenever I do see something like this utilized the way it is, it just looks horrible. And it's also very noticeable when you see it on the skeleton and the witches house. The latter isn't so bad, actually, though, the skeleton is definitely a mixed bag. It kinda reminds me of the pipe organ used in that "Beauty and the Beast" Christmas movie which, funnily enough, was also voiced by Tim Curry. And unlike that pipe organ, which actually looked really cool in CG, the skeleton, however, doesn't quite match it. Hell, he didn't even get a song, which I think could've benefited the movie a little bit. But that's just me, of course. Overall, guys, the animation is definitely a big downgrade when compared to other Bluth films. But for what is here that *does* work for animation looks awesome. The color palettes are great, the animation on just about every other character is just as good, and the backgrounds look amazing, too. So I'm still going to say that the animation is mostly positive. Just be aware that some of it is definitely on the cheaper side of things.

Sound-mixing here is excellent. The music here is also pretty good. In terms of musicals, this is definitely one of the weaker aspects of the movie. Though I will say that Lindlum's song is actually the only good song here that I really liked. The one that's not good, however, is the beginning song which is sung by Hank Azaria. Hank Azaria is a talented voice actor, but in terms of his actual singing, it's terrible here. And again, I'm not surprised that his character Bartok didn't get a musical number in "Anastasia". It probably would've stained what was already an amazing soundtrack. But as I said, the soundtrack is definitely not on parnwith other songs from Bluth's previous movies, but it still has at least one good song in it, which is more than what I could say about "Thumbelina", because I still despise that film to this day. So anyway, the music here is still fine for what it is, at least in terms of it's score anyways.

So with all that said, when it comes down to it, guys, can I recommend "Bartok The Magnificent"? If you liked or even loved "Anastasia", and you want to see more of it, then I think this film would provide more of that for you. If you have kids, or you are associated with kids in some way, then yes. I can totally recommend this one to children. The movie's also rather short, too. It's only a little over an hour long, so if you have that much time to spare, then by all means go ahead and check it out. The only reason why I did is because it was the only film left that I haven't seen from Don Bluth until now. That, plus this film came as part of a combo pack with "Anastasia". So that's the other reason why I held off on this movie until now. But now that I've seen it, I can say that I have officially completed the filmography of Don Bluth. Which is awesome to say because I love most of his movies, save for a few. Speaking of, I think I'm gonna go and watch "Anastasia" again right now, seeing as how I just finished with this movie and all. So yeah, I'm gonna go and do that next as soon as I get done here.

And with that, guys, we come to the close of another Reaction & Review. Until next time, ladies and gentlemen, take care, and I will see you all later. Peace.