The King Of Fighters (2010)

 

The King Of Fighters (2010)- * *

Directed by: Gordon Chan 

Starring: Sean Faris, Will Yun Lee, Maggie Q, Bernice Liu, Monique Ganderton, and Ray Park

An evil baddie named Rugal (Park) wants to stay on top as the KING OF FIGHTERS. He has his own special dimension of existence where he can fight whoever joins him there using a Bluetooth earpiece. Certain relics are needed to help defeat Arugula or whatever his name is, so that’s where Mai Shiranui (Q) and Kyo Kusunagi (Faris) come in, because naturally Kyo has “the Kusunagi Sword” or some such thing. Iori Yagami (Lee) also is an opponent of Rugelach and Terry Bogard, a non-fighter, wants to know what the heck is going on. Vice (Liu) and Mature (Ganderton) are also fighters in the tournament. Will anyone be dexterous enough to beat Rugtime?


It must be an interesting challenge to turn a fighting video game into a 93-minute movie. Obviously you can’t have opponents fighting each other for the entire running time, so you have to fill the spaces in between the fight scenes with something. While, in The King of Fighters’s case, it took three people to accomplish this task, still the outcome fails to engage the viewer.

It’s all pretty slickly done in the visual sense, but there’s no emotional or intellectual aspects to lock on to. The end result is like watching someone else play a video game. And we all know how much fun that is. With King of Fighters, we don’t even get the pleasure of moving our thumbs around a plastic controller. It’s a video game that someone else is playing for you, and you can’t even press X to skip the cut scenes. That’s what the plot consists of.

The target audience for this movie seems to be obese middle-schoolers or otherwise very undemanding people that enjoy Mountain Dew and Cheetos as their main source of sustenance.

Sean Faris was an odd choice to play the Japanese Kyo Kusunagi. Mainly because he’s Sean Faris. He’s a himbo of the highest (or perhaps lowest) order. He seems like he’d be much more at home on the CW, delivering highly melodramatic dialogue about turbulent teenage relationships. Ray Park is no stranger to video game-related projects, including having been in Mortal Kombat: Annihilation (1997), which looks like a masterpiece compared to the brainless and taxing King of Fighters. If Gary Daniels or Scott Adkins played this part, it still wouldn’t have saved the movie, so perhaps it was better that it was Ray Park.

So while some scenes are somewhat stylish, it seems like the aforementioned Mortal Kombat: Annihilation might be enough for any sane viewer. That’s kind of the last word on movies like this – in other words, a bunch of people flying around in video game style while techno music plays on the soundtrack. And there is a ball of CGI snakes in there for good measure.

Featuring the end credits song “Go Fly” by Yoshitaki Iwai, King of Fighters is not recommended viewing, unless, for some reason, you’re trying to watch every video game movie out there. If so, you’re on your own there, buddy.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Also check out a write-up from our buddy, The Video Vacuum!

Shadows In Paradise (2010)

Shadows In Paradise (2010)- * *

Directed by: J. Stephen Maunder

Starring: Mark Dacascos, Sofya Skya, Tom Sizemore, Danny Trejo, Bruce Boxleitner, Vernon Wells, Steven Bauer, Andrew Divoff, and Armand Assante

Max Forrester (Dacascos) is fighting in Iraq alongside Sasha Villanoff (Skya). As a fellow soldier and Max’s girlfriend, he feels especially inclined to protect her from the baddies all around her. Max is put to the test when Sasha disappears. He tracks her to a place called Paradise Island, found somewhere in the middle east. 

During the course of their perilous journey, they uncover an illegal arms-smuggling ring run by some corrupt soldiers called Shadow Company. Since Shadow Company is on PARADISE Island, that explains the title of the movie. Meanwhile, Col. Bunker (Sizemore) and Captain Dyer (Boxleitner) are at odds because of the activities of Captain John Santos, who goes by the code name of “Ghost” (Assante). 

Could he have something to do with the arms smuggling? Or could it be Matador (Trejo), Stronach (Divoff), General Ruth (Wells), or Agent Stubbs (Bauer)? While we desperately want to invest some intrigue into all of this, we really just wanted to highlight all the names involved here. Will the hot middle eastern sun eradicate all the SHADOWS IN PARADISE? And who else will be eradicated?

Shadows In Paradise is such a textbook example of what we call the Lone Tiger Effect (for those who don’t know, it’s when a movie features a bunch of the B-Movie names we all know and love – so we think the movie itself is going to be good – but it turns out to not be so hot) that we should really consider changing it to the Shadows In Paradise Effect. Yes, all our favorite people are present and accounted for but…at what cost? In other words, while it was enjoyable to see all our cinematic buddies all together in one film, we were disappointed at the final result. Which makes things all the more disappointing.


That being said, this movie is just too darn silly to really hate. While the overall feel is one of those modern-day DTV “Seal Team” movies (i.e. junky and none too involving), and the muzzle flashes on the guns are roughly on par with the ones in Hangfire (1991) (i.e. really stupid and fake looking), once you see Tom Sizemore’s “acting”, you want to say to the movie, in a loving and forgiving tone, “I can’t stay mad at you…”


Is it any wonder, then, that with the incoherent mumblings of Armand Assante, layered with the incoherent ramblings of Tom Sizemore, that the movie as a whole is, well…incoherent? Thankfully, Sofya Skya is on board, but Assassins Run (2013) offers up a better example of what she can do. She does sing the theme song, “Don’t Break My Heart”, but with its 90’s Lilith Fair vibe, even that indicates she is capable of better. She should have followed the example of Natalie Burn and done more of a rocker.

There’s a bunch of beat-ups and shooting, and even some light prerequisite torture, but what else would you expect from director Maunder, whose only other directorial credits are Tiger Claws II (1996) and Tiger Claws III (2000)? Trejo, Bauer, Wells, and Divoff – enough to carry a movie in their own right – have glorified cameos. We believe Bruce Boxleitner was here, but it could have been Barry Bostwick. We’re still not sure. 

In the end, Shadows In Paradise is a lightweight and unfortunate example of a modern-day DTV actioner. While we were happy to see all the great cast members, to say they weren’t all used to their full potential is an understatement. It’s all pretty disposable. Bring us back to the 80’s any day.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Born To Raise Hell (2010)

Born To Raise Hell (2010)- * *

Directed by: Lauro Chartrand

Starring: Steven Seagal, Darren Shahlavi, and Dan Badarau

Our old buddy Seagal plays Robert “Bobby” Samuels, an agent for the “IDTF”, or International Drug Task Force, in Romania. When a psycho named Costel (Shahlavi) begins going around raping and killing people, not only does this upset Bobby, but it also tees off a criminal overlord named Dimitri (Badarau) whose toes Costel is stepping on. Despite initially being rivals because they’re on opposite sides of the law, Bobby and Dimitri enter into an uneasy alliance so they can both achieve their aim: stop Costel. Will they accomplish  their goal, or will they succumb to the depression of Eastern Europe? Dare you find out...?

In 1994, Motorhead, Ugly Kid Joe, and Ice-T all teamed up for the song “Born To Raise Hell”, which featured on the soundtrack to the movie Airheads, released that same year. Presumably they weren’t singing about Steven Seagal, but there are plenty of airheads in this run-of-the-mill latter-day Seagal DTV yawner. Perhaps Seagal himself is still bitter he wasn’t invited to perform on the track, as he is a musician, don’t’cha know. He’s really got the blues. One minute he wants to be an Asian Martial Artist, the next minute a Black bluesman, the next minute a Southern “Lawman”. Anyone but himself. 

Our working psychological theory for now is that 
Seagal is constantly running from his true self, which is why he constantly uses voice and body doubles as well. What he’s running from, we don’t know.  But he should run more often (we’ll try to keep the fat jokes to a minimum, but no promises).

As for the movie itself, it has that bleak Romanian DTV vibe regular viewers will recognize by now. To its credit, it doesn’t hide the fact that it was shot in the land of Vlad the Impaler and pretend it’s New York or something, but Seagal more closely resembles Count Chocula than anyone else more fearsome. Maybe his next movie will be a ghost story where he takes on the title role of Boo Berry. 

Born to Raise Hell just presents us with more depressing, soulless brutality served up as undemanding entertainment for less discerning viewers. Sure, it’s all tempered by the fact that we can now gauge the BMI of Seagal’s stuntman and Seagal himself is always shot with these bizarre shadows on his face, but none of this muck is really floating our boat as viewers. Seagal (or whoever is doing his ADR) is a bit more animated and less whispery this time around, but you’ll still need the subtitles on the DVD if you want any hope of knowing what people are saying.

It’s loaded with those quick-cut editing effects that are inexplicably used by moviemakers of the modern DTV era. Unless it’s all a conspiracy by LensCrafters and Pearle Vision Centers working behind the scenes with them so we all need glasses after watching a few DTV’s, there’s no reason for them to exist. They’re not cool, they’re just annoying. 

The same could be said for the dumb dialogue said in this movie, and what Seagal says is not tough-sounding, and doesn’t add to his image. It just makes him look like a cross between Eddie Munster and a walrus in an oversized leather coat. He ends most sentences with the words “boy” or “man”. Evidently he is judging how mature you look, which is just creepy.  After the second half of the movie, it just spins its wheels, nothing noteworthy happens and you’re mentally checked out and thinking about what you’re going to be eating for dinner that night. Not unlike...well, you get it.

While we appreciated the presence of fan favorite Shahlavi as the baddie, and perhaps the quick-and-silly fight/action scenes, we just thought it was typical crude oil from the Seagal spigot. Seagal fans may defend this one, as they are wont to do, but we just weren’t feeling it.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Also check out a write-up from our buddies, Cool Target and DTVC

The Killing Machine (2010)

The Killing Machine (2010)-* * *

AKA: Icarus 

Directed by: Dolph Lundgren

Starring: Dolph Lundgren and Bo Svenson 




"No One Is Safe."








Edward Genn (Lundgren) is a family man and loving husband and father - but he’s also a secret assassin trained in the former Soviet Union and working for the Russian Mob. His code name is Icarus. After certain events go sideways, all manner of bad guys - goons, hired killers, Russian mob, other mobs, etc. are after him. All Genn wants to do is protect his family. But he’ll have to face the demons of his past first, personified by the evil gangster Vadim (Svenson). Will his double life come crashing down?

It’s very cool to see Dolph as a hitman and he looks quite dapper in his suits and ties here. As seems to be the trend of late, some scenes are underlit and too dark to see, but what we did see, we liked very much. Except for the film quality and the soundtrack, this film could have been made in the 80’s, which is definitely a good thing in our book. Dolph, as star and director, obviously knows what his fans want, and he delivers yet again. It helps that the writer, Raul Inglis, is also the uncredited writer on White Tiger (1996) as well as the writer of Breach of Trust (1995).

 There’s plenty of action, good violence, and Bo Svenson as well. He doesn’t show up until the very last portion of the film, but it was cool to see Dolph and Bo together, especially in a showdown as mortal enemies. Interestingly, the plot of “guy was a hitman and now has a wife and daughter who are now in danger because of his past life and he now must use his violent training to protect them” was also used for Hitman’s Run (1999). Thankfully, neither Esteban Powell, nor any other annoying sidekick is on display. As said earlier, Dolph knows what his fans want. Annoying sidekicks are not one of them.

So thanks to the action, violence, presence of two of our favorite stars (Dolph and Bo) and the undemanding running time of 88 minutes, not to mention the 80’s throwback feel and Dolph’s direction, The Killing Machine is a solid winner.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Beatdown (2010)

Beatdown (2010)-* *

Directed by: Mike Gunther

Starring: Rudy Youngblood, Susie Abromeit, Michael Bisping, Mike Swick, Bobby Lashley, Heath Herring, Eric Balfour, and Danny Trejo











Brandon (Youngblood) is a tough street brawler whose brother Frankie is killed by gangsters. Now the gangsters are after Brandon for the 40,000 dollars his brother owed. Brandon then flees to a small Southern town where he develops a romance and also lives with his paraplegic father (Trejo). It's not long before Brandon enters the underground Punchfighting circuit where the reigning champion is Victor Dean (Balfour). It turns out the burgeoning romance is with Dean's sister Erin (Abromeit), and Victor's not happy. Brandon moves up the ranks and eventually faces off against Victor. Who will win?

The biggest problem with this movie is the editing. There are weird, unnecessary cuts, as well as puzzling camera zooms and spins. The fights are pretty brutal when you can see them, as there are plenty of blood-soaked fences (yes, fences!) to show the extreme nature of the fighting. Also quite extreme is the now-prerequisite playing of the song "Wildfire in the Streets" by Tommy Fields. Surely the makers of all these modern-day Punchfighters must have known that fans don't watch just one of these things. If you like one, you probably will like them all, and fans would notice the constant reappearance of Tommy Fields.

The plot is also haphazard, as there is a quick setup with the gangster Gino Ganz which kind of falls by the wayside until much later. All the cliches you know and love are present and accounted for - the training sequence and the silly love story, with its insipid dialogue. There's plenty of "Barnfighting", as Southern "redneck" stereotypes are beaten by Youngblood. There's, inexplicably, a TapouT octagon in the middle of a state fair in the deep south. Their tentacles reach from there to prisons everywhere, as Locked Down (2010) proves.

Youngblood is relatively likable, but as you might expect, Danny Trejo is the best actor in the movie. He seems like he doesn't care, but it could be his character.

If only the directing and editing were competent, this would be a not-bad modern-day Punchfighter. As it stands, Beatdown is not really a success.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty

Locked Down (2010)

Locked Down (2010)-* *

Directed by: Daniel Zirilli

Starring: Vinnie Jones, Bai Ling, Tony Schiena, Sarah Ann Schultz, John B. Lowe, Dave Fennoy, Rashad Evans, Lance "The Snake" Cartwright, and Kimbo Slice






 "I'm betting my life on it."


In Chicago's Blackwater state penitentiary (not to be confused with the covert ops organization), mob boss Anton Vargas (Jones), rules the roost. Everyone is on his payroll, including the warden and the guards. He runs Punchfighting matches in the basement of the prison. Meanwhile, undercover cop on the edge Det. Danny Bolan (Schiena) is involved in a drug bust gone wrong where he's framed and mistakenly sent to Blackwater.  While inside, he faces off against Vargas and his Punchfighting minions in order to survive. That includes criminals he himself put in jail.

This modern-day Punchighter is another 90-minute commercial for the TapouT brand. While Circle of Pain (2010) has more TapouT product placement than Locked Down, still, somehow, inmates in a maximum security prison have have TapouT shirts and hats.

These TapouT ( we feel very silly adding that last capital T, just so you know) productions always manage to get one B-list name - in Circle of Pain it was Dean Cain, Beatdown (2010) has Danny Trejo, and here we have Vinnie Jones. He is underused as the baddie, and this role doesn't let him live up to his full potential. He wears the same outfit the whole movie and doesn't say that much. As for Kimbo Slice, the filmmakers tacked on some unrelated plot about him fighting people in Florida. The word "shoehorned" comes to mind here. Tony Schiena is such a meatheady dolt - more than usual - I didn't recognize him at first.

 There are a lot of classic clichés on display: Bolan tells Vargas "we have a lot of history together", the scene where a guard says to the incoming prisoners "this is the end of the line" and "you can't do anything without my say so", and at one point Bolan even says "this might sound cliched, but my father was a cop...my grandfather was a cop..." Also, Bolan's shrew of a girlfriend whining, telling him he can't a be an undercover cop because she never sees him anymore. The lifer/trainer of  the Bolan character, and much more.

Despite some of the negative things we've said so far, Locked Down is really not that bad for a modern-day Punchfighter. These movies hark back to a late 80's/90's style of filmmaking, which is decent, but what ruins that is all the horrible nu-metal music over the top of it all. Tunes such as "Wildfire in the Streets" by Tommy Fields, and other bands such as "Stabbed", "Eject", "Dgat" and others offer their selections as well. The most ridiculous song names a bunch of real-life fighters and how they are all going to, and I quote "pop your hood". What this means exactly is open to interpretation.

 As far as the fights, they have all the slow motion and quick cuts you might expect, as well as the choreographed pulled punches, but at least they seem to be TRYING.

Locked Down is worth seeing if you liked Circle of Pain or other TapouT vehicles. It's more of the same.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty

The Expendables (2010)

The Expendables (2010)-* * *1\2

Directed by: Sylvester Stallone

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Mickey Rourke, Terry Crews, Randy Couture, Eric Roberts, Jet Li, Steve Austin, Gary Daniels, Giselle Itié, Dolph Lundgren, David Zayas, Jason Statham, Bruce Willis, and Arnold Schwarzenegger














The Expendables is the most macho movie ever made. From the metallic-looking credits on down, the screen pretty much oozes testosterone.

Barney Ross, Lee Christmas, Yin Yang, Toll Road, Hale Caesar, and Gunner Jensen (Stallone, Statham, Li, Couture, Crews, and Lundgren respectively) are an underground A-Team of sorts who go all over the world doing the hard jobs that no other teams of mercenaries will do. When it is discovered that evil South American dictator General Garza (Zayas) is a puppet for rogue CIA agent James Munroe (Roberts), the team are sent in to clean up the mess (i.e. create a bigger mess by creating countless deaths and explosions) by a mysterious man named Mr. Church (Willis).

When Barney falls in love with the dictator's daughter Sandra (Giselle Itié) and she is kidnapped by the Munroe's goons The Brit (Daniels) and the very imposing Dan Paine (Austin)... get ready to party like it's 1986 as The Expendables hearkens back to the glory days of action cinema. Even Stallone's vehicles (car and plane) are reminiscent of the classic Cobra (1986), as are Garza's soldiers. 

Roberts plays the slimy Munroe with aplomb. He gets the classic final villain speech we all want to hear. Let's not forget our favorite governor Arnold: He is basically the comic relief with his jokey cameo and prerequisite funny name (Trench). It would have been fun to see Willis character to return one more time to angrily bellow "This wasn't part of the deal!" or some line like that but sadly, that is not to be.

We're so used to seeing these faces on the small screen, it was a real treat to see them in the theater. They truly deserve it. Eric Roberts, Dolph Lundgren and Gary Daniels in the same scene? Oh yeah! We also get to see a one-on-one fight between Dolph and Jet Li for the first time ever. And Gary Daniels vs. Jet Li and Statham. In the theater!



The pairings of all the different fan-favorites is pretty mind-boggling. Of course, with an international cast such as this it becomes hard to understand what some of them are saying - when Stallone and Li talk it's hard to understand, and when Couture talks you don't want to understand. But to counteract his Dale "Apollo" Cook-style delivery, we have Mickey Rourke on hand as the token "good actor" who gets a heartfelt monologue. For a movie with so many characters, it was very well done how each got a nice backstory and it never got confusing at all.




God bless Stallone - he couldn't have delivered this at a better time. What the world needs now is more tough, take-no-prisoners action. Not more sissy junk involving "facebook". This movie is the antidote to "Eat Pray Love". To quote The Simpsons, this is more like "Beat Slay Shove". Another good thing about the movie is it has no stupid kids or teenagers. 

When Jason Statham is the YOUNGEST person in the group, we get mature, professional action. Stallone is known for giving his characters funny names and here he really goes to town. You thought Driven's Joe "The Hummer" Tanto was funny...He also includes another of his trademarks - ripped from the headlines topicality. Like the plot of Rambo III (1988) involving Afghanistan, here we have Somali pirates and a clear analogue to crimson-shirted cretin Hugo Chavez.



If there is a downside to The Expendables, it is the use of CGI. CGI sucks and it takes away from the old-school feel we love. It's not entirely dependent on it, but when it was there, we felt it was unwelcome.

Back in the golden age, any one of the cast members could have sold a movie. It is a sad comment on movies today that it took a ton of producers and EVERY major action star just to get the project off the ground. How can they top this if they want to do it again?

It has all the clichés we know and love, just on a bigger scale. Abandoned warehouses, neck-snapping the villains, the line "we've got company", exploding guard towers and many, many more. The first 20 lines said by our heroes (and throughout the film) are fun clichés and soundbites. This isn't a complaint. Perhaps a certain appreciation for action movies is needed to truly understand what's going on here. Anyone who trashes this movie simply doesn't get action movies or their significance. They should go back to poking Twi-hards on facebook, or some such moronic twaddle.




Truly a movie for the fans, The Expendables delivers the goods with a once-in-a-lifetime cast. See it!

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Circle of Pain (2010)

Circle of Pain (2010)-* * *

Directed by: Daniel Zirilli

Starring: Kimbo Slice, Tony Schiena, Dean Cain, Bai Ling, Heath Herring, and Frank Mir














Dalton Hunt (Schiena of the awful The Number One Girl fame) retires from the Revolution Fight Club (RFC) after a sparring match gone wrong put his friend Wyatt (Cain) in a wheelchair for life. Five years after this tragic event, he is forced to fight for the RFC to fulfill his contract, which requires "one last fight". His opponent just happens to be the scary, mohawked badass Colin "The Brick" Wahle (Herring). Dalton must train harder than ever before or his family will be put out on the street by RFC boss Victoria (Ling).

Did you expect something BESIDES a beat-em-up fight fest starring a cast of mainly meatheads? In these movies, either someone is being beat up, or doing the beating. There are many slow-motion fight scenes so the experience is extra-meatheady. The film is a 90-minute training sequence. It is also a 90-minute advertisement for TapOut enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved.



Kimbo Slice, despite his top billing and prominent appearance on the box art, has merely a cameo. He gets beaten up by the main star, as per usual in his punchfighting movie cameos (i.e., Locked Down (2010), etc.)

"The Brick" speaks in short soundbites only. For example "This fight is already over", and before he kicks Frank Mir (in another cameo) in the face in a random parking lot brawl, states "It's kickoff time".



The movie is enjoyable because it delivers what you want. There is a great punch to one of the baddies. Beware the trailer, as it gives away all the cool parts. If you are looking for a decent straight-to-video beat-em-up, and don't mind the crass commercialism, watch Circle of Pain today.

Comeuppance review by: Ty

Undisputed III: Redemption (2010)

Undisputed III: Redemption (2010)-* * *

Directed By: Isaac Florentine

Starring: Scott Adkins, Mykel Shannon Jenkins, and Robert Costanzo


"One Deadly Tournament. A Last Fight For Freedom."






Undisputed III: Redemption is just as well made as the 2nd one.

 Boyka (Adkins) is still in jail after the fight with Chambers (played by Michael Jai White). Chambers destroyed his knee. All Boyka wants to do is fight again. "I am the most complete fighter" he keeps telling himself.

Luckily, there is a new ultimate fighting tournament in Russia, called the "Prison Spetz Competition" where they get the best fighters in the country to fight for their freedom. It is run by the corrupt guards of the prison and the mob.

Boyka is desperate to get in and after he barely beats a fellow prisoner, he is let into the competition...but the guards and the mob have rigged the event for the dangerous Colombian fighter to win and Boyka to lose.



Can Boyka win the tournament against all the odds?

The best parts of the movie are the fighting sequences. They are excellently choreographed and brutal. You can almost feel every punch and kick, because this is a punchfighting movie, the plot is basically predictable and some of the acting is amateurish.


Scott Adkins' fighting skills are amazing in this. He executes one kick towards the end that is just devastating.

Undisputed III is one of the best DTV fighting movies in a long time and I definitely recommend it.



Comeuppance Review by: Ty