Contract To Kill (2016)

Contract To Kill (2016)- * *

Directed by: Keoni Waxman

Starring: Steven Seagal, Jemma Dallender, and Russell Wong

A man named John Harmon (Seagal, in one of his countless roles where he plays a guy named John) is described as a "CIA/DEA Enforcer", whatever that means. This CIADEAE, for short, uncovers a dastardly plot by Islamic terrorists to go through Mexico, using the pre-existing drug shipping corridors, to smuggle in weapons of mass destruction to cause a terrorist attack. Harmon realizes he must now contend with both terrorists and drug lords, so he teams up with Matthew Sharp, an expert at working with drones. That's why he's working with Seagal. Wah-wah! But he also teams up with Zara Hayek (Dallender), who is described as a "seductive FBI agent", and this must be true, because she ends up wooing Harmon. Just like you would with anyone three times your age and five times your weight. So, will Harmon fulfill his CONTRACT TO KILL? Wait, there was a contract in this movie? It's not about hitmen? Well, that's not important...


As we said in our Cartels (2017) review, at this point we were living in a Breaking Bad/Narcos/Sicario world. In fact, there are characters here whose names are "Sicario #1" and "Sicario #2". So, for writer/director Keoni Waxman and Seagal, this is yet another DTV variant of the drug lord movie, and let's not forget shows like Homeland were still very popular. The problem is that Contract to Kill is dull, mediocre, and slow. It's talky, interspersed with some perfunctory Seagal quasi-beat-ups because they think the fans demand it every so often.

The dialogue, such as it is, is just insipid and you never grow to care about the characters, and by extension, what's happening in the film at all. Russell Wong's main job in the movie is to be good at drones. As if this is a specialized skill that an eleven-year-old couldn't handle. So we see him with the drone remote control in his hand, moving the levers up and down. Whoa, hold on to your hat. There are many shots of drones and/or droning in the film. In many different forms and fashions. Both cameras and guns are attached to drones, as we see quite often. Perhaps this wasn't as much of a novelty in 2016 as the filmmakers probably thought it was?


Meanwhile, Seagal continually mentions a group of people called "The D-Boys". Maybe we missed it, but they never actually explained who The D-Boys actually are. Are they good guys? Baddies? A satellite faction of I Come In Peace's The White Boys? What? As far as Seagal, he doesn't quite have what we call a "sit-down" role, but there are many scenes of him sitting. When he has to do his fight scenes, they feel a bit forced and like he doesn't want to or possibly can't do them. 

Steve is looking pretty chunky in this one, and they try to hide it with black, flowing clothing, but it's rather obvious. By itself, the weight alone isn't a major dealbreaker or anything - we know Seagal struggles with his weight - but the movie around his orbit just isn't that inspiring or noteworthy. So, it, well...collapses under its own weight. Sorry to say.


As far as these latter-day DTV Seagal outings go, Contract to Kill isn't bad or good. It's simply plain and forgettable. It's just grist for the DTV mill, and if you watch it, there's a strong chance you won't remember anything about it just a few days later.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Also check out write-ups from our buddies, DTVC and The Video Vacuum! 

Honor (2006)

 Honor (2006)- * *

Directed by: David Worth

Starring: Roddy Piper, Russell Wong, Joanna Pacula, Jason Barry, Linda Park, 

LT Tyrell (Piper) is an L.A. cop and bar owner, and he and his wife Rose (Pacula) are thinking of packing it all up and retiring to Brazil. A guy named Ray (Wong) is the neighborhood baddie, who not only sends out his goons to get protection money from the local businesses, he also stages underground Punchfights. He also has a tragic history with Tyrell.

When the Tyrell's adopted son Gabriel (Barry) comes back from a Special Ops mission, he seems disturbed. The seemingly-ubiquitous Ray forces Gabriel to Punchfight for him, threatening that for every fighter Gabriel beats, that's one member of the Tyrell family he'll leave alone. Even Kate (Park), Tyrell's former partner, is powerless to stop all this feuding and brawling. Will it all be just a matter of HONOR?


Well, it's better than director David Worth's previous effort American Tigers (1996), but that's not saying much. Honor is humorless and dour; the problem with these latter-day Punchfighters is that by this point in time, viewers have seen this type of thing many, many times before. 

By the time the 2000's rolled around, makers of Punchfighters could not just retread the same old ground. They either had to bring something new to the table, or at least make it fun. Shootfighter (1993) had colorful characters that were clearly delineated, such as Boa and Mongoose. Fist Fighter (1989) had memorable characters such as Punchy. Warrior of Justice (1995) is just a spasm of pure insanity dreamt up by the fevered mind of Jorgo Ognenovski. Honor has none of these sorts of attributes. By 2006, what Honor was doing was pretty well-worn stuff.


Not that it's all bad, of course. Thankfully, the filmmakers had the good sense to make it 80 minutes. That was a blessing. Something like Honor should be 80 minutes. It's perfect for that sort of running time, and other makers of these sorts of things should "Honor" the viewers' time like this. So points go to them for that. Plus, it's always nice to see one of our heroes, Roddy Piper.


He gives one of his more serious dramatic performances that we've seen to date. The problem with the Tyrell character is that a nice guy like him isn't going to start busting heads right away. He has a long fuse, which means we have to wait quite a while until we see Roddy unleashed. 

Some people might not like that. However, viewers won't fail to miss the They Live graffiti on the wall, as it's shown twice, rather clearly. And Jason Barry as Gabriel was also rather brooding as the estranged son. Russell Wong stands out as the evil baddie that the audience can boo and hiss at.


The directorial career of David Worth is certainly a mixed bag. While we enjoyed Lady Dragon (1992) and Lady Dragon 2 (1993), and Chain of Command (1994), not to mention True Vengeance (1997), we have mixed feelings about Air Strike (2004). We weren't crazy about Soldier's Revenge (1986) and the aforementioned American Tigers is pretty awful. We've been on the record for years about how we think Kickboxer (1989) is overrated. Honor falls into the mid-range/end of the Worth spectrum. It's not entirely "Worth"-less but it definitely could have used some color or pizazz of some sort.

So, for the Piper factor and the reasonable running time, Honor may be 'worth' checking out for Punchfighting fans. But keep your expectations tamped.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Satin Steel (1994)

Satin Steel (1994)- * * *

Directed by: Siu-Hung Leung

Starring: Jade Leung, Anita Lee, Kenneth Chan, and Russell Wong










Jade Leung (evidently as herself, as she is portrayed by...Jade Leung) is a female Hong Kong Cop On The Edge. As she is a fearless and take-charge officer, her higher-ups put her in charge of the case of a lifetime - stopping the illegal, international arms dealings of a Mr. Fowler, a classic super-evil white guy. 

To accomplish her mission, she must travel to Indonesia and Singapore, all the while teaming up with Ellen Cheng (Lee of Tiger Cage 2 fame), a fellow policewoman/beauty. Together, the two face all kinds of scrapes, from local, indigenous, bulletproof (?) shamans, to keeping control of the classic “disk”, to a fighter with a bionic arm. But the men in their lives are causing complications as well, as they are wont to do, and our heroes also have to deal with Ken Chan (Wong), and a guy who calls himself Jean-Paul Belmondo (Chan). Will our heroes be more satin or more steel? Find out today...

We tracked down Satin Steel because it is directed by a man named Siu-Hung Leung, who directed fan favorite Superfights (1995), as well as Bloodmoon (1997), so we wanted to see more, especially from his earlier Hong Kong period.  Satin Steel has been described by others as a female Lethal Weapon (1987), but Lethal Weapon didn’t have the cartoonish, at times wacky vibe (note the muzzle flashes, which essentially are cartoons). Naturally, that fun, high-energy HK style is on display most of the time. Not that it doesn’t flag at a couple of points, but that’s only natural. Jade Leung and Anita Lee make a great team, and this was only the first movie Leung had been in after debuting with Black Cat (1991) and Black Cat 2 (1992).

Hon-Kam Lee delivers a rockin’ theme tune and his music helps things along well. The fact that the movie overall is well-shot, with interesting locations, has plenty of Martial Arts action, blow-ups, and top-quality stuntwork, as well as silly humor, not to mention the beautiful and talented leads, mean Satin Steel is never anything less than entertaining. 

It even includes a classic workout montage. The film stands on its own as a HK action outing, produced during a time (the 90’s) when it seemed Hong Kong was really cranking them out. Not that they didn’t produce some of the greatest action of all time, but there were so many, some tended to get lost in the shuffle. At least today, we can shine a light on Satin Steel and give it some love.

Hong Kong action fans, especially those who love female protagonists, will no doubt be very interested in Satin Steel.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty 

The Tracker (2001)

The Tracker (2001)-* *

Directed by: Jeff Schechter

Starring: Casper  Van Dien, Russell Wong, Francoise Robertson, and Jason Blicker



“Mr. Spears has his own way of doing things.”









Connor “Connie” Spears (Van Dien) is a former NYC cop who moved to L.A. to become a private detective. When an old friend who he trained in Martial Arts with, Rick (Wong) contacts him because his sister was kidnapped, Spears agrees to go back to his old New York stomping grounds to try to find her. The plot thickens when it seems she’s caught in between two rival gangs: the Chinese mob and the Malakov family of the Russian mob. Teaming up with the streetwise taxi driver Carmen (Robertson) and old cop buddy Jack “Chick” Cicollini (Blicker), our team of four unlikely heroes hit the streets to try to find the missing girl. Will they find her before it’s too late?

2001, when this movie was released, wasn’t that far from the 90’s in time. Thus, The Tracker fully retains a 90’s feel. It’s standard DTV fare, but it’s professionally made and doesn’t look like junk. While it doesn’t reach the heights of Drive (1997), a movie it seems to be influenced by, it makes a decent one-time watch, mainly because of the Martial Arts scenes with Russell Wong. There’s plenty of other reasonably enjoyable stupidity on display, mainly in the action scenes.  Add a little humor, and there you have it.

Casper Van Dien’s blonde hair and snarky attitude gives him the vibe of Billy Idol. Was that intentional? But because he’s supposed to be the ultimate coolguy, with an answer for everything, that puts him more in the category of being the Zack Morris of action (or Zacktion to those in the know). 

Throughout most of the 90’s, and into the 2000’s, having the main character in a movie or TV show spouting sarcastic, ironic retorts all the time became the norm. Somewhere along the line, writers got off the track, and being the likable hero got confused with being the snotty jerk. Van Dien in The Tracker is a perfect example of this. Is he supposed to be likable? We assume yes, but he doesn’t make it easy on us, the viewing public. This “Coolguy-is-a-jerk” phenomenon was a misstep in pop culture, in our opinion. Of course, we blame Sloane (1984) for starting it all.

The movie is really nothing more than a compendium of cliches, from the prerequisite torture scene to the abandoned warehouse shootout, but that might be one of the movie’s strengths after all. The Tracker is what people rented in video stores when everything else they intended to rent was out for the evening. 

For better or worse, Connor Spears (remember this was the heyday of Britney) did not return for another outing. There were to be no franchises for him. It would have been interesting to see an Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) kind of thing, where Howie Long plays Casper Van Dien’s father, and they can compete to see who has the squarest head.  So that was not to be, but at least we have this, and we’re all happy about it, right? ....right?

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Also check out a review by our buddy Keith from The Unknown Movies! 

China White (1989)

China White (1989)-* * *

Directed by: Ronny Yu

Starring: Russell Wong, Steven Vincent Leigh, Lisa Schrage, Frank Sheppard, Saskia Van Rijswijk, and Billy Drago












Brothers Bobby Chow and Danny Chow (Wong and Leigh, respectively) want control of Amsterdam’s Chinatown for their drug trade. Seriously hampering that is Italian crime lord Scalia (Drago) and his minions. In one of the many gambling houses the brothers frequent, Danny meets card dealer Anne Michaels (Schrage) and they strike up a romance. As it happens, Anne is an undercover DEA agent working with her partner Rasta (Sheppard). Amidst all the shootouts, both Anne and Danny are torn between their respective professions and their love for each other. If the Chow brothers are going to control their turf, it’s going to take a lot more than CHINA WHITE...

Kicking off with a shot of some Asian tattoos and some classic wailing 80’s guitar, it sets the scene for what we’re about to see. There are a lot of ethnic tensions at work in Chinatown, and some classic racism along the way. 

One of the best things about this movie is Billy Drago as Scalia (although wouldn’t it be weird to see Jack Scalia as Ivan Drago?)...anyway, he puts in a strange and menacing performance. Since he almost exclusively plays bad guys, he’s probably always thinking about how he can put some kind of twist on it. Here he speaks quietly and has many strange mannerisms. He’s definitely a highlight.

While China White is a gangster drama, it features some very impressive stunts in the mix. There’s one especially great action scene, but there are a few others as well. Once the action moves to “The Golden Triangle”, the pace slacks considerably, and you realize this movie is too long. 

Other things that stand out are Ricky Ho as Kong, and his amazing wardrobe. The “nothing stereotypical going on here” character of Rasta, and Scalia’s bodyguard Saskia (Van Rijswijk) are also memorable. Saskia makes Brigitte Nielsen look like a wimp. There could easily be a movie where Van Rijswijk plays the starring role. More Saskia would have been a good thing for China White.

A great moment in the dialogue department comes when Danny tells Anne all his heroes are American. When she assumes he’s talking about John Wayne and Ronald Reagan, he retorts, “H. Ross Perot”! First of all, it’s great that Perot finally gets a mention in a foreign 80’s violent gangster movie. Secondly, he used his proper name, utilizing the “H”. Has Perot himself ever seen this movie? That was a great moment. Too bad there weren’t more of them.

While China White should have been shorter, with the brighter elements turned up like you would the “brightness” on a TV, it would still make an interesting double feature with Amsterdamned (1988). Just be sure to watch China White first.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett