Welcome to the film-related musings, complaints, and comments of Zack Clopton, an amateur film-critic, scholar, and screenwriter. Featured here are Director's Report Cards, essays, and other reviews. Enjoy!
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By 2010, many video game adaptations were still weird flops. However, enough of them had become commercial successes for a major studio to take a risk on one. In 2009, Jerry Bruckheimer and Disney acquired the film rights to the “Prince of Persia” video game series. The game developers who rebooted the once forgotten series would be intimately involved with the film's development. (That Disney would make this adaptation was fitting, as their “Aladdin” was doubtlessly an influence on the reboot.) “Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time” was positioned by the studio as the next “Pirates of the Caribbean,” a live action adventure film that would launch a long-running series of highly profitable blockbusters. It didn't quite work out that way.
During the ancient days of the Persian empire, wise King Sharaman adopts a homeless street rat named Dastan after seeing the boy perform a brave act. Dastan becomes one of the princes of Persia, seeking adventure out with his royal brothers. The king's brother, Nizam, learns the neighboring kingdom of Alamut is going to act Persia. The royal forces attack the city, captures beautiful Princess Tamina, with Dastan grabbing an ornate dagger. Soon afterwards, King Sharaman is murdered and Dastan is framed for the crime. He goes on the run with Tamina and learns that the dagger allows the user to travel a few seconds back through time, enough to undo a fatal mistake. He soon discovers his uncle killed the king and is seeking the magical sands that power the dagger for his own nefarious purposes.
As I said, the creator of the “The Sands of Time” game, Jordan Mechner, wrote the first draft of the script. It was re-written by a trio of screenwriters, so I have no idea how closely the finished product reflects Mechner's ideas. However, I suspect many of his ideas were maintained because “Prince of Persia” is way too invested in its own lore. Convoluted mythology drives the plot, often dump on the viewer in weighty monologues. Certain criteria must be met by various parties for the plot devices to function properly. Just like in a video game, the characters spend the whole film chasing after a power-up. The power-up's ability is finite, forcing the protagonist to collect more magical fuel. It's all very boring, another video game movie that feels more like playing a video game than its own experience.
I don't know if the movie's mythology is full of shit or if it just fails to get the viewer invested in its nonsensical lore. The lack of a likable protagonist is a big problem for “Prince of Persia.” Prince Dastan has no problem raiding a clearly peaceful city at the beginning of the film. Immediately after his father dies before his eyes, he has to go on the run, leaving no time for mourning. He spends most of the first hour acting selfishly. His attempted romance with Princess Tamina does not humanize Dastan or the princess. She comes off as stuck-up know-it-all, deriding Dastan for his perceived lack of intelligence. Yet the humiliating things the script does to her next – enslaved by bandits, killed off before the inevitable time travel re-do – come off as mean-spirited. The whole movie feels like that, characters repeatedly dying and then being brought back via magic, in a way that is both needlessly nasty and saps suspense.
Perhaps the film was hoping the charms of its cast would make up for the lack of likable characters. This was Jake Gyllenhaal, a respected performer with more indie cred than mainstream success, making his big attempt at being an action star. He adapts a cheesy British accent, perhaps to make up for the obvious fact that he's not Persian, and smugly smirks his way through most of the film. Gemma Arterton is spellbindingly gorgeous as Princess Tamina but can't breath much life into the hopelessly dull dialogue she's given. Ben Kingsley, making his second appearance this month, once again goes weirdly subdued when playing a cartoonish villain. Alfred Molina largely steals the show as a proto-libertarian bandit, given most of the film's funniest lines.
“Prince of Persia” was directed by Mike Newell. With the exception of the fourth “Harry Potter” film, Newell is better known for dramas, making him an odd pick for a big adventure movie. This is reflected in the film's supremely tacky action sequences. There's a lot of slow motion in “Prince of Persia” and not just during the time reversing shots. Dramatic flips and big sword fights become overblown with cheesy slow-mo. Yet many other shots are awkwardly framed, spearings happening just off-screen or stabbings occurring at odd angles. The CGI is not well integrated either, especially during the big swirling sandstorms or various projectiles that leap towards the viewer's face. The general clumsiness peaks during a hilariously dumb moment where a minor villain suddenly enters into frame.
As I said, Disney had high hopes for “Prince of Persia.” The film was given a prominent May release date. McFarlane Toys produced a whole line of action figures, targeted at both kids and collectors. Alanis Morissette recorded a pop charts ready song to go with the movie. There was even Lego sets. However, the general lackluster quality of the film and a controversy surrounding whitewashing kept American audiences away. “Prince of Persia” flopped domestically but did better overseas, making it one of the highest-grossing video game movies... But the film still fell short of earning a profit, meaning this dull film would not spawn a dull franchise. [5/10]
Following the 2009 release of “Street Fighter IV,” the iconic fighting game series was more popular than it had been in years. Hoping to capitalize on this success, and likely because another Capcom inspired film series had proved surprisingly profitable, someone decided to make a new “Street Fighter” movie. Though an established cult classic by this point, the previous attempt at a live action “Street Fighter” movie certainly left room for improvement. When it was announced, I even thought “Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li” had a promising premise. Chun-Li has always been my favorite character in the game. Focusing on origin stories for individual characters might've been a smart way to avoid the crowded cast and convoluted stories of other game adaptations. “Might've been” being the key phrase there.
To any “Street Fighter” fans reading this, I want to know how faithful to your beloved video games this sounds: Chun-Li is the daughter of a rich businessman and trained as a concert pianist. As a child, her dad is kidnapped by mysterious crime boss M. Bison. Years later, after receiving a mysterious scroll, Chun-Li travels to Thailand. She seeks out Gen, a former associate of Bison who is now seeking to end crime in Bangkok. He trains Chun-Li in martial arts, before she heads off to rescue her dad from Bison. Meanwhile, an Interpol agent named Charlie Nash attempts to undo Bison's criminal empire.
“The Legend of Chun-Li” deviates so much from the games, it hardly counts as an adaptation at all. Some of these changes are minor. Shadoloo is a corporation, instead of a crime organization. Chun-Li is a pianist, instead of a cop. Many of them, however, are major. Most of the characters are unrecognizable. Gen is not an old man but middle-age. Video game Vega wears a mask to protect his pretty boy face. Movie Vega wears a mask to hide his hideously ugly face. Aside from their name, the cinematic Charlie Nash has nothing in common with Guile's dead war buddy. Even though the story is set in Thailand, home of Sagat, the role of Bison's primary enforcer is given to Balrog, who never does any boxing. M. Bison makes no mention of psycho-powers and has no interest in fighting tournaments. Nobody wears anything resembling their trademark costumes, a blue dress being the closest Chun-Li comes. The differences are such that a viewer wonders if some moments – Chun-Li doing a series of quick kicks, a female supporting character named Rose – are deliberate homages to the games or simply coincidences.
“The Legend of Chun-Li” is a bizarre movie not just because it has so little to do with the video games that ostensibly inspired it. Many of the story decisions are very strange. Chun-Li becoming a Robin Hood-like figure that defends the Bangkok slums from crime is one thing. Having her living as a homeless vagrant for long portions of the story is an unusual decision. Making Shadoloo a corporation injects a vein of anti-corporatism into the story. The bad guys drive down real estate prices by bringing crime into the city, buy the land back up cheaply, and then build luxury housing on it, forcibly displacing the people who live there. Which is a decent villainous motivations but has jack shit to do with “Street Fighter.” Or what about Nash's entire subplot? He barely interacts with Chun-Li and does no actual fighting on the street. It's a cheesy crime movie plot introduced into material that has no need for it.
The weirdest thing about “The Legend of Chun-Li” is how graphic and sexualized its violence is. Bison orders the other leaders of Shadoloo killed. Vega chops their heads off, the graphic aftermath of which we see. After a sexy dance with Bison's henchwoman (that I'm surprised isn't call Juni, as she's as close to that character as anyone else here is to their supposed inspirations), Chun-Li brutally throws her around the ladies' bathroom. When she nearly breaks her arm, the woman's pain is emphasized. Chun-Li wears high-heels through this and then swings on a stripper pole. Afterwards, Bison graphically beats the woman to death. Nash's partner, an original character inspired by Crimson Viper, is clarified as liking rough sex for no reason. The most unnecessarily fucked-up element of the film involves Bison's backstory. In his youth, he tore open his pregnant wife's belly with his bare hands! The violence is so bloody, and so targeted at young women, that it strays from animesque to slightly unsettling.
Aside from being gratuitously bloody and kinky, how do the action scenes stack up? Some of them are good. Director Andrzej Bartkowiak, previously of “Doom,” directed two films with Jet Li. This shines through in a few scenes. Like an early fight, where Chun-Li's dad weaponizes a bottle of brandy and sets a criminal goon on fire. Or Gen and Balrog's final fight, which at least uses the environment around them in decent ways. However, many of the other scenes are badly directed. Chun-Li's fights are sloppily edited, which I assumed was done to disguise Kristin Kreuk's lack of martial arts skills. Yet Gen's fight scene are similarly choppy and Robin Shou is a former stuntman, for fuck's sake. The film's attempt to emphasize various special moves, like Chun-Li's Spinning Bird Kick or Bison's seemingly magical throws, are so overdone that they veer towards unintentional hilarity. The movie, in general, focuses way too much on shoot-outs and missile launchers, feeling further disconnected from the fighting game genre.
I knew something was fishy about “The Legend of Chun-Li” the moment Kristin Kreuk was cast as the first warrior woman of video games. Kreuk might be talented – I don't know, I've never seen “Smallville” or anything else she's done – but she's no Chun-Li. Though a quarter Chinese, Kreuk looks white as can be. She lacks Chun-Li's powerful frame, looking like a scrawny teenage girl instead. Without the character's trademark head-crushing thighs, Kreuk's acrobatic skills are emphasized instead, which are fairly impressive, I suppose. Ultimately though, Kreuk doesn't just come up short physically. Her performance is largely understated, the actress showing a face of bland determination and little else. Kreuk also contributes a bored-sounding voiceover narration, a totally unneeded addition.
The rest of the cast hams it up to varying degrees of success. Chris Klein – otherwise known as the other other guy from “American Pie” – leaves all semblance of good taste behind as Nash. He overemphasizes every line of dialogue he's given, overacting with every fiber of his face and body. It's hilarious. He attempts to seduce Moon Bloodgood as Maya, who seems soundly disgusted by his advances. Taboo, the third most popular member of the Black Eyed Peas, literally growls every line of dialogue he's given. Michael Clark Duncan is having a very good time, playing Balrog as an unforgivable evil son-of-a-bitch. Neal McDonough is trying to bring some threatening power and grace to Bison but the script works against him. So he settles for being a slithering bad guy instead. Robin Shou is actually pretty decent as Gen, being the only guy in the movie acting with a degree of subtly.
“The Legend of Chun-Li” begins with a prominently displayed Capcom logo. The gaming company hoped the film would establish them as a cinematic brand akin to Marvel. (Just think, if this movie hadn't been fucking terrible, we might've gotten that “Darkstalkers” movie I've always dreamed about by now.) Likewise, “The Legend of Chun-Li” ends by teasing a sequel that would've starred Ryu. Instead, the baffling film was K.O.'d by poor box office returns and even worst reviews. I listed it as my most disliked film of 2009, for one example. However, upon rewatch, “The Legend of Chun-Li” proves to be bad in a far more compelling way than I remembered. It's a fiasco, an awful adaptation, but is also incredibly fucking weird. Too weird to be all together boring, which gives it an advantage over a lot of other video game movies. [4/10]
In October of 2001, Rockstar Games would release “Grand Theft Auto III,” a groundbreaking and immediately influential video game that was the hottest shit among kids my age at the time. However, a few months earlier, the publisher released another title with a similarly gritty crime story atmosphere. “Max Payne” was praised at the time for his “Matrix”-style bullet time game play and film noir-inspired plotting. While the series didn't have the blockbuster reach of “GTA,” it remains a cult classic. Enough so that a “Max Payne” movie would unspool before audiences in 2008. The game was refashioned into an action vehicle for Mark Wahlberg, a move that would alienate many of the games' fans.
So who is Max Payne? He's a New York cop whose wife and infant daughter were murdered three years before the story's open. Consumed by his grief, Max has been trying to locate the killer all this time. When he finally discovers a lead, she's brutally killed. Next, his former partner also winds up dead, Max being framed for the murder. He goes on the run, forming a rough partnership with the dead girl's sister. He soon uncovers a plot involving an experimental drug created by the U.S. military and with unexpected connections to cops and million-dollar corporations.
The cinematic “Max Payne” is clearly inspired by another gritty, neo-noir, crime land saga. “Max Payne” wants so badly to be “Sin City.” You can see that in its stylized direction, full of high contrast blacks and whites with big bursts of color. The dialogue is macho and mythic. Women are either sexy dealers of vengeance or graphically disposed-of victims. The metropolis of New York is exaggerated into a hellish landscape of towering skyscrapers, constantly falling snow, and pit-like alleyways. Like Robert Rodriguez' Frank Miller adaptation, the film's noir atmosphere is so hyper-extended that it becomes a fantasy. Why else do we see the drug-induced visions of fiery infernos and demonic male-for-some-reason valkyries flying around? Unlike Rodriguez/Miller's film, “Max Payne” has no sense of humor about itself. So its stylistic excess quickly become ridiculous and funny. Most evidently in the scene where Max roars towards the heavens after surviving a dip in an icy river. Instead of being cool and fun, it's ridiculous and exhausting.
The film doesn't just attempt to emulate the style and visuals of noir genre. It's also trying to weave a twisted and winding plot that draws the viewer in. However, “Max Payne's” plot is so convoluted and awkwardly told, that you quickly gets lost. Max is still a cop but acts like a vigilante right from the get go. He follows a long series of witnesses before stumbling onto the connection between his wife and the Valkyrie drug. He's obviously being framed and betrayed by someone in the police department. The exact motivation behind this is difficult to parse out. Like previous shitty video game movies, “Max Payne” attempts to straighten out its convoluted plot with multiple exposition dumps – in the form of villainous monologues or convenient video tapes – that only manage to annoy audiences further. Further adding to the confusion is how several plot points are intentionally left dangling, presumably to set up a sequel.
“Max Payne” was directed by John Moore, whose other credits include uninspiring titles like “Behind Enemy Lines,” the remake of “The Omen,” and “A Good Day to Die Hard.” Moore's direction doesn't distinguish itself much from what we saw in those movies. The action scenes in “Max Payne” accomplish the rare feat of being overly stylized and surprisingly boring. The game's trademark bullet time effect is utilized a few times but it looks goofy, instead of cool. Especially in a scene where Max practically performs a back flip with a shotgun. The film loves to show people getting tossed through the air by gunshots, which become sillier each time it's repeated. Hyper-dramatic images of shattering glass and billowing flame exists alongside boring shots of blazing machine guns, unsteady zooms, and shaky-cam fight scenes.
When challenged, Mark Wahlberg can be an interesting or even impressive actor. Too often, he's satisfied to pump up his ridiculous macho image in shallow action films. “Max Payne” absolutely belongs to the latter category. Wahlberg blusters his way through the film, wearing the same expression through much of it. He seems actively bored during some scenes, but he might just be trying that hard to be a stern, stoic bad-ass. The rest of the cast seems largely baffled by the script. Mila Kunis clearly can't make heads-or-tails of the material, playing a character with no real personality. Olga Kurylenko is wasted in a part that's almost identical to her “Hitman” role. Beau Bridges seems similarly confused by his role as Max's mentor, a part largely defined by exposition. At least Ludacris is cast amusingly against type as an upright and moral police officer.
Despite the R-rated source material, the studio would demand a PG-13 rating. Yet the MPAA would give “Max” an R anyway, forcing more edits. This is before an R-rated cut was released on DVD, which is what I watched. That tough guy crudeness is so ingrained into the project that I can't imagine what a PG-13 version might've looked like. “Max Payne” was a modest box office success but not enough to greenlight a sequel, leaving all those sequel hooks unexplored. The developers of the games and many “Max Payne” fans hated the movie. I've never really played the games but I have to agree with them there. [4/10]
Even though developers have always tried to cast as wide a net as possible, video games were primarily marketed to children for many years. And in any medium pubically defined as a kids' toy, some creators get a transgressive thrill out of being as outrageous and offensive as possible. The likes of “Mortal Kombat” and “Grand Theft Auto” paired their controversial content with innovative, entertaining game play, Games like “Postal” had less substance under their aggressively in-your-face ingredients. “Postal 2” was a video game designed to be as offensive as possible and was already largely forgotten by 2007. (For further proof of that, the 2011 release of “Postal III” was met with total indifference.) Not that this stopped Uwe Boll from directing a “Postal” movie. Oddly, this match made-in-Hell seemed to work for some people and the film won some of the best reviews of Boll's career.
Unlike most of his video game movies, you get the impression that Uwe Boll actually played “Postal 2.” His film keeps many of the elements from the video game's admittedly loose plot. The film follows an unnamed protagonist, eventually dubbed the Postal Dude by the media. In order to placate his morbidly obese and hateful wife, he seeks gainful employment in the hellish Arizona town of Paradise. This doesn't really work and the Dude is soon working along his Uncle Dave, a cult leader starting to fall on hard times. The two devise a plot to steal a shipment of highly profitable scrotum-shaped dolls. Little do they know, al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden are also in Paradise with their eyes on the same prize. Yes, a live cat is used as a silencer but, no, Gary Coleman does not appear. The late Verne Troyer filled his role.
The low expectations inherent in an Uwe Boll movie go a long way but “Postal” does include some genuinely funny gags. The opening scene, which re-imagines the events of 9/11 in the the most flippant way possible, is incredibly offensive. It's also an absurd joke contrasting the assumed graveness of Islamic terrorists with far pettier concerns. Other moments mine a similarly offensive but absurdly funny thread. Such as J.K. Simmons' cameo as a conspiracy theorists who has some thoughts about the people inside World Trade Center or the sight of a disenfranchised Osama bin Laden attending a seminar on how to motivate your employees. A sense of hostility towards corporations runs throughout much of the film. Such as the job the Dude applies for, which openly admits it screws over its employees and asks nonsensical questions during the interview. Or Uncle Dave rambling on about frequent flying miles.
However, these inspired moments only make up a small portion of “Postal's” run time. Decent jokes like the Postal Dude doing anything to shorten his wait at the unemployment office stand alongside Verne Troyer being raped by chimpanzees and a naked Dave Foley taking a shit in front of his employer. “Postal's” world is nihilistic in its ugliness. Everyone is horrible, all the dialogue is vulgar. A racist black cop murders a Chinese woman in broad daylight. The Postal Dude's obese wife is the source of much grotesque mockery. The film's determination to be as offensive as possible quickly grows exhausting. The film seemingly has a checklist of topics it has to touch upon. Gay marriage, Tom Cruise and Scientology, Nazis and Hitler, drugs, non-stop sexual references, Christian and Islamic extremism, mental and physical disabilities, and coffee shops are all rolled into the plot. It's hard to be shocked by kids being gunned down or babies being run over when everything in the movie is designed to be offensive.
Still, I think Uwe Boll had learned from the mistakes of his prior films. “Postal” is actually pretty well shot, at least when compared to the director's previous features. The action scenes are coherent, totally free of the whiplash inducing editing, shaky camera work, or questionable musical choices of Boll's other video game movies. “Postal” doesn't have the television-like flatness of Boll's other films, with more cinematic angles and even a warm dash of color here and there. There's even a decent sequence of a CGI rocket flying through a crowd. Boll has a fourth wall shattering cameo as himself, admitting his movies are funded by Nazi gold and quibbing that he hates video games before dying from a shot to the dick. Earlier, the creator of “Postal” appears to beat Uwe up for ruining his games. So at least the guy has a sense of humor about himself.
Some cast members seem more into the material than others. Dave Foley, as Uncle Dave, gives it his all, showing everyone his cock and probably improvising much of his dialogue. Even then, he seems somewhat embarrassed as the film drags on. Verne Troyer seems entirely embarrassed. Especially in light of his recent death and the details of his struggle with mental illness, the humiliation he suffers on-screen seem even sadder. Zack Ward, after appearing in “Resident Evil 2” but before appearing in “BloodRayne II” or “Alone in the Dark II,” stars as the Postal Dude. Ward is totally willing to play along with the shock value laden script, somehow maintaining a degree of dignity during all of this. Unsurprisingly, all the women in the film are exploited and treated poorly.
“Postal” would be largely overshadowed by a publicity stunt Boll pulled to promote the film, in which he boxed critics that gave his movies bad reviews. This event certainly did little to dispel the image of Boll as an anti-intellectual egomaniac. (Boll is a semi-pro boxer but refused to fight anyone with actual melee training.) However, I can't help but admire Boll's carnival-like hucksterism. “Postal” isn't a good movie but it's also not without its moments. Boll would later direct “Rampage,” not a video game adaptation but a serious thriller covering similar ground to this film. That movie also won some positive notices, suggesting Boll is a better director when he's actively invested in his scripts. [5/10]
Video games and the film industry have an interesting, back-and-forth relationship. Movies based on games tend to be bad. Games based on movies tend to be bad. Yet things work out better when they just influence one another. For a while, “Dead Space” was one of the best “Alien” video games. Similarly, “Crank” is a better “Grand Theft Auto” movie than any official adaptation could hope to be. Hong Kong action flicks, like “The Killer,” would influence the creation of the popular “Hitman” video game series. A few years later, the “Transporter” film series would swipe most of that game's visual aesthetic. Which meant, when an actual “Hitman” movie hit theaters in 2007, it already felt a bit warmed over. This didn't stop the film from becoming a decent commercial success.
A secret organization known only as the, um, Organization genetically engineers bald-headed, bar-coded boys to be the perfect assassins, training them from birth and giving them numbers instead of names. Agent 47 is the best of this distinguished lot. After a successful hit, his boss tells him to publicly assassinate the president of Russia, Mikhail Belicoff. After killing Belicoff, 47 is informed that he actually murdered a look-a-like. Soon, he's being pursued by his own Organization. Teaming up with Nika, Belicoff's abused mistress, he's determined to get to the bottom of things.
“Hitman” is trying to be a twisty neo-noir for the video game generation. The film begins with 47 confronting an Interpol agent played by Dougray Scott in his home. The rest of the movie is a flashback, leading up to this moment. The plot is full of double-crosses, look-a-likes, and secret favors between old friends being called in. And maybe it's just me but I couldn't follow any of it. The villain's plan seems to change from scene to scene. Supporting characters are implied to be bad guys but never do anything. Agent 47 is said to be a genius manipulating everyone but he mostly just seems to know everything without explanation. The subplot involving the Interpol agent adds little to the story. Weirdly, we never learn anything about the Organization that created 47, why they turn on him, or how he feels about it. “Hitman” seems determined to appear vague and mysterious, quickly leaving the audience in the dust.
I've never played any of the “Hitman” video games and don't really have an opinion about them. Speaking as an uninformed outsider, Agent 47 seems to be such a beloved character because he's a graceful bad-ass, effortlessly exterminating his targets without remorse but in the most sensible fashion possible. The movie version seems to stray from this pattern. There's very little of the disguising, sneaking around, and stealthily disposing of victims I associate with the games. Timothy Olyphant, looking absolutely ridiculous with a shaved head, seems terminally miscast. (Olyphant was a last minute replacement for comfortably bald Vin Diesel.) His Agent 47 squints a lot, contemplating the nature of his business, and generally seeming very uncomfortable. Moreover, the entire plot of the movie hinges on this ruthless killer refusing to kill a woman. Why? Because her face tattoo reminds him of himself and that's pretty much it. Like I said, I've never played a “Hitman” game but falling in love with a girl just because she's pretty doesn't seem like the kind of thing Agent 47 would do.
Despite there being little reason for Nika to tag along with Agent 47 on this adventure, their relationship still ends up being the best part of the film. He's gruff with her initially, of course, but soon his heart begins to defrost. This is visible when he gives her a knowing glance after buying her breakfast and threatening to shove her in the trunk. Nika is quickly attracted to this mysterious, murderous man, attempting to seduce him repeatedly. The film never confirms this but the implication seems to be that 47 is a virgin. That he's intimidated by such a sexually vivacious woman. That's an interesting dynamic! Instead of leaning into that, the relationship never evolves pass it. Nika exits the film before the last act, “Hitman” totally falling into incoherence afterwards. Olga Kurylenko does her best to flesh out the thinly written part.
“Hitman” was directed by Xavier Gens, right after his extreme French horror flick “Frontier(s)” received some mild hype. Gens was probably chosen because of the visual flashiness he displayed in his debut. Compared to some of the wretched action movies I've watched this month, “Hitman” doesn't look too bad. At least you can mostly follow the shoot-outs and sword fights. Yet they feel seriously uninspired. A shoot-out with a weapons' dealer or the final showdown in an old church features lots of high-intensity shots of machine guns firing. There's nothing much interesting about it, the shoot-outs quickly fading into each other. The only scene that really stands out is a lightly ridiculous sword-fight on a train with other agents. It's a very dumb moment – the agents deciding a sword fight would be easier instead of just shooting each other – but at least there's some panache there. The rest of the film's violence is competent but boring, lacking identity.
“Hitman” would be a decent commercial success, grossing about 100 million against a 22 million dollar budget. The film seemed primed to launch a series, considering the many unexplored plot points introduced here. Yet a sequel would never quite gain traction. Timothy Olyphant admitted he only made this film because he needed the money, so obviously he wouldn't return for a sequel. Despite having a script for a part two ready to go, a reboot would be greenlit instead. “Hitman: Agent 47,” starring someone named Rupert Friend, came out in 2015 to okay box office but general public indifference. Meanwhile, the public has seen a hundred other movies about cool bald dudes in suits killing guys, so maybe the market is just saturated. [5/10]
When “Resident Evil: Apocalypse” grossed 129 million dollars at the box office, against a significantly smaller budget, a third film in the series was guaranteed. The second film, of course, planned for this, with its gratuitously long-winded sequel hook. Even though the first two “Resident Evil” movies annoyed critics and fans of the games, the continued success gave producers little reason to change things up. For “Resident Evil: Extinction,” Paul W.S. Anderson would stay on as screenwriter/producer, while the story would remain centered on Milla Jovovich's unstoppable Alice. In fact, all of the marketing seemed to revolve around Milla and Milla alone.
The Umbrella Corporation thought they contained the T-Virus at the end of “Apocalypse” but they apparently didn't do a great job of it. The zombie outbreak quickly spreads across the globe, turning all of Earth into a barren wasteland. I guess the evil corporation is still hoping to rule that wasteland, as they continue to develop projects. Such as domesticating zombies or cloning Alice. Elsewhere, a convoy led by Claire Redfield and Carlos Oliveira tries to find survivors, bringing them food and resources. Meanwhile, the growing-more-powerful Alice wanders the world, trying to avoid being tracked by Umbrella.
While Anderson remained involved in the production of “Extinction,” neither he nor his mini-me Alexander Witt directed. Instead, the reins of the sequel were handed to veteran genre man Russell Mulcahy. And it's like night and day. While Mulcahy is very familiar with schlock, he is not shackled to Anderson's obnoxious tics. Save for some slow motion in the action scenes or a moment when Alice comes face-to-face with her dead clones, “Extinction” is totally free of the stylistic quirks that made the last two movies so irritating to watch. In fact, the action scenes here are very fun and well done. A sequence involving zombies overturning a bus or a disastrous fight against super-zombies in a sand-buried Las Vegas are easy to follow, excitingly edited but not overdone. It's amazing the difference hiring an actually competent director can make.
In the first two “Resident Evil” movies, the zombies – otherwise known as the primary monsters in most of the games – had almost nothing to do. They were obstacles that the heroes easily tore through. In both entries, some other genetic mutation emerged as the actual threat. Mulcahy's film course corrects in this regard. “Extinction” actually feels like a zombie movie. The undead appear early, cool make-ups shambling alongside the war wagons the heroes ride around in. There are multiple scenes where the flesh-eating hordes feel like an overwhelming force. Especially in wide shots when we see just how many zombies are inhabiting the country now. “Extinction” never grasps the feeling of creeping dread the best of the genre succeeds at. These are, after all, fast zombies. Yet it's actually trying to reach that goal, which is more than you could say about the first two films.
In fact, “Extinction” proves that even the annoyingly overpowered Alice was not necessarily why the previous “Resident Evil” movies sucked. In part three, Alice is more powerful than ever. For ill-defined reasons, she has also developed telekinetic abilities. She uses it to hold back a wall of flames, toss enemies around, and even levitates motorcycles in her sleep. Despite being as much of a super-powered zombie killer as ever, this is the first time Alice actually feels like a real person. She has friendships and endeavors to rescue others. She has a weakness now too, the Umbrella Corporation having gained temporary control of her mind. Milla Jovovich even emerges as a likable actress for once, smiling and cracking jokes during a few key moments. It turns out, when a character has more to do than be as excessively bad-ass as possible, they can actually be interesting. Or at least sort of likable.
In general, it feels like “Extinction” is willing to have more fun than the stiflingly self-serious earlier entries. The zombie dogs show up for the third time but they are actually threatening for once, instead of being another foe Alice can easily dispatched. There's also zombie crows, infected after feeding on undead flesh, which leads to one of the film's wildest sequences. The subplot involving Alice clones allows the sequel to riff on the first film in fun, amusingly misleading ways. This episode's final boss – a variation on Tyrant finally being put on-screen – is also pretty cool. As a foe with an established connection to Alice, the climatic fight is exciting for both character reasons and action-packed reasons.
By this point, the “Resident Evil” film series has strayed so far from its video game roots, that it barely resembles Capcom's creation at all. Yet this does not bother me too much, as “Extinction” manages to be pretty fun on its own. That's a first for a series that had just been punishingly lame action scenes, obnoxiously in-your-face direction, and an annoyingly flat lead character up to this point. (Fans seem to be divided on this one, some liking it and others hating it.) Sadly, Paul W.S. Anderson would return for the next installment so I suspect my enjoyment of the “Resident Evil” movies will be short-lived. I'll find out soon enough. [7/10]
At best, I'm a mediocre player but most of my favorite video games are still fighting games. So I actually have quite a lot of experience with the “Dead or Alive” series. There are many technical reasons why the series has its merit but its main appeal, the thing that truly differentiates it from other fighting games, is its gratuitous T&A. “Dead or Alive” is most famous for, and largely defined by, its many female characters and their large and bouncy physical features. (To the point where there's a spin-off series that plays like the softest of softcore porn.) The games have a plot, the characters have back stories, but they are very convoluted and totally unimportant. So “Dead or Alive” was a weird choice for a film adaptation. Yet something about “DOA: Dead or Alive” attracted legendary Hong Kong action choreographer/director Corey Yuen. The result was one of the few video game adaptations that both gets the appeal of the original games while functioning as its own thing.
As I said, the plot of the “Dead Or Alive” series is both too complicated and too insignificant to cover here. The movie abbreviates things nicely: There's a fighting tournament called Dead or Alive, run by a shady corporation with evil genetic experiments in mind. A bunch of talented martial artists from all over the world are invited to participate. Such as runaway ninja Kasumi, who is pursuing her missing brother Hayate; Ayane, a rival ninja who is chasing Kasumi; pro-wrestler Tina Armstrong, who is seeking independence from her overprotective pro-wrestler dad; internationally wanted thief Christie; and Helena, peppy daughter of one of the corporation's founder. There's many other fighters in the film – including “Ninja Gaiden's” Ryu Hayabusa – and quite a lot of deviations from established game lore. But, seriously, who cares?
“DOA: Dead or Alive” is essentially a live action cartoon and I'm not even talking about its over-the-top action scenes. This is – and I'm being one hundred percent serious here – a movie that has cartoon hearts floating around a guy's head to indicate he's love struck. Within the opening minutes, a high-tech hang glider is deployed out of nowhere. All the fights around the island are cinematically observed. In a further attempt to replicate its video game roots, life bars are displayed overhead during these fights. When simpler options are available to the characters, they choose to do things like ascend bamboo shoots, walk along spinning water wheels, or acrobatically climb an elevator shaft. Someone is defeated via thrown shoe. Yes, there's even a volleyball scene, as dramatically orchestrated as any of the fights, because “DOA: Dead or Alive” perfectly understand the gleefully brain-dead appeal of its source material.
These delightful excesses are simply another manifestation of the cartoon world all of “DOA” inhabits. Of course, the biggest indicator of this is the fight scenes. “Dead or Alive” is almost non-stop action, the film squeezing in much punching, kicking, and sword fights as possible. The characters are not bound by the laws of physics. Kasumi cartwheels weightlessly through the air, kicking opponents on the way down. Tina defends her yacht with high-wire kicks and punches. One especially ridiculous moment has Christie slipping on her underwear while fighting off attackers. If the film's women are never less than graceful while fighting, its men are supernaturally strong. The likes of Bass and Bayman punch through doors and walls without any effort at all. The film's interior logic is such that we hardly notice when the bad guy knocks someone sideways with a simple punch near the end.
The fight scenes are very dumb but they are not assembled in a dumb way. Corey Yuen has been making martial arts movie, either as an actor, director, or choreographer since the early seventies. He knows his shit. As artificial as the flipping and tossing looks, it's all very intentionally in line with the movie's ridiculous world. “DOA” is an absurd ballet of violence. This is most clear during two key fight scenes. The first occurs when Hayabusha fights his way into one of the island's secret laboratories. He gracefully cracks, bashes, and dispatches a line of dudes with dancer's like speed. A later, even more impressive scene has Helena fighting off a horde of ninjas with a sword, alongside a scenic temple backdrop. It's a moment that just becomes more over-the-top as it goes on, the audience's smile getting wider as it goes on.
I have no idea if Yuen or the film's trio of screenwriters were fans of the “Dead or Alive” video games. However, somebody must've been because the movie shoves in as many of the game characters as possible. Granted, some of them – drunken boxer Brad Wong, wise old kung-fu guy Gen Fu, dragon lady Lei-Fong, Bruce Lee knock-off Jann Lee – don't amount to much more than cameos. Yes, there are some odd adaptational changes. Rather than the emotionless assassin she is in the game, Holly Valance plays Christie as a fun and carefree jewel thief. The character called “Helena” is actually a hybrid of the game's Helena and another femme fatale named Hitomi, more-so resembling the latter. This Ryu Hayabusa is much more child-like and bubbly than the stern and unwavering video game version. Victor Donovan, played by a fabulously sleazy Eric Roberts, graduates from background character in the games to full-blown final boss here. Again, not that any of this matters.
Yet some of the other characters are pitch perfect adaptations. Brian J. White hits the right notes as Zack, an oddball hustler based on Dennis Rodman. Jamie Pressly and Kevin Nash could not be better cast as the bickering father/daughter pro-wrestlers. Granted, none of the leading ladies have the famous proportions of their video game counterparts. This is especially noticeable with the very modest Devon Aoki, playing the famously busty Kasumi. Aoki's performance is also pretty flat. Natassia Malthe – who also appeared in several Uwe Boll related video game movies – gives a similarly broad and wooden performance. Not that acting and emoting matters much in a movie like this and all the performers are excellent fighters. Kane Kosugi and Collin Chou are especially well equipped in that regard.
Here in the U.S., “DOA: Dead or Alive” had the misfortune of being distributed by Dimension Films during one of the Weinsteins' many financially difficult moments. It was barely released in American theaters, grossed less than a million dollars at the box office, before being dumped onto the Dimension Extreme DVD label. Intentionally, the movie was released a full year earlier and did much better business. I don't know if “Dead or Alive” would've done better here if it had actually gotten a decent release – intentional audiences tend to be a little more open to bullshit like this – but I suspect it might've. Because “Dead or Alive” is a lot of very silly fun, full of fantastic action and tonally faithful to the games that inspired it. [7/10]
