Samstag, 17. Juni 2017

Gastreview, Trailer "Kill 'em all" von Dragonrage

Unser Mann für Facebook hat sich den Film angetan:


I think I've mentioned this once before, I just don't know when and "where", but believe I said once that one of my earliest movie memories was me watching BLOODSPORT, KICKBOXER and LIONHEART. I don't know which one was the first, but those three were some of the first movies I remember watching as a little kid.
It was my 6-years older cousin who first introduced me to Jean Claude Van Damme, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Sly, Arnie and many other action guys whose movies I still love to watch even to this day. So yeah, its safe to say that action movies, and especially martial arts movies, were my favorites from my early days.
Since he "was the first", or at least the first whose movies I remember watching, Van Damme was always my favorite action guy. Hell, back in the days I liked him even slightly more then Arnie and Sly! Now, maybe Im still just to big of a fanboy, or Im to nostalgic, but IMO he was always kind of underappreciated and disrespected. Sure, he never made a timeless classic like THE TERMINATOR or RAMBO, but IMO he worked with couple of really great directors (Roland Emmerich, John Woo, Peter Hyams, Ringo Lam, Tsui Hark etc.) and made couple of great action movies (BLOODSPORT, LIONHEART, HARD TARGET, TIMECOP, UNIVERSAL SOLDIER) that are no worse then Arnie's and Sly's best work.
But drugs and lack of luck did their thing, and by the end of the 90's, his Hollywood carer was done, and he end up in DTV hell, making cheap DTV movies in Bulgaria and Romania. But the thing is, while he made his share of crap (DERAILED, SECOND IN COMMAND, THE HARD CORPS, etc.), he actually made couple of great and fun little DTV's (REPLICANT, IN HELL, WAKE OF DEATH, UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: REGENERATION, WELCOME TO THE JUNGLE, ENEMIES CLOSE, etc.), and generally, for what it matters, his DTV movies were always better then Seagal's. Plus, he became much better actor with years then he was in his prime days, and he learned how to have fun on his own expense (and because of that he made one of the best movies in his career; JCVD), which is another plus.

But anyway, long story short, after couple of years of doing nothing but commercials (remember that awesome Volvo trucks commercial?), small roles in cheap movies (U.F.O., SWELTER, DRAGON EYES, KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE) and playing bad guys (THE EXPENDABLES 2 and ENEMIES CLOSER), he finally has a movie where he plays the main hero. And what even more cool about it...he plays the hero who has to KILL'EM ALL! Sound like fun, right!!?
Well...and it was fun, but in a "so bad it's good" kind of way! KILL'EM ALL is cheap and generic movie, and honestly, not very good movie, but somehow, I had fun watching this...because it was so ridiculous.
The story of KILL'EM ALL is basically about revenge, but its so messy, going back and forth, with bunch of unnecessary flashbacks (inside flashbacks). I mean, every single bad guy gets his introduction flash back, just so that we can see how dangerous they are lol. It makes no sense...same as the unnecessary twist near the ending. I dunno what was that about, and it came out of nowhere, but it was totally WTF lol.
The back story of this movie revolves around the war in ex-Yugoslavia, war between Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina. And whats really funny about it, the fact are all wrong. You see, I live in Croatia, so I know the history and what happened...and let me tell you something, war was over in 1995., not in 2001., as it was stated in this movie lol. And there was definitely no killings and battles in 1999. And that's exactly what KILL'EM ALL suggests.
Also, since the bad guys are Serbians, they speak Serbian. And I know the language, since the Serbian is basically 99% similar to Croatian...and the thing is, with exception of Mila Kaladjurdjevic, non of the actors playing the bad guys was Serbian. So to hear Daniel Bernhardt, Kris Van Damme and others how they speak Serbian, it was ridiculous. It made me laugh. Still, I would say that they did a better job then John Travolta in KILLING SEASON. Now, that was bad!

Now, for a movie called KILL'EM ALL, this was kind of slowish at moments, and it was more like hide and seek thriller with occasional action moments then action packed action movie. But still, there was enough action moments, mostly fight scenes, to satisfy action junkies like me. Van Damme was doing what made his famous, and had couple of cool trademark moves. Unfortunaley, the fight scenes weren't mind blowing,...choreography was OK, but average directing by Peter Malota and choppy editing made them look no as impressive as I hoped they will be. Although, the last fight between Van Damme and Bernhardt was kind of cool.
Acting is mostly bad (although, Autumn Reeser did try hard), but again, in a ridiculous kind of way. Van Damme was unfortunately in his "boring" phase here, just going trough the motions in pain, occasionally kicking ass like his pain magically disappeared. But Peter Stormare was fun playing this prick CIA agent who is kind of harassing his only witness lol...so he was funny in a weird kind of way.


Anyway...KILL'EM ALL is not really a good movie...its generic and forgettable, and I wouldn't recommend it. Unless you are extremely huge Van Damme fan, or you just love to watch cheap (and possibly crappy) action movies. But even in that case(s), its possible that you wont like KILL'EM ALL. Still, for some reason, I expected something way more worse, and I did liked it more then KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE...and for what it matters, I think this was better then anything Seagal did in the last 15 years, simply based on the fact that this movie had a story that was easy to follow, and paper thin characters actually had a clear motives...and that's something Seagal movies usually don't have.
Giving this movie 2, or 2,5 stars would probably be more appropriate then giving it 3 stars...but my 3 stars actually don't have anything to do with the actually quality of this movie, and as I said before, I found KILL'EM ALL to be extremely ridiculous in a so bad it's good kind of way for all kind of different reasons that only I can understand, so in a way, I had fun with this. But I doubt that many will feel this way.

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