With this movie Stallone is back and in surprisingly good shape. That is a good thing since the enjoyment of this movie is pretty much Stallone and not much else. If you are not a Stallone fan you are most likely not going to enjoy this movie.
I cannot help making a comparison to Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback movie The Last Stand. These films are quite different in approach. In The Last Stand, Schwarzenegger was playing his age and not trying to be all gung ho "I'm back" and still feel young. The script however was quite okay. I had my reservations about certain parts but at least someone had put some effort into it.
This movie, well Stallone is indeed back and he is truly kicking ass. To my surprise he actually manages to pull it off. I loved every minute of Stallone being on screen. However, for this movie, someone must have misplaced the real script and quickly thrown something together in order to get 90 minutes of screen time for Stallone. The story, well let us just say that I am not impressed. It is pretty much just there in the background to tie together the various action scenes. Not much thought seems to have gone into it. Especially the ending is quite disappointing and seems very rushed.
Some people have complained about the violence. Well, what did you guys expect? It is a Stallone comeback movie. If you are going to be upset about violence then do not watch Stallone movies. Personally I enjoyed the action sequences with Stallone as well as the ones wit he bad guy's hired mercenary. Actually I quite liked this hired mercenary. I made for a suitably impressive adversary. The real bad guys behind him meh. The black guy was okay(ish) though, at least until the end when it all went a bit silly.
The Korean cop, Taylor Kwon, was mostly just silly and dumb. He constantly screwed up and his silly whispering sessions over the phone where he was unknowingly, since he was so bloody stupid, telling the bad guys everything made me squirm in my chair.
The end? Well that was indeed a bit of a disappointment as I said. Kind of "okay let's quickly get everyone out of the way, as in dead, so that we can get on with the final fight between Stallone and the mercenary". I mean, the bad guy mastermind suddenly turns into a total idiot? Could they not have found some more intelligent way to finish him off? The final axe-fight was somewhat cool though.
Bottom line, I enjoyed the movie quite a lot but that was pretty much only because of Stallone and action sequences. I was quite surprised at how well Stallone managed to make a comeback as an action hero. It is really a shame that quite a few other things where just sloppily done or botched up since this could have been a really great movie. Now it is just good and if you are not a Stallone person then it probably just weighs in as okay or even mediocre.
I cannot help making a comparison to Arnold Schwarzenegger's comeback movie The Last Stand. These films are quite different in approach. In The Last Stand, Schwarzenegger was playing his age and not trying to be all gung ho "I'm back" and still feel young. The script however was quite okay. I had my reservations about certain parts but at least someone had put some effort into it.
This movie, well Stallone is indeed back and he is truly kicking ass. To my surprise he actually manages to pull it off. I loved every minute of Stallone being on screen. However, for this movie, someone must have misplaced the real script and quickly thrown something together in order to get 90 minutes of screen time for Stallone. The story, well let us just say that I am not impressed. It is pretty much just there in the background to tie together the various action scenes. Not much thought seems to have gone into it. Especially the ending is quite disappointing and seems very rushed.
Some people have complained about the violence. Well, what did you guys expect? It is a Stallone comeback movie. If you are going to be upset about violence then do not watch Stallone movies. Personally I enjoyed the action sequences with Stallone as well as the ones wit he bad guy's hired mercenary. Actually I quite liked this hired mercenary. I made for a suitably impressive adversary. The real bad guys behind him meh. The black guy was okay(ish) though, at least until the end when it all went a bit silly.
The Korean cop, Taylor Kwon, was mostly just silly and dumb. He constantly screwed up and his silly whispering sessions over the phone where he was unknowingly, since he was so bloody stupid, telling the bad guys everything made me squirm in my chair.
The end? Well that was indeed a bit of a disappointment as I said. Kind of "okay let's quickly get everyone out of the way, as in dead, so that we can get on with the final fight between Stallone and the mercenary". I mean, the bad guy mastermind suddenly turns into a total idiot? Could they not have found some more intelligent way to finish him off? The final axe-fight was somewhat cool though.
Bottom line, I enjoyed the movie quite a lot but that was pretty much only because of Stallone and action sequences. I was quite surprised at how well Stallone managed to make a comeback as an action hero. It is really a shame that quite a few other things where just sloppily done or botched up since this could have been a really great movie. Now it is just good and if you are not a Stallone person then it probably just weighs in as okay or even mediocre.