How did they get all of these decent actors in this movie, and why do they all look so bad?? Well, the script is full of plot holes and sub standard dialogue, it's shot on digital video (which actually the camera work and lighting are about the only decent part about this flick, which is why I rated it a three)...I guess all the actors needed to pay their rent or something, I don't know...there is a part near the end where a car blows up, then a cut to a different shot ---no car there or at least something that resembles flames falling across the actors' faces (and this would be a major cheat shot)!!! I guess somebody that produced this had some money, was able to pay some decent rates to the actors for minimal shooting schedule, and voilà, there you have it!! This is when great digital technology goes bad!!! Don't waste your time, I'm was really disappointed and there is only one naked girl in this, a skanky looking stripper...much rather see Nichole Hiltz bare some flesh, she has a love scene but nothing is shown (sorry girls, no flesh baring for Eric Mabius either!!) Do something else with a hour and a half of your time!!!
6 Reviews
The Man with the Golden Gun!
zsenorsock8 November 2007
Warning: Spoilers
Writer-Director Eric DelaBarre is the author of a self-help book and in his IMDb bio one of his personal quotes is: "Failure is an opportunity to see things in a new light...giving us a new direction in which to move." Hopefully DelaBarre took his own advice and decided to move in a new direction and away from writing and directing feature films. This modern day "Mod Squad" reinvention is a dull mess. To combat a Venice drug war, under pressure from the Mayor (who of course is up for re-election) Captain John Sullivan (Ed Lauter, who you've seen everywhere) agrees to go with a plan cooked up by Sgt. Rick Mills (Randall Batinkoff, who you've seen in "Buffy"). His plan is to get a team of undercover operatives (not even out of the academy yet!) and have them infiltrate the underbelly of Venice. Their job is to stop the violence using whatever force they want. See since they are not really cops, they don't have to play by the rules. So they don't. As they investigate they find themselves stalked by a mysterious killer...a man with a golden gun! Sound interesting to you? Me neither. Can't blame the actors much. They have to deliver some pretty awful dialog. However Carolina Garcia and Eric Mabius do a good job (though not for one second do we believe they are undercover cops), Danny Trejo makes a menacing figure (though is given nothing to do but look menacing) and Nichole Hiltz is always a delight (though watch her love making scene closely and watch the flesh colored top appear and disappear in subsequent shots!). Unless you know somebody in this one, there's not much reason to watch it.
Almost like welfare for 3 veteran character actors
MBunge24 May 2011
Warning: Spoilers
A silly jumble of 21 Jump Street and some MTV reality show, Venice Underground provided a paycheck for some decent actors and
that's it. That's the only positive thing I can say about this nonsense. The storytelling and filmmaking here sucks. There's nothing for any viewer to enjoy, not even gratuitous nudity or exciting violence. The fact that guys like Danny Trejo, Mark Boone Junior and Ed Lauter were able to pay some bills because of it is all that prevents this movie from being one of the most existentially useless things ever created.
The plot concerns a group of young police cadets, yanked out of the academy and plopped down in the street culture of Venice Beach as an undercover, anti-drug task force. One of them is an ex-musician (Edward Furlong), one an ex-surfer (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe), another an ex-party girl (Nichole Hiltz), and one an ex-street hustler (Nicholas Gonzalez). Apparently the Venice Beach Police Department is like a safety school you go to when other plans fall through. Those 4 are teamed up with the son of a cop (Eric Mabius) as their leader, living in a ridiculously expensive beach house and working off the books to find and feed information to real police about drug and gang activity. But don't let the fact that each character has a different background fool you. They all have the exact same personality.
The team starts out investigating two separate crimes, a drug-dealing record producer and the most good-natured Latino drug gang in all of California, and wouldn't you know it? They wind up being connected with a "surprise" villain behind it all. Just to be clear, those are mockingly ironic quotation marks. When they're not investigating crimes, the white members of the task force have sex with each other while the minority members are apparently celibate.
Here is how badly written Venice Underground is. The ex-musician and the ex-surfer are supposed to be dating each other. The viewer only knows this because those characters and others talk about the relationship. The ex-musician and the ex-surfer barely say 10 words to each other before one of them gets killed and the other spend the rest of the movie occasionally remembering to feel sad about their dead lover. And when they're supposed to be remembering their dead lover, the film has to use the same scenes already seen by the audience because writer/director Eric DelaBarre didn't bother to shoot any additional footage for the flashbacks.
Here's how badly filmed Venice Underground is. There are several shots from the point of view of the "surprise" villain. Every one of those shots has this off-kilter color scheme and tunnel vision perspective, like the bad guy has some sort of eye problem. Does the weird way those shots look turn out to have any meaning or significance? Of course not. That would have required writer/director DelaBarre to put some thought into what he was doing.
It's the same old crap over and over again with this kind of low budget, direct-to-DVD disaster. Idiot plots that go nowhere, banal dialog stuffed into the mouths of too many characters, emaciated melodrama that couldn't make you feel anything if it cut off your toes with a hacksaw and filmmaking that's about a half-step above an infomercial. But at least some veteran actors made a little money off their involvement with Venice Underground. That's good for them. It does nothing for everybody else.
The plot concerns a group of young police cadets, yanked out of the academy and plopped down in the street culture of Venice Beach as an undercover, anti-drug task force. One of them is an ex-musician (Edward Furlong), one an ex-surfer (Jodi Lyn O'Keefe), another an ex-party girl (Nichole Hiltz), and one an ex-street hustler (Nicholas Gonzalez). Apparently the Venice Beach Police Department is like a safety school you go to when other plans fall through. Those 4 are teamed up with the son of a cop (Eric Mabius) as their leader, living in a ridiculously expensive beach house and working off the books to find and feed information to real police about drug and gang activity. But don't let the fact that each character has a different background fool you. They all have the exact same personality.
The team starts out investigating two separate crimes, a drug-dealing record producer and the most good-natured Latino drug gang in all of California, and wouldn't you know it? They wind up being connected with a "surprise" villain behind it all. Just to be clear, those are mockingly ironic quotation marks. When they're not investigating crimes, the white members of the task force have sex with each other while the minority members are apparently celibate.
Here is how badly written Venice Underground is. The ex-musician and the ex-surfer are supposed to be dating each other. The viewer only knows this because those characters and others talk about the relationship. The ex-musician and the ex-surfer barely say 10 words to each other before one of them gets killed and the other spend the rest of the movie occasionally remembering to feel sad about their dead lover. And when they're supposed to be remembering their dead lover, the film has to use the same scenes already seen by the audience because writer/director Eric DelaBarre didn't bother to shoot any additional footage for the flashbacks.
Here's how badly filmed Venice Underground is. There are several shots from the point of view of the "surprise" villain. Every one of those shots has this off-kilter color scheme and tunnel vision perspective, like the bad guy has some sort of eye problem. Does the weird way those shots look turn out to have any meaning or significance? Of course not. That would have required writer/director DelaBarre to put some thought into what he was doing.
It's the same old crap over and over again with this kind of low budget, direct-to-DVD disaster. Idiot plots that go nowhere, banal dialog stuffed into the mouths of too many characters, emaciated melodrama that couldn't make you feel anything if it cut off your toes with a hacksaw and filmmaking that's about a half-step above an infomercial. But at least some veteran actors made a little money off their involvement with Venice Underground. That's good for them. It does nothing for everybody else.
Arrgghhh
browchay4 May 2006
Somebody owes me 1 hour and 32 min's of my life back. This film is beyond terrible. If it'd been terrible I'd have suffered through it happily.
The storyline, the plot, the characters .. nothing works. If you're going to make a film like this at least try to make it mildly realistic. Unless of course all cops in Venice are young and sexy and drive Ferrari's What a load of old rubbish. Save you money and buy yourself a beer instead.
The acting is weak and Edward Furlong should be severely reprimanded. He's had enough acting experience to know how to act by now surely ?!
The storyline, the plot, the characters .. nothing works. If you're going to make a film like this at least try to make it mildly realistic. Unless of course all cops in Venice are young and sexy and drive Ferrari's What a load of old rubbish. Save you money and buy yourself a beer instead.
The acting is weak and Edward Furlong should be severely reprimanded. He's had enough acting experience to know how to act by now surely ?!
Bad
dreamtheater467 December 2006
I am happy someone borrowed this movie to me .Is't just Awful!!! The Plot is just plain stupid.The Acting is Terrible and the Director must have been on Drugs.I didn't even Finish watching the Movie cause i couldn't stand the bad acting no more. It's really sad that some of the Actors like Edward Furlong and some other familiar faces accept Stupid Scripts like these!! Do yourself a favor and don't even rent this Movie,you would be angry for waisting your time-
i think this Movie if didn't even get to play in theaters
Just Plain Bad
if i could rate this movie from 1-10 i would give it a big 0 it doesn't even deserve a 1
i think this Movie if didn't even get to play in theaters
Just Plain Bad
if i could rate this movie from 1-10 i would give it a big 0 it doesn't even deserve a 1
It needs to be put underground
delhart200128 April 2006
Warning: Spoilers
What a load of tripe this movie is, i cannot understand why Ed Lauter and Danny Trejo would have anything to do with this film, the acting and directing are dire, and the plot is clueless, a woman on a steak out in a bar, using a walkie talkie phone to talk to one of the other "undercover" cops out side in a top down convertible Mustang, five of them go out to stake out a bar, again in a top down convertible,five of them ??, they send two of the girls into one of the toughest places in Venice Beach, acting as hookers, and they take the place apart in a flash, but the rest of the team is outside standing in the street with headphones on listening in, covert or what. one of the "undercover" cops get pregnant, but not sure which one of the other cops is the father, do i really need to say any more, watching paint dry would be more exciting.
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