Realizing that the law will not grant him the justice he deserves, Nick refuses to testify against his son’s murderer, deciding to enact his own brand of vengeance. One cliché leads to another, and Nick ends up killing the guy, which sets off a chain reaction of revenge between the surviving members of the gang, including the slain criminal’s older brother and father, and Nick’s own family. Lots of bullets, lots of knifings, lots of bullet dodging. These guys are terrible shots.
The film plays a lot on the whole “protect your family” theme, and the idea that violence only begets more violence. An eye for an eye, and all that. It’s actually a pretty neat concept, and I can imagine that on paper this seemed like a good idea, but in reality, it’s just a very run-of-the-mill shoot ‘em up. Like I said earlier, I’ve got no beef with a solid B-movie, and I don’t mind a cliché or seven thrown in for good measure. Hell, Lone Wolf McQuade is one of my favorite movies, but this flick, despite a few good action scenes, just doesn’t bring anything new to the table, and it’s barely worth watching.
What it does bring to the table is bad acting and homage after homage to Taxi Driver and the Saw films, which happened to be directed by the same guy that directed this film (the Saw films, not Taxi Driver). There’s a scene after the older brother’s death in which the family, who at this point are apparently not able to speak above a whisper, all lie in bed crying and listening to some crappy Sarah McLachlan song. Yeah, seriously. It doesn’t just tug at your heartstrings; it attempts to forcibly remove them, but in the end, you just end up laughing at it.
The DVD includes both the theatrical release and an unrated cut of the film. My review is based on the unrated version. Who knows, maybe the tamed down theatrical cut tamed down some of the lameness as well? Might’ve been worth checking out. The extras featured on this disc are: “Making A Scene,” a mini-documentary originally shown on the Fox Movie Channel, detailing how director James Wan shot a particular action sequence. Since the action sequences are the best parts of the film, this was actually worth watching and far more interesting than the movie. An episode of the Fox Movie Channel’s “Life After Film School” and a bunch of webisodes are also included. The former being something of a “poor man’s Inside The Actor’s Studio” hosted by three film students, and the latter being a bunch of little behind-the-scenes vignettes which appeared on the movie’s website. Again, both proved to be far more interesting than the film itself.
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