7/10
Extremely intelligent mindless action flick
6 April 2012
Quite possibly the silliest movie ever made. I'm pretty sure these guys set out to make the ultimate mindless action flick and they succeeded brilliantly IMO. I've never seen anything like it before. IMDb claims the budget was $20M, although that seems like quite a stretch. But there is about $1B worth of craziness in it. The makers didn't hold anything back - no restraint whatsoever and it's amazing. Anyone looking to be offended will be. Guaranteed. I've heard of people walking out of movies but this is the first time I ever saw it happen. I wonder if they asked for their $$$ back. I'm pretty sure the theaters are covered from giving refunds; there's fine print on the tix or something.

Anyway, the opening credits are in video game form, which I now realize was a signal. Viewers need to forget reality, not just suspend disbelief in that routine movie kind of way. These guys throw everything they can think of up on the screen and I kept wondering what drugs they were using during filming. Maybe all of them. Also, there's something to irritate everybody. I really mean that; I don't think any insult or stereotype or slur was left out. Nothing offensive was held back that I could notice, although I've led a sheltered life.

Now here's the switch: it's hilarious and I mean laugh-out-loud funny from start to finish. I saw scenes I never saw before or ever expected to see. It starts out so unbelievably crazy that it's actually shocking (sorry) and then just keeps it up and keeps it going for the entire flick. Dark Chocolate's elaborate eye-roll sequence is one for the ages and is worth the price of admission all by itself.

Here's how funny it is: SpikeTV showed it and of course had to make countless cuts: not just the copious female nudity but the language and graphic violence and so on. Anyway, with all that gone it was still incredibly funny and astounding and just totally insane. The ending was a set-up for a sequel, same way the first "Crank" was, but I honestly don't see how they can top this one. Maybe I'm wrong; I sure hope so but it seems to me that they deliberately made it as wild as possible and didn't hold anything back.

One last word: it's not for everyone. I promise you'll either absolutely love it or thoroughly despise it. There will be no in-between for this one.
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