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One in the Chamber (2012)
Great 'budget' action!
One in the Chamber movie review – One in the Chamber is a 2012 Action movie staring Dolph Lundgren (Expendables 2, Command Performance, Icarus) and Cuba Gooding Jr. "A seasoned assassin plays both sides in a Russian gang war and becomes the target of an unknown enemy." The blurb pretty much says it all. Lundgren plays Alexie, or the Wolf, A freelance hit-man. He is contracted by a Russian mafia family boss to destroy another rival family after their first hit-man failed to eliminate all the targets. Enter Cuba Gooding Jr. Gun fights, knife fights, fist fights and explosions ensue and the two rival hit men face off.
Cuba Gooding Jr plays a good role, his age has helped him 'sell' that hit-man look and he slips into the role nicely, he is physically fit and quick, allowing me suspend my disbelief enough to able to accept him in the role. His character appears to be pieced together haphazardly, there is a cutscene at the beginning that shows a guy being shot whilst holding a bible with a young girl watching. Gooding Jr has this bible and appears to be stalking a mid-20′s woman that is inferred to be the girl from the cutscene. It turns out she is the girl from cutscene and that Gooding Jr is trying to apologise to her for executing here daddy. It doesn't go well.
Lundgren is as fierce as ever as the lone-hit-man Wolf but what really makes the role is the character itself. He is regarded as faery tale around Eastern Europe because he is a ghost, its difficult to imagine Lundgren as inconspicuous. The mafia family he is sent to destroy soon realise he is no Humpty-Dumpty and begin to wish they could all just live happily ever after.
The addition of Billy Murray as Gooding Jr's handler is brilliance because his delivery is always so good. You can really imagine him in the role he plays and he carries it all off very well.
The plot is weak in places, the underlying 'dad-was-executed' story arc is confusing and never explained but the Russian mob war is executed with grace. Ludgren's character is priceless and had this been an English movie I can see Vinny Jones as the star. The action is good too with some great gun fights and car bombs. Although, there are numerous times where people are firing automatics in broad daylight and no-one seems to care, there are also some hand grenades involved that the Police don't seem too bothered about!
On the whole I really enjoyed it. Lundgren and Murray were the mainstays of the movie because their characters were so well developed, Gooding Jr acted his role well but the character was weak.
One in the Chamber movie
Give it a watch!
Belly of the Beast (2003)
Great Seagal action!
Continuing with the compulsion to watch more Seagal I took in "Belly of the Beast" yesterday and LOVED every minute of it!
This DTV movie ticks all the right boxes for me; revenge, guns, swords, girls and Seagal! In this flick Seagal's daughter is taken hostage along with a congressman's daughter by a 'terrorist' cell looking to blackmail the US government. What they don't count on is that Seagal is one pis*ed of retired Special Ops Commando.....
The direction, production and delivery of this movie is great. The budget of $14million really shines through and considering Stallone got $15million for Demolition Man alone this movie is shrewd! The only real let down is the 'mage' towards the end fight scene, this I thought wasn't needed.
Overall the VFX were executed brilliantly, the kung-fu (I think!) was choreographed beautifully and Seagal's trademark stone faced acting was entertaining. Even if you're not a Seagal fan you can watch this movie. Good right out of the box to a complete novice!
7 out 10!
Attack Force (2006)
I love terrible movies but this.....
So to continue my mammoth Seagal season I just finished watching 2006′s direct-to-DVD Attack Force. I IMDb'd the flick before watching to see what I'm in for and was greeted with a measly 2.4 rating. I thought to myself "it can't be that bad, I love terrible movies anyway!" I was, on the whole, wrong.
The premise is good, it's an atypical Seagal revenge flick full of dead bad guys, bullets and blood. Everything I look for in a movie but the narrative, production and overall execution was the worse I can ever remember seeing!
There are numerous times in which Seagal gets his voice dubbed by someone that sounds nothing at all like him for no apparent reason. I'd suggest it's poor recording equipment or a crap editing. Other flaws include very obvious set decoration, stones moving in the breeze by the wind, **ahem polystyrene**, stunt doubles of a different ethnic background and the aforementioned atrocious post production work. The editor needs to be shot!
Seagal was actually OK to be honest, no Oscar winning performance but conventional and entertaining. I don't like bad mouthing Seagal but if I were his Steamroller Productuons team I'd have pulled this off of the shelves years ago.
I gave it a 3 out of 10 and would only recommend watching this if the only thing on TV is X- Factor, otherwise give it a miss.