On DVD/Blu-ray: CARTELS (2017) and THE RECALL (2017)

CARTELS
(US - 2017)

Shot back in 2015 under the title KILLING SALAZAR and probably retitled to cash in on Netflix's NARCOS, CARTELS "stars" Steven Seagal but was held from release as six more Seagal movies were shat out ahead of it in 2016 (I'd list them but that would surpass the effort Seagal put forth in all seven movies total). It's hard to fathom the existence of a present-day Seagal joint that's so bad that Lionsgate delays releasing it, but CARTELS is maybe the least terrible of the bunch, though that's in no way meant to be interpreted as a recommendation. As usual, Seagal is a top-billed guest star who was probably on the set in Romania for a couple of days, while another actor--in this case, Luke Goss, still cornering the market on second-string Stathams--is the real lead. Seagal and his double are featured in a framing device as John Harrison, a covert CIA black ops mastermind interrogating US Marshal Tom Jensen (Goss) over a botched assignment involving Mexican-Russian cartel boss Joseph "El Tiburon" Salazar (Florin Piersic Jr), who's introduced ruminating over a chess board as he tells his top underling "You know why I love this game so much? Because there can only be...one king!" The CIA fakes Salazar's death in order to take him into custody after he offers to flip and go informant, turning him over to a crew of US Marshals and military personnel and holing them up in a luxury hotel in Romania to await extraction for 24 hours. Knowing Salazar has turned on them, his betrayed crew, led by second-in-command Bruno Sinclaire (Georges St-Pierre), lead an assault on the hotel, going up floor by floor in pursuit of their old boss--somehow, the hotel remains open for business--and taking out the Marshals and soldiers one by one until, of course, only the disgraced Jensen, seeking redemption after a previous assignment went south, remains to kill them all.

Seagal's usual director Keoni Waxman is on hand, and for what it's worth, he does an acceptable job handling what's basically a RIO BRAVO/ASSAULT ON PRECINCT 13/THE RAID scenario. Goss is actually trying, for some reason, and creates a surprisingly credible hero, and while the fight scenes and gun battles are mostly an incoherent, quick-cut blur, Waxman at least uses a decent-looking mix of practical and CGI splatter that looks a lot wetter and splashier than in most films of this sort. CARTELS starts stumbling when it tries to get tricky, doling out increasingly ludicrous twists and double-crosses before abandoning logic altogether: the team has obviously been infiltrated by at least one mole, but when that person's identity is revealed, it certainly begs the question of whether CARTELS' version of the CIA has ever heard of a background check and wait, Seagal's character knew this person was a mole all along? Then why are you interrogating Jensen? It's no surprise that Seagal is once more the epitome of laziness, mumbling and wheezing, sporting his standard tinted glasses and a bushy goatee dyed with shoe polish, doubled in every shot where he's not facing the camera and in an embarrassing fight scene with GSP, where the MMA champ is forced to pretend he's getting his ass handed to him by the three-decades older and almost completely immobile Seagal, master of the timeless "wave your hands around and let your opponent run into them" move. CARTELS would've been an ordinary and perfectly watchable B-movie had Waxman just focused on Goss and the siege of the hotel and shitcanned the framing device. But the need to shoehorn Seagal into the movie ends up being its biggest detriment, stopping things cold every time he or the double pretending to be him shows up. The age-old question remains: Seagal doesn't give a shit. Why should we? (R, 100 mins)



THE RECALL
(Canada/US/UK - 2017)

A muddled jumble of a sci-fi thriller, the Freestyle pickup THE RECALL can't figure out what it wants to be: alien invasion saga, CABIN IN THE WOODS ripoff, sensitive YA weepie, conspiracy movie, superhero origin story, or Wesley Snipes comeback vehicle. There's three credited writers plus someone else credited with "additional writing," so there's a big tip off to the indecisiveness and lack of focus. THE RECALL can't stop tripping over its own feet, shifting tone and direction so many times that it constantly stonewalls any momentum it generates. Five uninteresting college-age kids--two couples and a nerdy fifth wheel played by BREAKING BAD's RJ Mitte--head to a cabin for a weekend getaway only to find their plans ruined by an inconvenient alien invasion. Hothead Rob (Niko Pepaj) accidentally shoots and kills his girlfriend Kara (Hannah Rose May) and promptly gets pulled into the sky and zapped aboard a spacecraft, leaving heartbroken Charlie (someone calling himself Jedidiah Goodacre), who's still grieving after his girlfriend's death in a car crash ten months earlier, Kara's friend Annie (Laura Bilgeri), and Brendan (Mitte), to seek the protection of a local survivalist (Snipes) with a complicated backstory who's been preparing for "the arrival" for over 20 years. Snipes' character has some kind of psychic connection with a Russian prisoner (Graham Shiels) being held at a remote military base in Alaska in one of several subplots that never quite come together.

Top-billed Mitte has little to do and Snipes gets more screen time than you might expect for his "and Wesley Snipes" billing (he's also one of 22 credited producers), but the real stars are Goodacre and Bilgeri, which requires director Mauro Borrelli to frequently stop the film cold to establish their love connection and his emo bona fides. There's nothing like a violent attack by a seven-foot-tall, lizard-like alien brought to a screeching halt by a guy who picks the most inopportune times to wallow in self-pity over his dead girlfriend. Sorry for your loss, brah, but is this really the time? Borrelli has made a few low-budget DTV horror movies over the last decade in between his far more lucrative day job as a conceptual artist and illustrator on any number of big budget movies going back to the late '80s--THE ADVENTURES OF BARON MUNCHAUSEN, BATMAN RETURNS, a couple PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN entries, THE HATEFUL EIGHT, and the upcoming STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI just to name a few--and early on, some of the visual effects and the creature design are surprisingly well-done, which isn't a surprise considering he probably has some friends in the business who did him a solid. But those guys must've had other things to do midway through production, because the effects get much shoddier as the film goes on, but it's right in line with everything else in THE RECALL that starts falling apart around the same time. The only reason to bother checking this out is Snipes, who turns in a far more spirited and amusing performance than he needed to, putting forth much more effort here than he did in most of the films leading up to his stretch in the hoosegow for tax evasion. Snipes turns the character into a bitterly sarcastic smartass ("Come on, sissy boy!" he keeps telling Brendan), though that could just be a coping mechanism once the veteran actor realized he was merely a supporting actor in a Jedidiah Goodacre movie that ends with three young characters newly imbued with otherworldly powers, looking in the distance at a gray sky with one actually saying "Looks like a storm's coming." (R, 91 mins)

In Theaters/On VOD: KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE (2016)

KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE
(US/UK - 2016)

Directed by John Stockwell. Written by Dimitri Logothetis and James McGrath. Cast: David Bautista, Alain Moussi, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Georges St-Pierre, Gina Carano, Sara Malakul Lane, Darren Shahlavi, Cain Velasquez, Fabricio Werdum, T.J. Storm, Matthew Ziff, Sam Medina, Hawn Tran, Daneya Mayid, Steven Swadling. (Unrated, 88 mins)

A remake/reboot of KICKBOXER the 1989 Jean-Claude Van Damme favorite, KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE is passable action fare that's tailor-made for a long life on cable and streaming, even if it doesn't quite match up to its inspiration. Taking part in the illegal underground fight scene in Thailand, Eric Sloane (the late Darren Shahlavi) is mercilessly killed via neck-snap in the ring by unstoppable Muay Thai master Tong Po (Dave Bautista). Of course, as the title of the film already indicates, vengeance is nigh as Eric's little brother Kurt (veteran stuntman Alain Moussi) vows revenge on the ruthless Tong Po. After infiltrating Tong Po's training stronghold and getting his ass handed to him, Kurt seeks the guidance of legendary, fedora-sporting trainer Master Durand (Van Damme). Endless training sequences ensue as Kurt grows stronger and more agile under the tutelage of the wise and outwardly laid-back Durand. As has been the case in every other kickboxing and martial arts fight movie ever made, the sworn enemies meet for the final, fatal showdown in the ring.

It doesn't get much more formulaic than KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE, a film that may set some kind of record with 43 credited producers. The story offers zilch in the way of surprises and character development is kept to the most shallow minimum. A romance between Kurt and local cop Liu (Sara Malakul Lane) comes out of nowhere. She's obsessed with nailing Tong Po's balls to the wall over his illegal fight operation, but she's thwarted at every turn by her own corrupt police force. She ultimately arrests Kurt and Durand for their own safety, and after they improbably escape from jail and go to the fight, she shows up and is right there to cheer Kurt on as he and Tong Po beat one another into a pulp. The fight scenes are mostly well-done and effectively brutal, if a bit too reliant on the shaky shots and quick-cut editing (one sequence involving Kurt and some bad guys parkouring and fighting atop two elephants in a parade had some bizarre potential, but is ruined by some far-from-seamless editing between fake elephants and cuts to close-ups of real ones). Moussi has some credible action star potential, though he's about as expressive as Van Damme was at that age, and Bautista, despite not being the first person who comes to mind when one hears the term "Muay Thai," makes a formidable, imposing villain. Thai model Lane is stunningly beautiful, UFC champ Georges St-Pierre doesn't have much to do as a hapless, drunken Tong Po stooge who joins Kurt and Durand, and MMA legend Gina Carano (HAYWIRE, DEADPOOL) is wasted in a nothing supporting role as Eric's unscrupulous manager and scheming fight promoter. Why hire Carano for a movie called KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE and not have her fight? She's not about to advance her movie career based on her acting skills.

The real selling point here is the presence of Van Damme. He didn't appear in any of KICKBOXER's four forgotten sequels, where Sasha Mitchell played another kickboxing Sloane brother. It's always nice to see the iconic Muscles from Brussels in action and his turnaround into a beloved pop culture figure who has a sense of humor about himself is a look he wears well. As he was quietly putting together a strong DTV resume over the last decade and a half when no one was looking, I've often said he would make a terrific Bond villain if anyone gave him the chance. He seems to be opting for the self-deprecating, self-aware William Shatner career approach, which is fine, too. When the closing credits play over a split-screen comparison of JCVD's goofy bar dance from the original KICKBOXER and Moussi recreating it in the present day, you know it's done out of genuine affection. But KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE doesn't take full advantage of having JCVD around. It's a great idea to have him graduate to the wise mentor role a la Stallone in CREED, but wouldn't having him play an older Kurt Sloane, instead of an all-new character, make more sense? There's also some hiccups throughout the film involving JCVD, like some scattered shots where he's clearly doubled (back turned, face not seen in shots with Moussi) and the second half of the film has some extensive relooping of his dialogue by a bad impersonator as Jean-Claude Van Dubbed comes perilously close to Steven Seagal territory. Much of this is indicative of a troubled shoot that saw the New Orleans crew revolting during production in December 2014 when they weren't paid, followed closely in January 2015 by the unexpected death of 42-year-old Shahlavi from an undiagnosed heart condition (preliminary tabloid reports indicated a prescription drug overdose). These incidents cast a dark cloud over the proceedings and may have led to the departure of director John Stockwell (a specialist in lush travelogues in the guise of action thrillers like BLUE CRUSH, INTO THE BLUE, and TURISTAS) after the US portion of the shoot. According to Impact's Mike Leeder, Stockwell bailed before the production headed to Thailand, where directing duties were assumed by co-writer/co-producer Dimitri Logothetis (SLAUGHTERHOUSE ROCK). Only Stockwell receives credit, but perhaps the whole thing would've turned out better with a guy like Isaac Florentine at the helm (and while we're at it, why isn't Scott Adkins starring in this?). There's nothing here you haven't seen before, but KICKBOXER: VENGEANCE is a case study of "It is what it is." It's diverting and entertaining, even if its flaws and Band-Aids are plainly visible. Moussi, Van Damme, and Logothetis already have the sequel KICKBOXER: RETALIATION in the can for 2017, with new cast additions Christopher Lambert and Mike Tyson.