Opened 40 Years Ago: NIGHTHAWKS (4/10/1981)

 

Retired cops Matthew Fox and Deke DaSilva 
hitting the gym in 2019

NIGHTHAWKS opening in Toledo, OH on 4/10/1981

Retro Review: EYE SEE YOU (2002)

EYE SEE YOU
(US/Germany - 2002)

Directed by Jim Gillespie. Written by Ron L. Brinkerhoff. Cast: Sylvester Stallone, Tom Berenger, Charles S. Dutton, Kris Kristofferson, Polly Walker, Robert Patrick, Jeffrey Wright, Robert Prosky, Courtney B. Vance, Christopher Fulford, Stephen Lang, Sean Patrick Flanery, Dina Meyer, Angela Alvarado Rosa, Mif, Alan C. Peterson, Hrothgar Mathews, Rance Howard, Tim Henry, Frank Pellegrino. (R, 96 mins)

Sylvester Stallone has had his share of ups and downs over the course of his long and storied career, but he perhaps hit his roughest patch in that post-COP LAND period from 1998 to 2006, after which he went into nostalgia mode with the surprisingly good ROCKY BALBOA. That film's success sent Stallone on an ongoing greatest hits tour that's seen him resurrecting Rambo, creating a new all-star action franchise with THE EXPENDABLES, and continuing Rocky's story in two CREED films so far, the first earning him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination. The 1997 "indie" COP LAND came at the height of Miramax's Oscar-baiting power, and was supposed to be then-51-year-old Stallone's bid to reinvent himself as a Serious Actor. He even pulled a De Niro by putting on 40 lbs and sporting a gut to play a powerless and partially-deaf sheriff in a small New Jersey suburb that a bunch of corrupt NYC cops call home. The film was critically-acclaimed, Stallone got some of the best reviews of his career, and it was a modest hit in theaters, but it was more or less viewed as a stunt for Stallone and offers for more serious roles never materialized. So he went back to action movies with 2000's remake of the Michael Caine classic GET CARTER and the 2001 racing drama DRIVEN, and both bombed critically and commercially. Aside from his comedic turn as the villain in 2003's SPY KIDS 3-D: GAME OVER, Stallone's next three films--2002's EYE SEE YOU, 2003's AVENGING ANGELO, and 2004's SHADE, where things had gotten so dire that he took a supporting role as the mark in a ROUNDERS underground poker knockoff starring Stuart Townsend--either made it to just a handful of theaters, or (as in the case of AVENGING ANGELO, notable only as Anthony Quinn's last film and released two years after his death), went straight-to-DVD after extended stays on the shelf.

EYE SEE YOU began life as DETOX, and was supposed to be a major-studio Stallone thriller, produced for Universal under the auspices of Imagine Entertainment and executive producer Ron Howard. Budgeted at nearly $60 million, with 1/3 of that going to the star, DETOX was shot in 1999, when its director, Jim Gillespie, was still enjoying a huge box office success with the 1997 smash I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER, one of the most popular entries in the post-SCREAM slasher craze. A strong cast was assembled in support of Stallone, including the likes of Tom Berenger, Charles S. Dutton, Kris Kristofferson, Courtney B. Vance, Robert Prosky, Jeffrey Wright, and Stallone's COP LAND co-star Robert Patrick, among others. DETOX was clearly a riff on the kind of dark and grim serial killer thrillers that came in the wake of David Fincher's SE7EN, and it cast Stallone as a troubled FBI agent who ends up at a secluded psychiatric facility that's dedicated to helping law enforcement PTSD cases. But once he's there, all the cops in the treatment program start getting killed off one by one and they can't call for help because communication's been knocked out thanks to a blizzard, which keeps them trapped inside. Mistrust, paranoia, and anger set in and for a bunch of cops who already don't need another push to go off the deep end, the situation soon turns into something akin to John Carpenter's THE THING if re-imagined as an Agatha Christie mystery.

Not a bad idea for a thriller, but things went horribly awry. Both Universal execs and test audiences hated Gillespie's initial cut. Reshoots were ordered and Gillespie was told to overhaul the entire thing. It's not clear how much he was involved, but Stallone said years later that Ron Howard himself supervised the post-production for a brief period of time. The ending was reshot and the title kept changing--from DETOX to D-TOX to THE OUTPOST and back and forth again as Universal tried testing the revamped version in 2001 and still got a chilly response. Now with the title settled on D-TOX, the  film was released in Europe in early 2002 with little success, while back in the States, Universal decided they'd seen enough and washed their hands of it. They sold it to the lowly DEJ Productions, who retitled it EYE SEE YOU, and released it--minus the Imagine Entertainment logo and Ron Howard's executive producer credit--on 78 screens with no publicity in September 2002 on its way to Blockbuster shelves two months later as one of the chain's "Blockbuster Exclusives." After three years, multiple reshoots, numerous test screenings, and at least $60 million spent on it, EYE SEE YOU opened in 57th place with a weekend gross of $32,000.

So is it that bad? No, it's not. Looking at it now, it's nowhere near the vicinity of being Stallone's worst movie, especially in a filmography that contains STOP! OR MY MOM WILL SHOOT, REACH ME, and ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES. It doesn't even belong in his bottom five and might not even qualify for his bottom ten unless you're looking at OVER THE TOP through rose-colored glasses. EYE SEE YOU's biggest offense is that it's kinda dumb (but not as dumb as Paulie's robot in ROCKY IV) and it's quite shameless in its SE7EN worship, starting with the same kind of shaky and jittery opening credits, which was already a little past its sell-by date in 2002 but still hasn't stopped movies from ripping off even today. Stallone is Jake Malloy, an FBI agent on the trail of a serial killer who kills cops--nine so far in the last six months--by taking their eyes out with a power drill and calling Malloy with garbled, electronically distorted phone taunts of "I see you...but you don't see me." As is wont to happen in cop thrillers of this sort, things get personal when EYE SEE YOU's "head in the box" moment comes pretty early on as Malloy's girlfriend Mary (Dina Meyer, in a test run for the SAW franchise she'd be a big part of a few years later) becomes the killer's latest victim on the night he was going to propose to her, her eyes drilled out and her corpse strung up and left hanging in the dining room. After a pursuit into an abandoned building, complete with a requisite dungeon-like room filled with just chains dangling from the ceiling, Malloy is about to confront the killer only to find that he's committed suicide and left a full confession. Case closed, but a depressed Malloy spends three months drinking himself into numbness, and after attempting suicide, his boss Hendricks (Dutton) intervenes, taking him to the remote clinic for cops, located in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming at a decommissioned former military asylum.

It's an effectively ominous setting, and it enhances the situation when other cops in the program--among them bullying hothead Noah (Patrick), emotionally shattered Conner (Sean Patrick Flanery), aging Canadian Mountie McKenzie (Prosky), drug-addled undercover narc Jaworski (Wright), and bad cop-turned-man of God Reverend Jones (Vance)--start getting offed one by one, with other targets and potential killers that include affable janitor Hank (Berenger), ex-cop and head doc Doc (Kristofferson), shrink Jenny (Polly Walker), and weirdo orderly Jack (Stephen Lang), whose obvious red herring behavior is so bizarre from the start that there's no possible way he could be the killer. Stallone turns in a strong performance, and while there are some head-scratchers throughout (why would off-duty, on-disability cops come from all over the continent and still bring their guns for Doc to keep in the safe and their shields for him keep in a file cabinet? Obviously, so Malloy can bust into the safe and give everyone their weapon once a killer is on the loose and so the killer can break into the file cabinet and collect the shields of his victims as "trophies." Duh!), it's really not any more or less idiotic than a lot of studio thrillers from that time. And after driving Malloy all the way out to the retreat, Hendricks decides to rent a cabin so he can do some ice fishing and of course, finds a dead body frozen in the ice, which turns out to be a cop who was on his way to the facility, which means someone isn't who they claim to be, as evidenced when Malloy just happens to look under the eyelids of one of the dead cops to find "I" written under one and "C.U." under the other.

Just out on Blu-ray from MVD Visual (because physical media is dead), EYE SEE YOU isn't going to be re-evaluated as anything more than a derivative but watchable time-killer aside from the novelty of being the closest Stallone's come to starring in a horror movie. But the Blu-ray does have one intriguing extra that's a point of interest for the morbidly curious or if you're the type that slows down on the interstate to rubberneck a car crash: the first official release of Gillespie's original 1999 cut, presented here as a widescreen workprint of acceptable VHS quality and under the DETOX title, with incomplete opening credits and no closing credits. There's ultimately just a one-minute difference between the two versions (EYE SEE YOU runs 96 minutes, DETOX runs 95), but the changes are apparent from the very first scene, even though there doesn't appear to be much in the way of reshot material. Most of the footage in EYE SEE YOU is right there in DETOX, but DETOX has a radically different structure that, to put it mildly, is a total clusterfuck.

Gillespie's DETOX cut utilizes a fractured timeline, but all this does is slow the film down and inadvertently compromise Stallone's performance. Arranging the film this way forces the audience to not only follow the unfolding mystery, but at the same time try to figure out what the hell happened to get Malloy there in the first place. There's absolutely no sense of pacing and no smoothness to the storytelling. It opens with a pre-credits sequence showing the murder of a cop, goes to the opening credits, and the first shot after that is Hendricks driving Malloy to the facility. Who are these guys? Why is Stallone being taken here? Why are his wrists bandaged? Less than ten minutes in, and DETOX dives right into Malloy's therapy with Doc and the other cops, while using periodic random flashbacks and cutaways to fill in the backstory--exposition that was ultimately presented in a linear and much more coherent fashion as the opening 20 or so minutes in EYE SEE YOU. In Gillespie's DETOX cut, it takes so long to dole out these important details that it's a full 45 minutes--almost half the film's running time--before we're even aware that Mary was killed and we can finally conclude why Malloy has been brought here. EYE SEE YOU fixes all of this start/stop, momentum-killing nonsense by arranging these sequences in a conventional narrative that quickly and concisely establishes who the characters are and what they have to do with the story.

Poster art for the European release
before Universal sold it to DEJ Productions.

Imagine SE7EN opening with Kevin Spacey walking into the police station and then Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman thinking back to all the murders they've been investigating as they drive out to the desert. There would be no reason for the story to unfold that way, just as there's no reason for the clunky, jumbled narrative in DETOX, other than Gillespie getting a little too big for his britches after one hit and thinking he's pulling some USUAL SUSPECTS head games. Sometimes, the basic way is the way that works. The impenetrable structure of DETOX isn't in the service of a surprise, game-changing reveal. It's Stallone vs. a serial killer. There's no need to complicate it and overthink it with laboriously-executed trickery in a hapless attempt to be clever. Sometimes--not often, but sometimes--when a director is ordered to make changes or even has the movie taken away from them, and you finally get to see the director's intended version, you realize on occasion that the studio was right. And while that final version may be a flawed compromise, the term "director's cut" doesn't automatically mean it's the better version (PAYBACK, NIGHTBREED, and THE EXORCIST III come to mind). There are a couple of other major differences between EYE SEE YOU and DETOX. In EYE SEE YOU, when Malloy finds what he thinks is the killer's body post-suicide, he drops to his knees in exhausted anguish--a natural response. In the DETOX cut, he does an enraged Rambo yell and shoots the corpse six times. Lang gets a couple of additional lines of dialogue and sinister glances that make his twitchy character more aggressively asshole-ish in EYE SEE YOU. And in EYE SEE YOU, the climactic confrontation has been significantly reworked, with some new shots that give the killer a more violent, over-the-top death. EYE SEE YOU is not going to be mistaken for a neglected classic, but it looks like top-shelf Hitchcock when viewed in conjunction with the unreleasable DETOX. It's no mystery why test audiences hated it. And if the DETOX cut is what Stallone saw before washing his hands of the project, it's no wonder he and Patrick openly dissed it on the commentary track for the 2004-issued director's cut DVD of COP LAND (as Michael Rapaport's character vomits in a trash can, Stallone quips to Patrick "He looks like he just saw DETOX"). Or why Howard took his and Imagine's names off of it before its belated release, as all involved parties distanced themselves from it like a loud fart in a crowded room.

In Theaters: RAMBO: LAST BLOOD (2019)

RAMBO: LAST BLOOD
(US/China/Sweden - 2019)

Directed by Adrian Grunberg. Written by Matt Cirulnick and Sylvester Stallone. Cast: Sylvester Stallone, Paz Vega, Oscar Jaenada, Adriana Barraza, Sergio Peris-Mencheta, Yvette Monreal, Pascasio Lopez, Marco de la O, Fenessa Pineda. (R, 89 mins)

When Sylvester Stallone resurrected his second-most iconic character after a 20-year break with 2008's RAMBO, nobody expected the ferocious and relentlessly over-the-top gorefest that he delivered. Packed with endless stabbings, slashings, eye gougings, throat rippings, decapitations, dismemberments, disembowelings, heads blown off, arrows through the skull, and virtually every other ultra-violent way to be killed, RAMBO was a kick in the balls that felt like Stallone had perhaps spent some prep time binge-watching a stack of '80s Italian splatter epics with his Eurocult superfan son and Grindhouse Releasing co-founder Sage, who would die unexpectedly in 2012. RAMBO ended with the title character returning to the family ranch in Arizona after slaughtering half of Burma in a quest to rescue some abducted American missionaries, and RAMBO: LAST BLOOD picks up a decade later, with Rambo living a quiet life raising both horses and his 17-year-old niece Gabriella (Yvette Monreal), after her mom--Rambo's sister--succumbed to cancer ten years earlier. Also living with them is beloved housekeeper Maria (BABEL Oscar-nominee Adriana Barraza), who took care of Rambo's late father and is like a grandmother to Gabriella. Everything is going well until headstrong but naive Gabriella, against Rambo's and Maria's wishes, goes to Mexico alone in search of her deadbeat father (Marco de la O), looking for answers as to why he abandoned her after her mother died.

Meeting up with Gizelle (Fenessa Pineda), a friend who now lives in the area, Gabriella knocks on her father's door and is cruelly rejected, which leads to the two girls going to a nearby club where Gabriella is roofied and taken to the stronghold of the Martinez brothers--Victor (Oscar Jaenada) and Hugo (Sergio Peris-Mencheta)--powerful crime bosses who run a lucrative sex and human trafficking ring. Rambo makes his way south of the border and is unprepared for the beatdown he gets from the Martinez brothers, with Hugo promising to make Gabriella's life a living hell and unwisely letting Rambo live so he can think about it every day. Rambo is nursed back to health by Carmen Delgado (Paz Vega), a journalist who's been tracking the Martinez brothers after they killed her sister three years earlier. Undeterred--and with a fresh "X" carved into his face by Victor--Rambo stages a daring rescue of Gabriella, who's been beaten and hooked on heroin by Martinez goons, and heads back to the Rambo homestead, where he prepares for an inevitable showdown.

Using the tried-and-true "this time it's personal" approach, the script owes more to TAKEN than to anything conceived by author David Morrell, whose 1972 novel First Blood was the basis of the 1982 film that started the franchise (and who's gone on the record as hating this new film) or by the Rambo that Stallone played back in the '80s (in its earliest stages, this fifth RAMBO was conceived with a sci-fi/horror angle, with Rambo helping track a PREDATOR-type alien creature, an idea that was wisely shitcanned). It all leads to a graphically gory tribute to HOME ALONE, as Rambo sets up a ton of Rube Goldberg-ian booby traps around the ranch and in a series of tunnels he's spent years constructing under the property as he leaves no kill method unutilized in his annihilation of the Martinez crew. It's cartoonish in the extreme, and its depiction of Mexico--portrayed here by Bulgaria--is straight out of a Donald Trump fever dream, a MAGA doomsday scenario complete with a shithole shantytown where a wholesome, virginal American girl is in immediate and constant danger and everyone who hasn't already joined a migrant caravan is a leering, lip-smacking rapist, a drug dealer, a corrupt cop, or a whore, and not even a close friend can be trusted (Gizelle sells Gabriella out to the sex traffickers, and even steals her bracelet which, of course, Rambo notices). Even in the glory days of '80s action movies, there was almost always a decidedly right-wing slant to these kinds of things, but it certainly has an added dimension in today's more aggressively partisan climate knowing that this scenario is the kind of bloodbath revenge fantasy that seems specifically designed to make Lou Dobbs come.

Nevertheless, it moves so briskly and Stallone is still so good at what he does that it's entertaining if you just accept it for the garbage exploitation movie that it is, headlined by a 73-year-old living legend methodically killing an endless parade of scuzzy shitbags in the most ridiculously blood-splattered ways imaginable, making this as close as we're likely to get to a DEATH WISH 3-level experience at a multiplex in 2019. Running just under an hour and a half and with the closing credits rolling at 79 minutes, RAMBO: LAST BLOOD does feel like it's been cut to the bone, especially with Vega's character, who just vanishes from the film after she agrees to help Rambo some more (also, marvel at how Rambo somehow manages to make it back across the border offscreen with what we must assume was no hassle even though there's a strung-out teenage girl in the passenger seat of his truck). Reports have already surfaced that the overseas version runs another 12 minutes and has an opening sequence where Rambo rescues a pair of stranded hikers caught in a storm. This prologue--likely to turn up on the eventual Blu-ray--was cut shortly before the North American release and obviously explains why Louis Mandylor is still in the credits as the sheriff but nowhere to be found in the film.

On Blu-ray/DVD: ESCAPE PLAN: THE EXTRACTORS (2019) and DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF (2019)

ESCAPE PLAN: THE EXTRACTORS
(US/China/UK - 2019)

The third entry in the ESCAPE PLAN franchise, ESCAPE PLAN: THE EXTRACTORS was already completed when ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES went straight-to-DVD exactly one year ago, and it seems to inherently realize that everyone would hate it. That includes star Sylvester Stallone, who hyped ESCAPE PLAN: THE EXTRACTORS in a recent interview by declaring ESCAPE PLAN 2 the worst movie he's ever made. An interesting approach to plugging your latest project, but at the same time, he's not wrong. More or less pretending the dreadful ESCAPE PLAN 2 never happened before anyone even had a chance to see it, THE EXTRACTORS abandons the high-tech, borderline sci-fi of the first sequel and instead expands on a storyline from the 2013 original, which only did modest business stateside but was a blockbuster hit in China, thus leading to these two cheaply-made and largely China-targeted sequels. Chinese tech giant Zhang Innovations is looking to set up shop at an abandoned factory in Mansfield, OH. But the delegation, headed by Daya Zhang (Malese Jow), is ambushed at the local airport by a heavily-armed crew of mercenaries led by Lester Clark Jr (Devon Sawa), and whisked away to Devil's Station, a black site, hellhole prison in Latvia (but played by the Ohio State Reformatory in Mansfield, as seen in THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION), with Clark demanding a ransom of $700 million and all of Zhang Innovations' secrets from its CEO, Daya's father Wu Zhang (Russell Wong). En route to Latvia, Clark also abducts Abigail Ross (Jaime King), the girlfriend of prison security expert Ray Breslin (Stallone), in a calculated effort to kill two birds with one stone: Clark Jr's missing-and-presumed dead father was once Breslin's corrupt business partner (played by Vincent D'Onofrio in the first film) and he had a side deal going with Wu Zhang that didn't end well. Obsessed with avenging his father, Clark Jr has devised a way to exact vengeance on both Wu Zhang and Breslin by kidnapping the most precious things in their lives. Of course, this means Breslin assembles his team to attempt an extraction, including Trent (Dave Bautista) and Hush (Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson), and they're joined by Daya's disgraced current bodyguard Bao (Harry Shum Jr.) and her former bodyguard and ex-lover Shen (Max Zhang, who also teamed with Bautista in this year's earlier Chinese import MASTER Z: IP MAN LEGACY)

Boasting a ludicrous 52 credited producers (shockingly, Stallone isn't one of them), ESCAPE PLAN: THE EXTRACTORS is as by-the-numbers as it gets, though at the very least, it's an improvement over the miserable ESCAPE PLAN 2. Bautista probably put in two, maybe three days work ("I'm gonna go check it out," Trent says as he splits from the rest of the group, disappearing for long stretches as Bautista likely headed to straight to the set of AVENGERS: ENDGAME), and I'd be surprised if 50 Cent was there for more than one. But Stallone gets a bit more to do here, and has a well-choreographed and quite brutal climactic throwdown with Sawa, the now-40-year-old FINAL DESTINATION star surprisingly convincing as the bad guy. Stallone can't possibly need this gig, he but seems to be somewhat more invested in the proceedings, perhaps because his buddy John Herzfeld (2 DAYS IN THE VALLEY, 15 MINUTES) is at the helm rather than ESCAPE PLAN 2's DTV/VOD hack Steven C. Miller, the helmer of many of Lionsgate's landmark "Bruce Willis Phones In His Performance From His Hotel Room" series (Stallone and Herzfeld previously collaborated on 2014's ill-advised, barely-released REACH ME, the IT'S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD of inspirational self-help dramas). The bottom line: it's utterly inessential Stallone, but it's got a couple of nicely-done fights (including one with Max Zhang and Daniel Bernhardt, as Clark Jr's chief henchman), it isn't afraid to kill off characters you least expect, and it doesn't overstay its welcome, with the super-slow closing credits rolling at the 78-minute mark, and that's counting the first two minutes of the film being nine straight production company logos. (R, 87 mins)



DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF
(Canada/US/UK - 2019)

Steven Soderbergh's 2012 action thriller HAYWIRE was supposed to make a star of former MMA fighter Gina Carano. It didn't quite pan out that way, but she's had supporting roles in FAST & FURIOUS 6 and DEADPOOL while keeping busy starring in several straight-to-VOD titles like IN THE BLOOD, EXTRACTION (one installment in  Lionsgate's landmark "Bruce Willis Phones In His Performance From His Hotel Room" series), SCORCHED EARTH, and now DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF. Carano is Clair Hamilton, a career military vet with an estranged son named Charlie (Anton Gillis-Adelman), who's been living in the Pacific Northwest with her father. But when her dad dies, and with Charlie's father out of the picture (killed in an IED blast in Afghanistan when Charlie was an infant), Clair has no choice but to be the parent and repair the fractured relationship with her son. Her plan hits a snag when Charlie is kidnapped and the ransom demand is exactly the substantial inheritance left to her by her wealthy father. She hands over the money as instructed, but two of the three kidnappers try to kill her anyway. She returns fire, killing two and seriously injuring the third, Larsen (Brendan Fehr), forcing him to take her to her son, who's being held by the plan's mastermind, "Father" (Richard Dreyfuss). Father, a grizzled mountain man unencumbered by the law, has a longstanding history of abducting boys and either taking them in as pseudo-adopted sons or selling them off to potential buyers, which is his intent for Charlie as his ultimate vengeance against Clair's dad for an unpaid loan from years earlier. Human trafficking seems like a rather extreme way to get back at a dead guy, plus Father--whose living conditions don't seem to gel with his inexplicable financial security--didn't count on Clair using all of her extensive military training and survival skills to take them on in the brutal cold of the snowy, treacherous mountain terrain.

Directed by David Hackl (SAW V, INTO THE GRIZZLY MAZE, and the John Travolta lineman dud LIFE ON THE LINE), DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF is a pretty dull and tedious affair, plodding along at a slow pace as Carano and Fehr do little but trudge through the snow on their long journey to Father's hideout. There aren't any Oscars in Carano's future, but HAYWIRE proved she's capable of headlining a well-made action vehicle, but that's not what she gets here with its predictable plot, clumsily-staged shootouts, primitive CGI splatter, and phone-app-level explosions. Speaking of Oscars, the only real point of interest here is a slumming Dreyfuss, who's become quite the hammy VOD fixture of late between this, BAYOU CAVIAR, ASHER, and the Netflix movies THE LAST LAUGH and POLAR. He's embarrassingly bad here, playing this supposed criminal mastermind as the deranged love child of Walter Brennan and Strother Martin. The character isn't threatening or scary in any way and half of his dialogue is unintelligible, but Dreyfuss at least seems to be enjoying himself, which is more than can be said for anyone watching DAUGHTER OF THE WOLF. (R, 88 mins)

In Theaters/On VOD: BACKTRACE (2018)

BACKTRACE
(US/UK - 2018)

Directed by Brian A. Miller. Written by Mike Maples. Cast: Ryan Guzman, Sylvester Stallone, Matthew Modine, Meadow Williams, Christopher McDonald, Colin Egglesfield, Lydia Hull, Tyler Jon Olson, Sergio Rizzuto, Swen Temmel, Joe Gelchion, Jenna Willis, Baylee Curran, Yan Dron, Carl Nespoli, Geoff Reeves. (R, 87 mins)

Though it's not part of Lionsgate's landmark "Bruce Willis Phones In His Performance From His Hotel Room" series, BACKTRACE certainly upholds the grand tradition: it's directed by frequent Willis VOD helmer Brian A. Miller (VICE, THE PRINCE, REPRISAL); it deals with a robbery gone south; has 50 credited producers; it's shot in Georgia, one of the big states (along with Louisiana and Ohio) known for generous film production tax breaks; and it boasts the star power of second-billed Sylvester Stallone, who hopefully wondered aloud at some point, "Who the fuck is Ryan Guzman and why is he billed over me?" Stallone is clearly pulling Willis duty here, probably working 4-5 days tops, with most of his scenes keeping him confined to his desk at a police precinct, glowering at a wall of maps and mug shots in what appears to be the only case he's been working on for seven years. It was seven years ago that Donovan MacDonald (Matthew Modine) and two accomplices made off with $20 million from a Savannah, GA bank and tried to keep more than the agreed 50% share from their silent partners, offering them a mere $5 million. A shootout ensued, killing MacDonald's two cohorts and leaving him comatose with a bullet in his head. Seven years later, he wakes up in a hospital with a debilitating case of retrograde amnesia, unable to remember anything and prone to migraines and nightmares. Robbery/homicide detective Sykes (Stallone) has been monitoring the case all this time, but is repeatedly told by MacDonald's doctor (Lydia Hull) that his mind is a blank slate and there's nothing there.

But buried somewhere in the nether regions of MacDonald's memories is the location of the stashed $15 million that he and his partners kept for themselves. Enter Lucas (Guzman, of two STEP UP sequels, HEROES REBORN, and currently on 9-1-1), who's in the psych unit for a voluntary 72-hour evaluation. He seems to know all about MacDonald, and is in cahoots with hot-tempered guard Farren (Tyler Jon Olson) and nurse Erin (Meadow Williams) to bust the amnesiac perp out and use an experimental medication on him to jog his memories and hopefully reveal the location of the money. Meanwhile, Sykes has to contend with FBI agent Franks (Christopher McDonald, cast radically against type as "Christopher McDonald") trying to take over the case (don't the Feds have jurisdiction on bank robberies anyway?), followed by the inevitable ridiculous third-act plot twist and assorted double crosses.

Would you be surprised to learn that BACKTRACE offers a climactic shootout at an abandoned factory? Or that at least one major character isn't who they claim to be? Or that at one point, a sneering Franks informs Sykes and his captain (Joe Gelchion) that "I'll expect your department's full cooperation?" The slightly sci-fi angle of the experimental serum injected into MacDonald's spine, allowing him to "see" his memories come to life, sounds like something that might exist on the bottom of Christopher Nolan's slush pile, but its almost-lofty ambitions end there. As far as Brian A. Miller movies go, this is better than expected, but that's not quite cause for celebration. The biggest surprise is that Modine is essentially the star. He has the most compelling character and the most screen time, and like a veteran pro, he invests much more effort into a forgettable VOD time-killer than was really necessary. Despite his inexplicable top billing, Guzman is strictly a supporting actor with no more to do than Williams and Olson (his image isn't even on the poster). And with CREED II still in theaters, Stallone finds himself back on the road to VOD/DTV oblivion a few months after headlining the execrable ESCAPE PLAN 2, with the simultaneously shot ESCAPE PLAN 3 due out next year. Sly at least handles his extended cameo with a reasonable degree of professionalism by actually showing up and sticking around for his scenes. That's more than Miller would've gotten from another cynical walk-through from Willis, who would've done his close-ups in a day and let an unconvincing double fill in the blanks. BACKTRACE has a slightly more ambitious approach to its formulaic, generic heist-gone-awry scenario, and its big-name action star is actually awake, but it's MVP Modine busting his ass and going above and beyond that almost single-handedly makes it maybe worth a look on a slow night.

In Theaters: CREED II (2018)

CREED II
(US - 2018)

Directed by Steven Caple Jr. Written by Juel Taylor and Sylvester Stallone. Cast: Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Dolph Lundgren, Phylicia Rashad, Wood Harris, Russell Hornsby, Florian "Big Nasty" Munteanu, Andre Ward, Brigitte Nielsen, Milo Ventimiglia, Ivo Nandi, Jacob "Stitch" Duran. (PG-13, 130 mins)

2015's CREED surprised everyone. The idea of a ROCKY spinoff featuring Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan), the illegitimate son of Apollo Creed, being trained by his father's rival-turned-best friend Rocky Balboa seemed like a desperate attempt by Sylvester Stallone to keep the ROCKY saga going. But it was a project conceived by others, most notably director/co-writer Ryan Coogler, who brought an electrifying energy to the story and a deep-rooted empathy and understanding of its characters, particularly Rocky, portrayed in a gut-wrenching performance by Stallone that earned him a well-deserved Oscar nomination (he lost to Mark Rylance in BRIDGE OF SPIES). It also put FRUITVALE STATION director Coogler and its star Jordan on the map, leading to their reteaming for 2018's phenomenally successful BLACK PANTHER, where Jordan played the villainous N'Jadaka/Erik Killmonger. Coogler remains onboard as a producer on CREED II, but directing duties have been handed off to Steven Caple Jr., who helmed the acclaimed 2016 indie THE LAND. More importantly, the script is co-written by Stallone, given a more active behind-the-scenes role this time out. That proves to be both a blessing and a curse: yes, he's lived and breathed Rocky Balboa for over 40 years, but as evidenced by the increased absurdity of every franchise in which Stallone has been involved in a creative capacity, he doesn't know when enough is enough (the long-in-development fifth RAMBO film was rumored to have him battling a PREDATOR-type alien creature until cooler heads prevailed). There seems to be little need for a CREED II, which serves as not just a sequel to CREED but also 1985's ROCKY IV.

Depending on your tolerance for the jingoistic, flag-waving Cold War histrionics of the Reagan era, continuing the storyline of ROCKY IV may or may not seem like the right direction for CREED II to go. As the film opens, Adonis has just won the heavyweight title from aging Danny "Stuntman" Wheeler (Andre Ward). He's proposed to hearing-impaired musician girlfriend Bianca (Tessa Thompson), and he's on top of the world. That all comes crashing down with the reappearance of Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), the man who killed Apollo Creed in the ring in ROCKY IV and was defeated by Rocky in a revenge match in the Soviet Union, where even the most hardline communists--including a Mikhail Gorbachev lookalike president--stood up and cheered for Rocky as he was draped in the American flag. Drago's life in the ensuing 30 years has found him alienated and shamed in his homeland. He now lives in a gloomy Kiev, Ukraine apartment block with his hulking son Viktor (Florian "Big Nasty" Munteanu), both of them abandoned by Drago's wife Ludmilla (Stallone's ex-wife Brigitte Nielsen also returns). An embittered, seething Drago wants vengeance--on Rocky, on Russia, on his ex-wife, on the Creed legacy, and on everyone--and he's spent Viktor's entire life training him to reclaim the glory of the Drago name, an opportunity that arises when unscrupulous fight promoter Buddy Marcelle (Russell Hornsby) teams up with them to issue a challenge to the new world champ Adonis. Rocky wants nothing to do with it, leading to a falling out that results in Adonis recruiting Little Duke (Wood Harris), the son of his father's trainer. Bianca also has her reservations, considering she just found out she's expecting and fears that history will repeat itself and Adonis won't be around for her and the baby.

The fight is a disaster: Viktor beats the shit out of Adonis, the fight virtually over in the second round but resulting in a disqualification for an out-of-control Viktor when he lands a huge blow to Adonis' head while he was already down. You know what comes next: Adonis on a long road to recovery, doubting his ability, turning his back on Rocky, feeling sorry for himself, patching things up with Rocky, and answering the challenge for rematch in--where else?--Moscow, this time with Rocky in his corner. CREED II gets by almost entirely on emotional manipulation and audience familiarity with Rocky. There's some deep and thoughtful themes running through this film, with parallels to both other characters and previous ROCKY films. And time and again, whenever it seems poised to go further down that road, it hesitates and reverts to the familiar. Stallone is again great as an aged and weary but always positive Rocky, and he makes magic with little moments and asides, like the way he visits Adrian's grave and talks about how cold it is and after a pause, mumbles a barely audible "Miss you." It's a real and heartfelt moment, as is Adonis, hurt and furious over being told he's battling Viktor on his own, lashing out at Rocky about his estranged relationship with his own son (Rocky's feeling of not belonging is constantly conveyed in shots that show him standing alone outside a perimeter like John Wayne at the end of THE SEARCHERS, away from a group of people, whether it's the ring, the delivery room, or his son's house). Those words sting only because of the degree to which these two characters have come to love one another, and it's in those moments that CREED II manages to achieve the honesty and gut-punch emotion of its predecessor.

But as the film goes on, Stallone's influence becomes the driving force, and right around the time they're going back to Moscow, it essentially switches to autopilot, becoming pretty much a remake of ROCKY IV, minus the patriot porn and Paulie's robot, but with the addition of a singing and dancing Bianca as his hype man. The biggest missed opportunity of CREED II is the way it only scratches the surface of the Ivan Drago story. He's granted moments of genuine drama that almost generate sympathy for him and his son, but it takes the easy way out and turns them into stock Russian bad guys by the final act (perhaps Coogler would've explored the psychological complexity of Drago by having him show some remorse for killing Apollo, but Stallone definitely does not). There's a story to be told about Drago's humiliating downfall and the way he's obsessively molded his son into a single-minded vessel for revenge to restore honor to the family name. There's even some signs in his mannerisms--perhaps brought to the table by Lundgren, whose aged, craggy face speaks volumes that his minimal amount of dialogue cannot--that Drago regrets not letting his son be his own man. And there's some hints in Munteanu's performance that boxing isn't even what Viktor wants, but it's all he's been taught to do. It's always nice seeing Rocky back onscreen, and Stallone, Jordan, and all the returning CREED cast members (there's also Phylicia Rashad as Apollo's widow) are excellent across the board, but CREED II never gets by the fact that the Adonis Creed story didn't need to be continued, and what we've got is really just another generic ROCKY sequel that Coogler's CREED managed to successfully transcend. It's a testament to CREED II's adherence to a tried-and-true formula and cookie-cutter storytelling that the most interesting character arc belongs to Ivan Drago, and that Dolph Lundgren's performance had me wishing they'd made a hypothetical DRAGO spinoff instead.

On Blu-ray/DVD: ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES (2018); CHINA SALESMAN (2018); and THE ESCAPE OF PRISONER 614 (2018)

ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES
(US/China/UK - 2018)

2013's ESCAPE PLAN was an enjoyable prison-break pairing of aging '80s action icons Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger that failed to generate much interest and flopped at the box office. Like some other underperformers, it proved to be a huge hit in China, which explains the existence of the needlessly convoluted, partially Chinese-financed ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES, the first of two sequels shot back-to-back for DTV release in the States and a theatrical rollout in Asia. Schwarzenegger is out and top-billed Stallone is back, albeit in largely a supporting role, but the nominal lead is popular Chinese actor and singer Huang Xiaoming as Shu, the newest member of security expert Ray Breslin's (Stallone) Atlanta-based team. After a botched extraction from a Chechen prison results in the death of a hostage, Breslin fires one of his men, Kimbral (Wes Chatham), for deviating from their set routine. A year later, Shu is in Thailand visiting his tech mogul cousin Yusheng Ma (Chen Tang) when both are abducted and thrown into Hades, a super high-tech prison nine stories underground that holds regular fighting showdowns (that's original) in "The Zoo," where the victor earns time in "The Sanctuary," a room with virtual reality imagery that provides a brief respite for the prisoners. Jake (Jesse Metcalfe), another Breslin staffer, goes rogue and tries to investigate Shu's disappearance on his own only to end up in Hades himself, where he and Shu encounter an incarcerated Kimbral. It then becomes clear--to them but perhaps not to the viewer--that it's all a set-up against Breslin as revenge for him escaping from "The Tomb" in the previous film, which means one thing: Breslin must do what he does best and get himself thrown into Hades, essentially breaking in to find a way to get his guys out.

Though Stallone is playing the same character, Curtis "50 Cent" Jackson is back as his right-hand man Hush, and co-writer Miles Chapman also returns, ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES seems like it takes place in a different world than its predecessor. It's got such heavy futuristic sci-fi leanings that it could almost pass as a FORTRESS or CUBE reboot, and at the rate this franchise is going, ESCAPE PLAN 3 could very well be set in space. Director Steven C. Miller, who's helmed several chapters of Lionsgate's landmark "Bruce Willis Phones In His Performance From His Hotel Room" series, churned this out in an undistinguished fashion, with constantly jittery cinematography and motion-sickness inducing shaky-cam in the action scenes, and some of the most unacceptably shoddy CGI in recent memory (a couple of iPhone-app-level explosions and Stallone administering a CGI neckbreak that's just atrocious). Huang is a dull hero, though to his credit, he's not acting in his first language. Half-asleep and sporting a terrible rug, Stallone is largely relegated to the sideline, almost-but-not-quite-Willis-style (Breslin actually leaves his office), until he ends up in Hades about an hour in and more or less becomes the focus. Dave Bautista has little to do but manages a couple of laughs as a fixer colleague of Breslin's who gathers intel for their search for Shu, strong-arming assistance from a hacker played by Fall Out Boy bassist Pete Wentz (and speaking of pointless cameos, Atlanta Falcons RB Devonta Freeman can briefly be glimpsed as a Hades inmate). ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES is lazy, cheap-looking, and laughably cliched, right down to its (ostensibly) chief villain, evil warden "The Zookeeper," played by Titus Welliver. A reliable ringer when it comes to character roles, a glowering Welliver looks like he's in physical pain being forced to gravely intone lines like "I know everything about my animals...I'm the Zookeeper," while one inmate helpfully waxes poetic with "That's why they call it The Zoo...we're all animals here...survival of the fittest." Between these hastily-shot sequels that were only made to satisfy the demand of the Asian market and the apparently ill-advised direction CREED 2 seems to be headed from the sound of things (why is Ivan Drago back?), it looks like Stallone is completely squandering the serious cred he got from that CREED Oscar nomination. Had he won it like he should have, we might've been spared ESCAPE PLAN 2: HADES. Or at least Miller could've rewritten the script to keep Breslin completely confined to his office so Bruce Willis could've stepped in and taken over the role. (R, 93 mins)


CHINA SALESMAN
(China - 2017; US release 2018)

It's pretty clear from the moment CHINA SALESMAN begins that it's gonna be something special. There's an opening certification stating that it's commissioned by the Chinese government, one of the 16 (!) production companies is represented by a typo ("Gloden" God Video & Culture), there's 72 (!!) credited producers, and former action star and current sleeper agent Steven Seagal is listed as "Steve Segal" in the opening credits. A $20 million epic that tanked in China a year ago, CHINA SALESMAN was picked up for the US by Cleopatra Entertainment, the company that gave us the Kazakh shitshow DIAMOND CARTEL, and prominently features Seagal and Mike Tyson in its advertising, making it a veritable Who's Who of #MeToo. But, like ESCAPE PLAN 2, the Hollywood guest stars have relatively minor roles, with the focus on Li Dongxue as Yan Jian, an ambitious representative from Chinese tech company DH Telecom, who's in Uganda trying to negotiate a lucrative contract to establish 3G wireless communication at newly-constructed cell phone towers in the civil war-torn country. Pretty scintillating stuff, with a lot of screen time devoted to captivating meetings and boardroom backstabbing as Yan Jian and his associate Ruan Ling (Li Ai) are in constant danger of being railroaded by duplicitous Eurotrash shitbag Michael Duchamp (Clovis Fouin), who's also trying to close the deal for his company and seems to be on the good side of Susanna (Janicke Askevold), the head of the independent committee charged with deciding the victor in the 3G bidding war. But Susanna eventually sides with Yan Jian, who's heroically depicted as the only person who can save Uganda, right down to a patently ridiculous scene where he risks life and limb to plant a Chinese flag, which he and Susanna then passionately wave as they drive past cheering Ugandan soldiers.

Tyson, who relooped his dialogue but still can't match his own lip movements, plays Kabbah, a religious mercenary from an unnamed African country who ends up as a flunky for Duchamp. Seagal has little more than a cameo as Lauder, an expat bar owner ("Of all the gin joints in the world...") and arms dealer on the side who, for some reason, has a framed action still of Steven Seagal on his desk. CHINA SALESMAN shows its only signs of life in the first ten minutes during an out-of-nowhere bar brawl between Tyson and Seagal's double, which starts when Kabbah refuses a drink for religious reasons, prompting Lauder to have one of his goons piss in a mug and try to force him to drink it. There's an admittedly amusing moment when Seagal('s double) flicks Tyson's ear in a way that has to be an Evander Holyfield dig, but what perfectly caps the scene is an enraged Kabbah shouting "You serve me pee...YOU DIE!" Beyond that, CHINA SALESMAN is an oppressively overlong bore, filled with the kind of crummy greenscreen and CGI that only Chinese visual effects teams can pull off, and populated by actors so stiff and uncomfortable with English (even Tyson) that Seagal ends up looking like a world-class orator by default. (Unrated, 111 mins)

THE ESCAPE OF PRISONER 614
(US - 2018)

It's rare that you encounter a movie that has no reason to exist. One of the most self-defeating films of 2018, THE ESCAPE OF PRISONER 614 initially appears to be a B-grade, Redbox-ready take on HELL OR HIGH WATER by way of the Coen Bros., with nitwit sheriff's deputies Jim Doyle (FREAKS AND GEEKS' Martin Starr) and Thurman Hayford (Jake McDorman of CBS' LIMITLESS spinoff) idling their days away in the sleepy and sparsely-populated rural town of Shandaken in upstate New York in the late 1960s. They have little to do but play cops & robbers in the woods and get on-the-house pie at the local diner, and without a single arrest in the last year, the stern, no-nonsense sheriff (Ron Perlman) comes down from Albany to fire them. But they find a way to regain their jobs when they get word of an escaped convict known only as Prisoner 614 (George Sample III) on foot and headed their way. They hike deep into the woods--idiotically wasting all their bullets in a pissing contest where neither of them can shoot a beer can at ten paces--finding 614 and taking him into custody. 614 is wanted for killing a deputy from a neighboring county, but insists he's innocent and that the deputy died of a heart attack, and as time goes on, Jim and Thurman believe him. Once they get back to Shandaken, they can't convince the sheriff, even with a sworn statement from a witness that the obese deputy had a heart attack while 614 was simply standing near him. Their actions get Jim and Thurman rehired, but then they risk it all by going against the sheriff and aiding and abetting a fugitive to get 614 to freedom in Canada.

It's hard telling who this movie is even for. Nothing sums up its utter futility like having a character unknowingly guzzle Ipecac in a set-up for what must be a showstopping comedic projectile vomiting set piece, but then it has that very character drop dead of a heart attack before the Ipecac kicks in. Is that like making a porno where two people are about to fuck and then just watch TV? THE ESCAPE OF PRISONER 614 subverts your expectations to the point where the entire movie just feels like one long dick move. Is it a comedy without laughs or a thriller without suspense? And is it that way by design? Starr and McDornan seem like they'll be playing affable goofballs but then just seem to wander aimlessly through the movie with no real character arcs or progression, while Sample has even less to do, even when writer/director Zach Golden throws in a cursory mention of the charges against him being racially-motivated. Perlman pops up here and there to slow burn at the deputies and basically be "Ron Perlman," but Golden doesn't seem to know what kind of movie he was trying to make, so he plays it too safe and makes what amounts to a movie about nothing that goes nowhere. The period detail is atrocious, and you can only gauge that it's 1967 or thereabouts from Jim mentioning that he recently saw COOL HAND LUKE (you should probably do the same). There's a few old cars and people chain-smoking indoors, but no one looks or sounds like they're in the late '60s. Speaking of sounds, if this is upstate New York in the Catskills, why is everyone breaking out overbaked Southern drawls like they're auditioning for a community theater version of IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT? (PG-13, 97 mins)

In Theaters: CREED (2015)

CREED
(US - 2015)

Directed by Ryan Coogler. Written by Ryan Coogler and Aaron Covington. Cast: Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Phylicia Rashad, Andre Ward, Anthony Bellew, Graham McTavish, Ritchie Coster, Wood Harris, Jacob "Stitch" Duran, Ricardo McGill, Malik Bazille, Gabriel Rosado, Frank Pesce. (PG-13, 133 mins)

"Time takes everybody out. It's undefeated."

When CREED was first announced a couple of years ago, with a plot focusing on the son of Apollo Creed being trained by Rocky Balboa, the immediate reaction of most was eye-rolling dismissal. It sounded like a desperate ploy by Sylvester Stallone to keep the ROCKY franchise going by remaking it with himself in Burgess Meredith's Mickey role. It sounded like the kind of cheap, cynical DTV spinoff along the lines of a CARLITO'S WAY: RISE TO POWER, an EASY RIDER: THE RIDE BACK, and the still-unreleased THE BRONX BULL, which was shot as RAGING BULL II prior to succumbing to various legal issues that have kept it on the self since 2012. Even if it's approached with lowered expectations, CREED is one of the biggest surprises of the year. In the hands of director/co-writer Ryan Coogler (2013's acclaimed FRUITVALE STATION), CREED is so much more than a Stallone nostalgia trip. It's a thoughtful and perceptive film about families, legacies, loss, and new beginnings. Ghosts of the past haunt nearly every scene. The legacy of the late Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers), killed in the ring in ROCKY IV (1985), unites two men: his best friend and former foe Rocky (Stallone) and Adonis (Michael B. Jordan), the son whose birth Apollo didn't live to see.

The result of an extramarital affair between his mother and Apollo Creed, Adonis Johnson was orphaned at a young age, had severe anger management issues, and seemed doomed to a life in juvenile detention when he wasn't bouncing around foster care and group homes until he was 13, when Apollo's widow Mary Anne (Phylicia Rashad) found him, took him in, and adopted him. Keeping his mother's last name to both honor her and avoid getting a free ride on his father's legend, Adonis establishes himself as a capable fighter in illegal Tijuana boxing matches while maintaining a day job at a prestigious investment firm in Los Angeles, where he's just gotten a promotion before promptly quitting to pursue boxing full-time. This angers Mary Anne, who remembers what it was like taking care of Apollo after his fights ("Do you know how many times I had to help the Heavyweight Champion of the World up these stairs because he couldn't walk?  Do you know how many times I had to wipe his ass because he couldn't use his hands?"), but she's powerless to stop him. Adonis heads to Philadelphia to track down Rocky. He finds him, still running Adrian's, the small neighborhood Italian restaurant named in honor of his late wife, who died prior to the events of 2006's ROCKY BALBOA. Rocky is happy to tell Adonis stories about his dad but firmly states he has no interest in becoming his trainer, instead sending him to Mighty Mick's Gym, now being run by Pete Sporino (Ritchie Coster), who keeps trying to get Rocky's celebrity name attached to his own son Leo "The Lion" Sporino (Gabriel Rosado). Of course, it doesn't take long for lonely Rocky, who's once again estranged from Rocky, Jr and who also lost his brother-in-law Paulie (Burt Young) and Apollo's trainer Duke (Tony Burton) in the years since ROCKY BALBOA, to see Apollo's spirit in Adonis and take him up on the training offer, not having much in the way of book smarts to give the educated Adonis but dispensing the sage advice he's learned from experience over his lifetime ("See that guy in the mirror?  That's your biggest opponent. I believe that in the ring and I believe that in life"). Adonis, meanwhile, falls for his neighbor Bianca (Tessa Thompson), an aspiring singer who's suffering from progressive hearing loss.

The story structure of CREED--the first ROCKY film not written by Stallone--is largely formulaic in its point A-to-point B plot mechanics: Adonis establishes a name for himself, eventually accepting his lineage and going by Adonis Creed when Pete leaks his true identity to the media, and becomes a recognized fighter over the course of the film, eventually taking on the champion "Pretty Ricky" Conlan (Anthony Bellew) in a Liverpool bout hastily arranged by Conlan's manager (Graham McTavish) to pay the bills while Conlan serves a seven-year prison sentence on gun charges. Stallone directed four of the six previous ROCKY movies, with John G. Avildsen helming 1976's ROCKY and 1990's ROCKY V, and both men are the sort-of capable journeyman types whose skills can best be described as "workmanlike." Coogler, on the other hand, displays more confidence and skill at just 29 than Stallone and Avildsen could've brought to the table, the innovative Steadicam contributions of Garrett Brown in the 1976 film notwithstanding. Coogler and veteran cinematographer Maryse Alberti (WHEN WE WERE KINGS) have fashioned some of the best fight sequences you'll see in the boxing genre, especially in Adonis' bout with The Lion, where the entire first round is shot in real time without a cut, the camera snaking around the ring, between and above the fighters, with a dizzying array of sounds from each of their corners drifiting in and out as they move around the ring. It's a stunning sequence, and along with the film's many long, uninterrupted tracking shots that follow Adonis or Rocky, indicative of a gifted director at work. Stallone must have had absolute faith in Coogler's vision to allow his most personal, iconic character to be placed entirely in someone else's hands. Coogler responds by making Rocky even more multi-layered and complex than ever, a man who knows he's a legend but remains humble, preferring his quiet, low-profile life and lamenting that all of his loved ones are gone and he's alone. Even in the midst of the formula elements (why does every aspiring boxer live in a shithole apartment?), CREED remains unpredictable: we expect Rocky Jr, now living in Vancouver and calling himself "Robert Balboa," to show up at a certain point in the film when Rocky needs him most. He doesn't. He's referenced once and never mentioned again. In some films, this could be an oversight, but here it's by design. Adonis is the son Rocky's lost through estrangement, and Rocky is the father Adonis never had (Adonis immediately endears himself to Rocky by repeatedly referring to him as "Unc"). We also expect Bianca's hearing loss to factor in, but it's introduced and matter-of-factly accepted. She puts her hearing aids in like someone putting on their reading glasses. There's nothing Adonis can do in the ring to restore her fading hearing, so like every other setback these characters face--and a big obstacle surfaces in the second half--they adjust to it and keep on fighting.

It would've been easy to cave to hokey sentimentality and maudlin manipulation, but when the waterworks start (this immediately joins the pantheon of Hall of Fame man-weepies--you can actually feel a wave of emotion in the audience late in the film when Bill Conti's "Rocky Theme" fires up), it's earned. Jordan is absolutely magnetic as Adonis, who's simultaneously running away from and directly toward the long shadow cast by his father ("I just want to know I'm not a mistake!" he yells when Rocky asks what he's trying to prove), but it's Stallone's Rocky who's the emotional core of CREED. This is a beloved character we've known for nearly 40 years, so much so that it practically transcends an actor playing a role. Stallone's had so many ups and downs throughout his career that he perfectly embodies that underdog spirit. It's enough to make you forget the cartoonish depths of the Reagan-era flag-waving of ROCKY IV (nobody likes the much-maligned ROCKY V, but at least it's better than ROCKY IV), even though CREED's springboard is Apollo's death at the hands of Soviet superfighter killing machine Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), a tragedy for which Rocky still feels tremendous guilt over not throwing in the towel to stop. Now that he knows Adonis, Rocky feels a responsibility for him. Stallone, who at 69 is the same age Burgess Meredith was in ROCKY, is so lived-in and naturally comfortable as Rocky that you almost forget he's acting. He's presented with a challenge by Coogler and co-writer Aaron Covington's script and he rises to the occasion by delivering his most accomplished and invested performance in many years, probably going back to 1997's COP LAND. He's great in his big moments, but brilliant even in little ones, whether he's looking on with pride at Adonis or visiting the cemetery and talking to Adrian and Paulie ("It's gettin' harder to walk up that hill!" the arthritic Rocky says, catching his breath and pulling up a chair at Adrian's grave to tell her about his day). Filled with exhilarating boxing sequences, dazzling filmmaking (watch the way Coogler darkens the arena midway through the final fight as a way of illustrating the fighters' singular focus), gut-wrenching emotion, and honest, heartfelt performances, CREED is like nothing you'd expect a seventh film in the ROCKY series to be. More than a generic sequel-turned-reboot, CREED very much stands on it own as a terrific film and one of 2015's very best.