Death Connection

This flick was interesting to me as I'm studying Polish, and it's rather humorous to watch a generic straight-to-vid actioner unspool in Warsaw, although it's never convincing when hundreds of Poles take it upon themselves to spray machine gun fire at Griffith, or when a whole meat -packing plant decides to show their karate moves, Polish style. Hauer is good as always, and the unique scenario makes it relatively watchable, but there's nothing plotwise you haven't seen a thousand times before.

This movie is known under titles "Aniol smierci" ("Angel of death") , "Beyond forgivness" and "Blood of innocence". The main star here is Thomas Ian Griffith (brother of actress Melanie Griffith) who never made a success and forever will be associated with third rate action cinema. The cast also includes the cult actor Rutger Hauer ("Blade runner") and John Rhys Davies ("LOTR" trilogy). Polish movie fans will also recognize some familiar faces like the very attractive Joanna Trzepiecinska (the love interest) , Artur Zmijewski (the brother of main hero) and Leon Niemczyk (the priest).

This movie is a combined American-Polish effort. The main hero is American with Polish roots and the action of the almost entire movie takes place in Poland. It felt very refreshing , since action movies usually take place either in USA or more exotic/popular countries.

I'm from Poland , so I had great fun watching familiar places and faces appear on the screen. However outside of that there isn't really that much to say about this movie. The acting is very OK (especially Davies is truly charming) , the plot makes sense and the dialogues aren't bad. The problem is this is genuinely forgettable movie. The plot isn't anything different you haven't seen before in thousands of "cop on revenge" movies , the characters are one dimensional , the budget is obviously low and the action is very anemic. It's your typical undemanding straight to VHS (straight to DVD nowadays) 90's action flick. Maybe I'm too harsh for it , because I have seen MUCH worse movies and if you want some undemanding movie to kill some time it's not a bad choice.

Action junkies should be satisfied. People with higher standards should look for something else. I give it 2/10.