Ten Dead Men

This film is so utterly dreadful that I couldn't finish it. It's obvious that the "actors" were just martial artists plucked from a gym and had no acting ability whatsoever. There's been no story development past whatever gangster films the writer/director and producer decided to use elements of and lastly there's a voice-over ... which made me cringe every time I heard it, and insisted on telegraphing the story.

The story is not so much conveyed to us, but dictated to us which is just sloppy. Didactic films are not the way to go here.

It's at that point I stopped the DVD and checked out the IMDb. Guys, you proudly proclaim that this is your 40th film together. Did you actually bother learning anything from the previous 39? Things that are essential in film-making such as story, character, frame composition, lighting, sound design, music and directing? It's obvious that while you have the talent (or luck) to get projects off the ground, you've no idea about how to execute a film.

In summation, either watch a bunch of really good films and learn to see how they work ... or just stop now and let other people have a go. I really hope this isn't representative of your body of work but i've an odd feeling it is.

I never give up on a film, but I jacked this one in after only 20 Min's just now. Bad camera shots, equally bad editing and sound post production. The score is one of the worst I've ever heard. I really could knock up up better one right now (even the instruments/sounds used are cheap ass midi tacky rubbish).

And to cap it all, (bearing in mind this is meant to be a hard bloke sorta film), it's only got Lee Latchford-Evans from a crappy British Village People-esquire pop band called 'Steps' that destroyed the airwaves for a good ten years or so.. trying to act hard/gangster. Even if your not British and don't know who he is, it's still not gonna sit right.

I get the feeling the whole thing is devised and made by inexperienced, retired cage fighters still high on after show testosterone fuelled steroid binges.

This is absolute tripe!! Terrible acting by most, if not all of the cast. I watched this for about half an hour thinking it couldn't get any worse....but it did. I only watched it because Terry Stone is in it and I thought Rise of the Footsoldier was excellent. Avoid this film....it is 90 minutes of your life you won't be able to get back. BAD BAD BAD BAD. I do wonder what people think of when they are making garbage like this? Do they honestly think this is a good piece of film making? I would love to hear what the director/producer have to say about it. It makes it into my all time worst 5 films. It is years since I saw something as bad as this. I love this type of film but this one falls way short on so many levels. The acting is rubbish, the sound is rubbish, the directing is rubbish.....and did I mention the acting???

This flick was sold at a horror convention due the name Doug Bradley. Horror geeks do know who he is, pinhead from Hellraiser. Naturally, by using his name the producers thought it would sell well. Doug isn't in the flick at all, he's just the narrator.

It even got nothing to do with horror, it is more a mafia flick were one is taking his revenge for killing his girlfriend. 1O people were there so ten men had to die. This is a British production and by doing so you have to dig the accents used. But it's all understandable. The last year I have seen a few revenge flicks coming out of the UK but this one here isn't that brutal. It's rough and merciless but I have seen rougher flicks like for example A Day Of Violence. Still, due the merciless fight scene's it isn't for the easily offended. The red stuff do flows but the torture is done off screen. So it's easy to see that it was a low budget. Personally I expected a little more from it but it fits in the line of British mobster revenge flicks. And there's a bit of relieve of fight scene's due the goofy couple Parker and Garrett.

Gore 1/5 Nudity 0,5/5 Effects 2/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 1/5

Ross Boyask & Phil Hobden have created, in this movie, a work so awful that it is utterly compelling.

If you remember the dreadful photo stories from the girly teen comics of the 80's, (so brilliantly parodied in UK adult comic Viz) then imagine a moving picture version with violence, and you will be most of the way toward understanding the feel and presentation of this film.

The storyline itself, is a poor version of The Crow, without all the coolness of course, and without the exceptional feeling of empathy for the main character. Where The Crow had dark, brooding, Gothic brilliance, with a classic and memorable score, this movie failed at everything... except at being bad, that is. If revenge story lines were drinks, The Crow would be a fine vintage Champagne, whereas 10 Dead Men would be p*ss flavoured water.

Where it fails in the storyline department, it fails equally as spectacularly in the action genre department. The fight scenes are patently contrived and badly executed, and the gore effects brilliantly poor.

The acting itself is so appallingly bad, that the viewer is forced to consider the possibility that Boyask abandoned the traditional auditioning route, and instead opted for the less orthodox method of approaching likely looking characters in bars, and asking them if they wanted to be in his movie. Seriously, the acting is so bad, that at times even the walking looks strained and put-on.

Doug Bradley's narration seals the deal. It comes across as a badly written afterthought; an addition to the moving picture storyboard. It's almost as if the director realised that the acting talent within the cast pool was utterly incapable of putting the rather tired storyline across, and threw it in as a necessary evil. The movie is however, all the better for it.

And therein lies the brilliance in this movie. It is so unintentionally bad, that it compels you to keep watching, right up to the rather predictable and clichéd ending. One needs to look to the deliberately awful genius of Peter Jackson's 1987 movie "Bad Taste" to see this sort of dreadful. Where movies deliberately made this bad miss the mark of awful by the very act of trying to be such, this movie succeeds in spades entirely by accident... It is that which makes this movie worth watching.

I would have loved to have given this movie a 10 vote, if for no other reason than the maker's sheer lack of shame for releasing it. In the end, I gave it one star, because awful REALLY IS the best description for it... and that's why you should watch it.