Renegados

Its clear this isn't your AAA big money Tom Cruise Action movie but that hardly detracts from the overall enjoyment from the movie in fact the day of the Hollywood A Lister headlining movies seems to be coming to an end.

The movie itself is well directed and the cast are all good with a couple of stand out performances from screen veterans.

Watching the film I was reminded very much of the action adventure novels I used to read as a kid and into my late teens. It had that vibe all throughout the film and it was just an enjoyable movie to watch from start to finish. There was some funny moments in it and there was some romance and sprinkled throughout was action,danger and bravado.

If you are expecting an out and out action movie then you may well be dissapointed as while there is action, explosions and fighting in the movie they certainly do not dominate it.

I think the pacing may be little off in parts and a tighter budget restricts the amount of 'danger' they can add to the scenes but all in all its a very enjoyable movie with a feel good factor throughout.

A team of Navy SEALs discover an underwater treasure in a Bosnian lake. And then they will go for it. The actors are all unknown, except J.K. Simmons as their boss and Ewen Bremner, atypically not really there to provide the comic relief. The latter is the responsibility of Simmons, and as in every role, ever, he's great at it, with his sarcasm and dry wits and all. Amazingly, at the moment of writing this in the early morning of September the 6th, there is no single critic review of „Renegades" on Rotten Tomatoes or Metacritic, and the IMDb user score 5.6 out of 10 doesn't seem to promising either. Even the image selection published thus far is shitty. Let me be the bearer of good news, then: „Renegades" is not some bullcrap deserving to be forgotten right after premiere. It is a very OK action adventure which I happened to enjoy from the beginning to the end. The action is fine, the story is fine and the cast of nobodies is cool also. Simmons, of course, steals the show but it would be difficult for anybody to wrestle with this cinematic magnetic force of a bald old man. "Renegades" is smart enough to not take itself too seriously so the story and the characters won't get boring. But it takes seriously the punching and shooting part, evoking the nostalgic atmosphere of old war (or maybe 1980's action) movies where the good guys always hit the mark and look good doing so. Luc Besson, one of the writers and producers, has been known for his „eurotrash" approach to action movies where the realism is out of the window and dirty fun factor is up to eleven. Well, surprisingly, this one's not trashy but rather a solid little actioneer that you could bring home to show to your parents, or something. The characters and their relationships are surprisingly subtle too, not a single sex bomb Eastern European chick on sight! The men are not complicated, mostly used as a means to move the story along, but they feel real enough to root for them. Oh, and the settings look beautifully pictoresque, especially the lake hiding the treasure. And it should, considering that it was shot in Croatia and Malta, among others. If one is to try to find the faults with the movie, the underwater part could have been shorter, maybe. It's not the most gripping section because of the impaired visibility and freedom of movement (due to it being underwater) which slows the usual high-octane action down. Interestingly, Steven Quale has co-directed the underwater documentary „Aliens of the Deep" (2005) alongside the great James Cameron. His other works are more mundane, including 2014's „Into the Storm" and, er, „Final Destination 5". „Renegades" is well done in every major aspect, a polished and solid action movie totally worthy of your time. Well, my time at least. A hefty slice of competence porn of manly men doing the hard work no on else can and not counting bullets doing so cuz doing the right thing justifies the means!

Completely predictable, Navy seal team are the strongest, no one can stop them. They avoided every bullet, which is impossible in reality but only possible in American cinematography ;)

The premise started off mediocre, somehow reminding you of The Expendables series. The audience would probably think of it as a rip-off to the movie as it has that similar environment with its freakin' huge tank smashing through walls and smearing dirt over the roads while the S.A.S (Rival) trying to put a stop to it and arrest them for their own sake. The scene here did not fortify anything for the sake of the plot except on showing the team they were reckless enough on a very confidential mission.

As part of that, most of the actions scenes, well probably all of them that were shown in the official trailer were seen only in that first 20 minutes of the film. The second and third act did not maintain its action-heroic sequences that we thought it's going to take place on that before the screening started.

The dialogues were kind cheesy, saying words and the quite bland witty one-liners that merely gave us a smile or a sudden chuckle.

The cinematography was corny. For one, the color effect did not live up to its standard expectation as for us who are living in a world surrounding with techs. The coloring style was dull that added the clichéd-ness of the entire film.

Sullivan Stapleton did a good job with his acting but not as great as he was previously in the five seasons of Strike Back. J.K. Simmons also put some hope for the film to lighten its mood but the rest of the casts seem to be against the notion.

As the film went on until the final climax scene, we were expecting probably an action scene to wrap the movie nicely but surprisingly, none of the mentioned scene was provided unless if you call a dozen of grenades being anchored into the deep water and a 20-second featuring soldiers firing guns an action scene then.. hell yeah.

Not a great movie to be made in 2017. It should have been done 10 years earlier as audience would appreciate this popcorn flick film. 30/100

This flick is not a war movie or a bond thriller, rather a mix of different genres with a really good story and characters. Defently worth the money.