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Martial arts actor Scott Adkins usually has a good sense of what film projects to pick, so when I found this particular film of his on Netflix, I took the opportunity to see it. It's not one of his very best movies, but overall it does have enough good things to warrant it a recommendation. Yes, it could have been a lot better than it ultimately is. The script is for the most part a collection of plot turns and occurrences that you will have seen many times before. The characters are also not that new as well. There are also some slow patches that will on occasion have the viewer telling the movie to simply get on with it. Also, there is a weird narration device throughout that doesn't really add anything, instead coming across as a possible post-production patch-up job.

But most people don't watch movies like this for their writing. Instead, they watch them for plentiful (and well done) action sequences. And when it comes to this part of the movie, things are pretty well done. The action (a mix of gunplay and martial arts) is very well crafted. In fact, it's pretty brutal, exciting, and bloody at times; whoever provided the fake blood for this movie probably comfortably retired when filming was completed.

As I indicated earlier, this is far from a perfect movie. It certainly isn't for everybody at any time. I would say that if you are in the mood for some brutal and well crafted action, and don't mind sitting through an awkward and very familiar story, the movie will grab your attention for 95 minutes.

I read some reviews that say this is a bad movie, but good for Scott Adkins fans. I tend to disagree. The good thing about this movie is that the director and Adkins try something different, but end up making the same movie over and over. Adkins shows that he doesn't evolve as an actor. And as a martial artist, he reached his peak way before this one. It's easy to say that this movie offers more than Ninja 1 and 2, but at the same time it offers less than anything Adkins should offer.

Adkins works better as a co-part in a mainstream movie, because as a lead actor in B-movies, he is done and is going the same way Seagal, Van Damme and others are, who make too many (of the same) movies.

Adkins, you can do better, and less is more.

I reckon if Scott Adkins was around in the 80s he'd be a very big star. As it is, he even struggles having a fan base in his "home" in the UK. But that doesn't stop him having decent success in quite a few movies in recent years. Also while I'm not sure if he's big in Japan (tonight), I do know he's big in Germany.

But even over here this particular movie will have some issues. Or rather limited success to be more specific. While the movie does try to give the whole thing a slightly different taste with its story it doesn't work that well overall. Also the action scenes are not the best he's done, stunt wise that is. If you're a fan of his work, this may be worth a look, but everyone else should probably spend their time otherwise

Lets get the obvious out of the way, is it something that will keep you on the edge of the seat? No. The story was quite OK. The script was barely good. The acting was just decent however as usual when the action and choreography is concerned with Scott Adkins, he is great. This movie is no where close to The Ninja series or the Undisputed Series however if you are Adkins fan , I would suggest you see it. It starts off slow but the action sequences at the end becomes really nice and has couple of strange twists as well which keep your head scratching. All in all good action movie but that's about it.

I had expected another standard martial arts flick but was pleasantly surprised to see that the director has put in some effort at character establishment , having some sort of story ...some effort at acting etc , and making the most of whatever little budget he had .... Make no mistake its still a low budget B level movie created mainly for martial arts fans ....but it was a refreshing take to see some effort being made to create a movie what we can call a decent one time watch...

Hope to see more from the Director ....