Deadly Outbreak

Aside from Ron Silver's usual wonderful, icy cool performance as the villain, the best thing about this Lethal Weapon knock-off is seeing how many action cliches you can spot. Deadly Outbreak is low-budget actioneer of the type that would star Segal, Willis or Van Damme if they had had any kind of a budget, but instead settles for a bunch of unknowns running through the most inane series of situations you can imagine (whenever someone isn't kicking someone else in the groin, or killing another hostage). Indeed, if you didn't know better, you'd think this was a Scary Movie-type of send-up of the genre. The Israeli setting gives the feeling that the producers got a subsidy from the government in order to attract some filmmaking business to Tel Aviv.

Probably the best thing you can say for this production is that for what must have been an extremely low budget, they managed to blow up an *extremely* large number of vehicles, planes, factories and what-not. All that said, however, the actors are not completely unattractive, and my teenage daughter says that I shouldn't be too hard on the movie. It still doesn't rate higher than a 3, though. Sorry!

This was one of the weakest Speakman's film, I can freely say that he corrected this mistake with The Expert (1995), but no luck after that much. Anyhoo, Speakman plays sgt. Hatfield who escorts evil Colonel Baron to a biochemical laboratory in Israel, than the evil Colonel Baron takes over the building and sets his goals to the American government… you know, the usual, typical stuff… half a billion dollars… a bus to a airfield… and that's because he's a madman who wasn't treated nice in the army… poor psycho baby. So, the whole plot turns into a cliché, with one man army who fights off mercenaries, just like in Die Hard films and Under Siege films… only with Jeff Speakman as the leading hero, using his Kenpo karate to defeat bad guys. Very low budget film, not too much satisfying for watcher, lousy action scenes, special effects and music score… but Jeff was solid in his fight scenes. Try not to pay attention to acting, the actors are not doing that well, OK, except for Ron Silver. And, how did he get here? I thought that Silver was a big name in bigger films and was a good actor indeed. I really don't understand how did Silver ended up in this low budget crap? Don't expect some solid acting from Speakman, nor from anybody else, not even from the smoking hot scientist Rochelle Swanson whom Speakman is trying to charm pathetically through the film, that romantic connection was very stupid. So, I don't recommend this film that much to anyone, well maybe for Speakman fans, they'll love it.

Despite being an accomplished martial artist in real life, Jeff Speakman didn't have much luck when it came to the motion picture industry. Most of his projects were pretty poor, and "Deadly Outbreak" is no exception. The problem is not that the movie is an umpteenth rip- off of "Die Hard", but that the execution is sorely lacking. The action sequences, the heart of the movie, are extremely lame and soft-feeling instead of being swift, brutal, and suspenseful. Production values are also lacking. Despite the movie being shot and set in Israel, nothing is really done with this, from the locations chosen to the extremely cheap sets constructed. As for Speakman himself, he comes off quite badly. His character is smug, arrogant, and spouts off some really awful one-liners. And the limited amount of martial arts he gets to do are far from spectacular. As I said, this is just one of many bad "Die Hard" clones to come out of the 1990s. Maybe that's what the title of the movie was referring to.

Unlike the extremely dull THE EXPERT, DEADLY OUTBREAK is more action packed and faster paced. Unfortunately, it's also ridiculously unrealistic and borderline cartoonish. The film begins nonchalantly but when the terrorists attack, well, credibility is quickly thrown out of the window. It was too much even for me. The security guards kept running blindly towards the terrorists who killed them on the spot. One after the other. It was like a cartoon or something, or a shooting gallery at an amusement park. Of course, with every security guard out of the way, there's only one man who can stop the terrorists: Jeff Speakman. So what 30 armed security guards couldn't do Jeff does effortlessly. Sure. I have to stop watching these direct to video Jeff Speakman flicks.

'Deadly Outbreak' aka 'Deadly Takeover' is a Nu Image title that has the formula down pat. You get introduced to the head villain, a pretty lady scientist and the hero main character with his young son in a warm likeable moment all with the first 3 minutes. However the action is standard and breaks no new ground.

Sgt. Hatfield (Jeff Speakman) from the American embassy in Tel Aviv is assigned to escort a group of scientists from the airport to a chemical research facility. The head turns out to be disgruntled former Colonel Baron (Ron Silver) stealing a dangerous compound while blackmailing Washington. When he takes complete control of the place it's up to Hatfield with the help of Dr. Levin (Rochelle Swanson) to stop them.

Of the dtv flicks Speakman was resigned to after 'The Perfect Weapon', I choose this because Ron Silver was in it and he can play a good villain. He gets some lines to chew on and deliver in his satisfying manner. Of course Speakman is up to the task of beating people and firing off guns. You get to see him perform a bunch of kenpo karate. Oddly Swanson (Sorceress) who looks good never gets naked.

Every part of 'Deadly Outbreak' is strictly generic. Feeling like a retread with scenes you've seen a million times before, stock characters and a poor musical score. It's competently made, but not at all memorable.