Braqueurs d'élite

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!

Renegades (2 out of 5 stars).

Renegades is a dull action thriller that could have been so much better as a war heist film about a group of Navy seals trying to reclaim gold that the Nazi's stole and buried it underneath a small town that is now a lake. Sadly, the film misses the opportunity to be an exciting fun action thriller. We are left with a movie that has tedious characters, boring direction, and terrible visual effects.

The plot begins with Nazi's stealing tons of gold from a village and had the village flooded with the gold locked in a vault. Now in 1995, a team of Navy seals led by Matt (Sullivan Stapleton) gather Intel by Lara (Sylvia Hoeks) that the gold is buried underneath the lake. After their mission was compromised. Matt and his team are put on leave. They decide to plan and reclaim the missing gold. With the SAS hot on Matt and his teams trail.

It was an interesting plot that does set up for a fun action packed thriller. The direction fails to even built any worthwhile action. The opening sequence with Matt and his team escaping after their mission was compromised was the only exciting scene there is. As they are driving their tank through the city with the bad guys after them. Even though, there were some bad visual effects. After that, the film drops the excitement and turns into a dull direction. Lara helps the team out by scouting and planning the heist. Nothing exciting happens throughout the second act of the movie. With Matt's commander Admiral J. Levin (J.K. Simmons) getting on their case for being military screw-ups. J. K. Simmons was the best thing about the movie. He delivers some fun laughs. Otherwise, the movie is boring. Even during the climax that spends most of the time underwater was a boring sequence. They travel to the flooded village and trying to break the gold out of the vault. With the SAS troops dropping bombs in the lake. And the scene gets confusing on what is going on underwater.

Overall, Renegades is a bad film. Nothing exciting happens. It has the concept of top notch action but fails in excitement. The characters are boring and forgettable. The script lacks development on the characters. The visual effects are terrible. And the direction is a tedious heist film. J.K. Simmons may have some moments to bring laughs but you will be falling asleep through the rest.

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

JK Simmon's had the best lines, but this was a feel good action movie with a good ending.

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 ;)