Showdown in Manila

Right, well the reason for why I picked up this movie was because it had Mark Dacascos in it. Boy was I surprised to find out that he had less than five minutes of screen time in the entire movie.

Well, this 2016 action movie definitely bears traces of wanting to pick up or cash in on the success of "The Expendables", by trying to put together an all who-was-sort-of-semi-big-in-the-late-eighties-action-stars. But these were not the blockbuster stars of the late eighties action movies, but the ones from the lower rated and smaller budgets. This includes Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Cynthia Rothrock and Olivier Gruner. But honestly, it was actually a blast to have these former semi-big action stars come together in a movie such as this.

As for the lead cast of Alexander Nevsky and Casper Van Dien, well I was familiar with Casper Van Dien of course. But Alexander Nevsky I have never heard about, and he fared well enough, despite only having one expression for most of the scenes that he did. But a movie such as this runs on action and adrenaline, so the inability to put on a thesbian performance was sort of alright here.

There is a good amount of action throughout the movie, which is also what keeps the movie afloat. As for the storyline and plot, well it was entertaining, but it was on the simpler side, so don't expect to be mentally challenged.

It was also nice to see Tia Carrere in the movie as well as Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa.

An entertaining enough movie for what it turned out to be. Worth watching once if you enjoy a good old action movie.

At least we know who should play in the life and times of Imelda that being Tia Carrere (Ms. Wells) who all of a sudden is looking a bit maidenly. Ms Carrera however was by far the best actor in this mess. Alex Nevski (Nick) should stick to being a thug rather then a depressing leading man. Even Veteran Casper Van Dien (Nick) was off key in a part that only Dirk Benedict could love. Everybody else was forgettable and struggling with a script that could have used a couple of rewrites. Nick's girlfriend Sofia (Maria Bravikova) pop's in from time to time and seems to be from a different movie, it is weird. The only good things about Showdown in Manila are - the music is not bad, the ending had some finality, and sniper Victor (Dmitriy Dyuzhev) looks a lot like a young Martin Landau, but other then that don't waist your time.

Showdown in Manila at first glance may remind you of The Expendables, but instead of the 80s and early 90s big action stars like Arnold and Sly, it use the "direct to video category". I am not saying this negatively as i for one enjoyed these type of movies. I had fun with Cynthia Rothrock, Don The Dragon Wilson, Olivier Gruner and Mark Dacascos action movies. Sadly, these peoples are barely anymore than an extended cameo for the first 3 and a litteral cameo for the last as Dacascos is actually the director of the movie and his poster appearence is completely misleading.

The movie instead follow Alexander Nevsky as the main character Nick Peyton. Imagine taking Arnold Schwarzenegger but basically stripping all the charisma and one liners from his characters. Thats pretty much what remain there. Nevsky speak with a huge accent making his dialogues hard to understand, but the biggest offender is that he has absolutely no charisma or acting skills. The Terminator showed more personality than his character.

Casper Van Dien plays his partner in the detective agency and is by far the best actor in the whole movie. He tries his best to add charisma and personality to it but thats sadly feel like trying to light a piece of paper in a water bucket.

Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa and Mattias Hues plays the villains and they do fine altough i felt they were wasted overall.

The story ain't nothing special, and i supose with better writing, acting and charisma it would had been alright to hold us til the climax, but in its current state it was litteraly a chore to sit trough. By the time you reach said climax you just wish the movie was over.

Dacascos direction when it comes to action was ...fine i guess, even tough the limited budget clearly showed its ugly head, but i felt like he watched Nevsky deliver his line like a robot and was like "thats a wrap, great take". I just can't understand how they could look at this and think it would pass.

I really wish i would had liked this movie, and don't get me wrong i was not expecting theatre quality in term of budget and action, and i was more than fine with these actors "very average acting skills". I never watched a Don The Dragon movie for his acting. That said the movie would had improved a lot if he had been the main character cause his acting is several steps above M. Nevsky.

This movie was litteraly on Youtube completely free (sadly with no subtitles, wich made a lot of the dialogue of Nevsky hard to understand for a non english native as i am) so i can't be too harsh on it i guess as it didn't cost me anything. But if i always enjoyed owning and putting back once in a while an old Bloodfist or China O'Brien, Showdown in Manila is one movie i never intend to rewatch.

Within a very short time of starting to watch, this movie made three distinct impressions. The first was to reflect that I had low expectations, so the good news was I wouldn't be disappointed. The second was that this is unmistakably a paycheck film, a production that its biggest stars and most others surely signed onto to help pay the bills, and for no other reason. The third was that some individuals working in the film industry, whether as actors, stunt people, writers, or otherwise, are able to very adeptly make a shift to the director's chair - but Mark Dacascos does not appear to be one of those individuals. One or two moments elicit a short laugh, but that's mostly on account of Casper Van Dien leaning into his character, who is seemingly written primarily as comic relief - but even that becomes overbearing after a point. One or two shots seem particularly well done, if unremarkable in the grand scheme of things, but many other instances seem imitative and derivative. I would love to say that I have more concrete praise to offer, but I really don't: 'Showdown in Manila' is... Well, it's not a movie you need to watch. Ever.

Even including Van Dien and his character Charlie, dialogue mostly varies from boorish, to tired, to dull. Scene writing varies from boorish, to tired, to dull. Characters range from boorish, to blase, to flat. There's nothing whatsoever in the narrative to meaningfully grab one's attention. With four brief sentences I've succinctly described Craig Hamann's screenplay, and it's not worthwhile to expound upon it any further except to note more than a few tropes, including one or two racist ones. Dacascos' direction is truly no better. The fundamental orchestration of almost every shot and scene feels lethargic and soporific, if not stilted - and that most definitely includes scenes with any measure of action or violence. I can't speak for every actor on hand, but there are a few noteworthy names here whose skill I recognize - so for the fact that they are shoved into a small corner that reduces their performances to either unbothered, lackadaiscal daydreaming or egregious overacting, with no middle ground, I assume Dacascos' inexperienced guiding hand is to blame. On the other hand, leading man Alexander Nevsky seems as stone-faced, wooden, and unmoving as John Wayne or Steven Seagal, illustrating acting one or two steps down from even that of his constrained co-stars. Ugh.

Whatever the tone of a given scene, or its content, the intended stimulation is so heavily squashed by flagging pacing and flailing direction that one may fairly wonder if 'Showdown in Manila' weren't intended as a deadpan parody of its brethren. For every inclusion that should offer a spark of joy, others cancel them out as questionable and unnecessary. What levity we get can't begin carry the film. The cast is utterly wasted, so one shouldn't get too excited that, say, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa is involved, or Cynthia Rothrock. Even supposing that action scenes did serve up appropriate levels of excitement - and they emphatically do not - the rest of the picture drags them down. The nearest this comes to offering any invigoration at all is in the hand-to-hand combat we see at the climax, but the arrangement of these moments is so blunt as to diminish their impact. I don't even know if I can rightly say that the feature is well made from a technical standpoint, as special effects are dubious, sound design feels indifferent, Sean Murray's music is bland, and even props and costume design seem to have been approached with a mindset of "Hmm, yes, this looks very paramilitary."

I want so badly to say there was something about this to stick out to me, in a positive way, that would save the whole from sinking to the bottom of the barrel. But there just wasn't. From start to finish 'Showdown in Manila is endlessly tedious, and altogether lacks color or flavor - which is, genuinely, preferable to moments that outright leave a bad taste in our mouth. There are no highlights; on the other hand, I'm not sure whose specific contribution is more rotten. Whatever it was about this title that drew you in - as someone who has watched many movies of a wide range of genres and quality, let me assure you that there's just no reason to watch this. Whatever you're looking for, it can be found elsewhere in much greater abundance, with much more value. Even if you're a diehard fan of someone involved in the production, 'Showdown in Manila' isn't a movie that anyone needs to see.

Ok. The middle part of this movie was terrible. I even considered turning the movie off. But aside from all of that, the beginning and the end (the first 25 minutes and the last 30 minutes) were pretty good. Those scenes were not too boring, included lots of action, and the acting wasn't that bad. A lot of the time. Keep in mind that I said a lot of the time. Because there was one actor (the main actor in the movie, Alexander Nevsky) who was absolutely horrible. He has only been in a few films ever, does not even speak good English (he has a Russian accent so it is occasionally difficult to understand what he is saying), and simply looks bored when killing the bad guys. On the plus side, he is not seen much in the action scenes, only moreso in the middle of the movie. To conclude, I think this film should be watched at least once, as some parts of it were very enjoyable, and at the end, the fifteen minute long fight scene with guns and explosions is one that I just can't stop watching.