King of the Avenue

This one had potential to be a quirky, unearthly combination of the supernatural and gangsters. Think Innocent Blood (1992). Even done in a low-budget hack job it could have been quite a hoot. But...

The lead actor is quite a dead-serious voice-over embarrassment and the gangsters are less than Comic-Book enticing. Only the Demon from Hell and his creepy demeanor and slaughterhouse shenanigans add any fun to this, as the family in peril backdrop subtext is weak and mishandled to the point of distraction. It has a good "Twilight Zone" twist but it doesn't save it from Indie Movie indifference.

Worth viewing for the better, brutal parts and Horror Movie splatter. However it is the smarmy child protection and the "I will not raise a punk" inclusions that stall this one from becoming an overtly outrageous display of Grindhouse gory glory.

After watching what ever this was suppose to be. I thought it was a comedy of showing how to not make a film. but found out on hear it is a drama thriller, only thrill I had in this movie was the ending credits.

Horrible acting. Horrible cast. What a waste of time. I mean it could have been done so much better because the story itself isn't bad. Simon Rex was the wrong choice as the lead. B movie acting at best. The gal who played his wife could use some acting lessons. This is a scar on Ving Rhames career. The music score didn't really match the movie. The special effects and stunts were cheesy and sub standard in my opinion. It almost seems like a movie a film school student would put together. It's a sad waste of money and time. I'll never get that 90 minutes back. Please don't waste your time on this turd.

This movie is not that bad. What would one expect in a movie about a dope dealer selling his soul to the devil? The Devil and Daniel Webster? But what I found in the movie was a alternating view of the oft told tale of Mephistopheles. The view is that Mephistopheles was a collector of souls of the damned. And that is exactly, I am sure not intentionally, what this movie is about. Every dope dealer who has a name is killed because the main character makes a deal to be the biggest drug dealer in his city. I find the leading actor acted like he was in a comedy. The supporting characters were way more interesting. Ving Rhames you can tell is having a ball. Who could take this move seriously? It was a DMX /Scarface redux.

The deal hinges on the soon to be King dope dealers wife and child getting killed if he does not take the deal. So he lives a double life the wife and his kids has no idea about. In any case the movie is entertaining if you like gore and shot outs. And you can suspend reality for a for a hour and a half. If not stay clear. But it is not any worse then most of the garbage out there. Just to see Ving Rhames hamming it up and having a ball.

The plot: A drug dealer makes a deal with the devil to become the biggest, baddest dealer in the city.

Like everyone else, I watched this movie because of Esai Morales and Ving Rhames. Unfortunately, it's not really all that great of a movie. Still, I kind of liked it, despite it being an overt morality tale that spends much of time lecturing the viewer. It's got a certain degree of charm, I suppose. Or maybe I'm just being too forgiving, because I pity the careers of Rhames and Morales, who are actually pretty good actors. Anyway, it's a perfectly serviceable plot, and, despite some less than stellar directing, the end result is perfectly watchable. If you're looking for something other than a low budget, independent exploitation movie, I think you're going to be writing "worst movie ever!" threads in the comments.

I can't really say that this is the sort of movie that you remember, because about 30 minutes into it, I realized that I'd already seen it. That's kind of a bad sign. Still, I sat through it again, and I'm not entirely regretful. When you're a Ving Rhames fan, sometimes you have to sit through some truly awful movies, and this was not his worst.