Street

The movie and storyline itself was enjoyable but the editing of the film is what ruined its potential to be great.

This movie was just awful. I give it 3 stars for actors who are at least better than a high school actor trying to pad a college application with extra activities. But the rest of it... I don't even know where to begin.

The script is basic. Just simple, non imaginative, cliché. The directing is the same. I will leave those elements alone, because you can almost enjoy those aspects in bad, low budget movies when you are going in to them knowing it was a bad low budget movie.

The star of the movie, the fighting, was OK at best. For such an obviously low budget movie that brought in some MMA names, they should have really done much more to make sure the fighting was way better. And maybe they did...maybe it was just lost in the editing. But none of the fights had any sort of drama. No build. No gripping action.

But the thing that KILLS this move...the bad technical aspects. The utter lack of proper post production. I hate seeing seams in the walls of cheap sets. It is a sure fire give away that you are dealing with low budget. The lighting had no character to it. Did anyone do any color correction? It looked like raw footage. And the sound mix was the absolute killer here. It really played like a temp cut that they rolled out because they just gave up. No attempt at SFX through most of the edit, other scenes just had a background SFX track playing on a loop, music cues dropping out all of a sudden, popping in hot in other places, playing loud under dialogue in other spots so you couldn't hear a thing. If the producers don't have respect enough for their film to finish it properly then nobody should but the time into watching this. Unless you are making a low budget film and want to see a good example of why post production can help a bad movie out, then watch this as a cautionary tale. It will convince you to find more money for post for sure.

The movie is about a kid called 'Street' who is threaten by a 'Mr. Big character into fighting for him for free or have his family hurt ... and there is no reason given for him to not go to police through bad writing.

The idea is there, but it's not been though about enough (though the script was re-written by a 3rd writer so maybe she messed it up, who knows?) The biggest problem with this movie is the sound. The music comes in loud and hard when it's not needed and drowns out the actors' dialogue and at other times, when music is playing in the background of the room and it makes sense for it to be loud... you can barely hear it. The sound designer needs to give back their paycheck.

There wasn't any real build up to the finale and some characters were under-written, but if you're a fan of martial arts movies, you'll probably get past it all for a single viewing.

The actors do a good enough job but some acting looks bad at times due to camera placement.

I was very excited to see that there is finally a new MMA movie out and that it is a respectable movie. I knew going in that this was not a high budget movie and quite honestly I was being a bit of a pessimist which probably worked in the movie's favor. I expected bad writing, bad acting, cheesy fights and a plot as invisible as Wonder Woman's plane. I am not comparing this movie to Here Comes the Boom, I am comparing it realistically as a small budget film and I have to say that when I first saw Beau Casper Smart in the opening scenes in his apartment with the corn rows, I was not too sure I was going to like the protagonist so I was already thinking the worst but to my surprise the movie, Smart and the other characters started to grow on me and though it does not end with Rocky style heroics and a 7 - 12 minute long music infused fight scene, it is much more of what you typically expect from MMA fights that last 3 rounds. A bit more realistic if you ask me. Most fights in real life do not last nearly as long as Hollywood portrays. A lot less like volcano eruptions and a lot more like earthquakes. I have to say that when the movie was over it made the cut and now sits on my DVD shelf in the fight movie section right beside Here Comes the Boom and Blood Sport. I will admit that there were a couple of cheesy scenes where Smart falls in love with the lady lead and the first workout sequence building up to the big fight; music was like something you would see in a faith based film but what the film did was tell a story from start to finish that actually made sense. I wish that they would have shown the female lead, Kate Minor, up to down a little more. She has some sexy legs. Only one scene shows them.

Remo Street is a former wrestling champion who spends his days job searching and forces himself to train at night whenever and however he can. It seems his life long dream of becoming a professional MMA fighter escapes him until one night when a door is opened and he is given the opportunity of a lifetime.

The film is definitely great for its budget and the quality is that of many digital features out there. It's amazing what they can do these days in film and STREET is a great example of being resourceful with your knowledge with skilled actors and crew. It's an action packed non stop film that you really shouldn't pass up.