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.

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.

In my daily work I stumble upon many awful action films and I've seen them far worse than this, even with a way fatter budget. This one is a correct homage to 80's martial arts and action flicks and its quality is honestly in line with those one, not being a good or great movie by any means, but at least entertaining and fun.

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.

I saw this movie via my satellite TV's movie package, and it was such a waste of 90 minutes of my life. The movie drew me with its cast of former action stars Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Cynthia Rothrock and Oliver Gruner plus Tia Carrere but gosh, the (lack of) acting, plot, flow and everything else made it one of the worst movies ever. Please do yourself a huge favor and avoid this turkey.