Ravage

Ravage (1997) is another Salt City offering of high caliber. This action/horror film by Ronnie Sector has a very "Michael Mann" feel to it and we could easily see this as one of the best airings of Miami Vice (This is a good thing, believe us). The 85 minute film features very high-quality scripts, editing, music and stunts. The acting is fair and the basic storyline is excellent. We were enthralled from start to finish while watching this film, especially the two brothers and their battle with one another. The action sequences were some of the best we've seen. The picks for location are well-chosen and this film shows you quite a bit of surreal imagery to help accent the best of buzzes. You can visit the Ravage Website for more information. This is a must-have video and would accent the best of home-video collections.

Ravage is a very cheaply made indie action flick. The storyline, quite frankly sucks and is very hard to follow. The film was made on the cheap and is not much to look at. The acting is passable, but not particularly good. The thing this film has going for it is bloody, ultra violent action which is particularly brutal. However, very little about this movie is particularly memorable. The film does move very slow and does not offer much iexcitement between the carnage. I fell asleep to this movie on more than one occasion. It was pretty hard to sit through. Supposedly this was inspired by Hong Kong movies, but as a avid fan of HK Cinema and action movies in general, I couldn't find any similarities.

Greg has had a very bad few years, his wife passes on, then his two children are brutally murdered for no apparent reason. So he sets off on some revenge in this low-budget indy that wants to be a big-budget action flick. Maybe I'm alone in this, but shouldn't indies bring something more to the table? Something that Hollywood won't show? I'm sorry guys, but Hollywood has the no-brainer action/revenge movies down to a T. I'm not saying that mindless action revenge indy movies can't be great as I saw a few. Just sadly that this isn't one of them. And it's such a shame too as I heard that the Director's first film, "Sinyster", is a superior film.

My Grade: C

Good Grief. I am big fan of B Grade and indi films but this one just surpasses that greatly. The video quality (on DVD!) was just absolutely painful. Looks to be filmed on a 1986 VHS camcorder. The color is dull and tasteless, contrast is so fuzzy I found my self looking away from the screen to rest my eyes. Looks worse then community access television. I always give movies of this caliber a chance, 1hr through and I turned it off in disgust. The actors seem to not even be trying. The main character (tHe Big bad vigilante) looks like a 300lb NYC pizzeria worker. Music was o.k. for an indi film I guess. Sound effects dubbed in awfully noticeable. And the plot I could have made up in a grade school homework report. No big amazing feat here. My copy went straight into the garbage. I mean at least use a camera over $300!!!! No clue how this made to DVD..and look THIS bad! 0/10

Criminal psychologist Greg is not having a good time. Widowed, his two young daughters are next murdered by a vicious serial killer. Revenge!! Labelled as an indie horror, Ravage is more of a revenge thriller than a horror movie, though it does have a crazed killer and plenty of gore. Obviously very low budget this looked like it was filmed on a VHS camcorder, picture quality is awful, and most of the acting is as wooden as it can get. The plot is pretty far fetched too. However there is a lot of violent action from beginning to end with plenty of blood. It would be easy to just write Ravage off as cheap crap, but personally I give the film makers credit for giving it a respectable go, I can imagine they had a lot of fun putting it together. I certainly could not sit through this again but all things considered, despite its obviously very low budget, I have seen much worse. Looks very dated.