D-Tox

There are two things a thriller needs: a strong sense of atmosphere, and a competent level of character identification. "D-Tox" has neither. It's hard to care about, much less like, a bunch of characters if you can't remember their names.

FBI Agent Jake Malloy (Sylvester Stallone) is tracking down a killer who is picking off cops. After his girlfriend Mary (Dina Meyer) becomes the next victim, his boss (Charles S. Dutton) gets him to go to a rehab for cops who had seen one too many bad things in their profession. But the killer is not finished with Malloy yet...

I'd address the performances, but to be honest, no one is developed enough to make that really matter. The actors do what they can, but the script is to paper thin and director Jim Gillespe is so inept that it doesn't matter. That's a real shame, because the cast members aren't exactly no talent hacks. Sylvester Stallone, Charles S. Dutton, Kris Kristofferson, Tom Berenger, Courtney B. Vance, Robert Patrick, the late great Robert Prosky, Sean Patrick Flannery. All of these actors have talent, but they aren't allowed to utilize them. Polly Walker still manages to be great despite her limitations, and Sly Stallone actually acts.

Given its star power and its great premise, it's hard to imagine anyone screwing this up. With a talented director at the helm and a few re-writes, this could have been the second coming of "Halloween." Alas, we have Jim Gillespie, whose only notable mark on his resume is directing "I Know What You Did Last Summer." I'll admit that making a suspenseful film is hard to do, but Gillespie is totally clueless. He has absolutely EVERYTHING he could need at his disposal, but he isn't able to pull it together enough to make it any more than watchable.

There are worse things you could do with your time, but if you want to get creeped out, watch something else.

We all remember him as ''ROCKY'' or ''RAMBO'' it's unfortunately sad that the critics won't agree when sly does anything outside the ''ACTION'' genre....anyway the movie is the kind that you would watch with you're girlfriend or a loved someone on a rainy night...

Troubled ''ex'' cops are in a D-TOX center ..something goes wrong when they start winding up dead...its up too stallone to catch the killer..

Sylvester stallone is good as the main character, Robert patrick ( the guy in the terminator and the x files series ) is really good and gives a 10-10 In his performance in this movie..without giving away anything else..., its a good movie. and stallone just like in the last decade is very very underrated, he CAN act!

*** (3)out of(5) *****

STAR RATING:*****Unmissable****Very Good***Okay**You Could Go Out For A Meal Instead*Avoid At All Costs

Stallone and the director of I Know What You Did Last Summer sound like an intriguing combination.But this belated picture isn't really.Sly's performance works more thanks to the script than to him,thanks to some emotive scenes at the beginning,otherwise he's as blank as he was in the Rambo movies.Worse than that,the story is told in a really straight-forward,unoriginal way,you can see scenes coming before you've even seen them.There are few real jolts or surprises.There's some okay action in between,but to be honest,it's hard to understand why this didn't go straight to video.**

The real mystery of D-Tox (hereinafter referred to by its video tile, "Eye See You") is why it never found a distributor in North America. I thought it was a good movie. You have to give star Sylvester Stallone a little credit for trying to shed his Rambo he-man image and playing a distraught and tragic hero.

The story involves a serial killer who has been murdering cops and whose murders will be investigated by FBI agent Jake Malloy (Stallone). When the killer murders Malloy's girlfriend Mary (Dina Meyer) he goes into a funk and finds solace at the bottom of a bottle to the point of contemplating suicide. Malloy's friend and partner Hendricks (Charles S. Dutton) convinces him to go to an isolated D-Tox center in Wyoming run by shrink Kris Kristofferson.

Malloy is thrown in with other cops from various locations who also have demons to exorcise. Among them are Christopher Fulford as Slater who tries to befriend him, Noah (Robert Patrick) who has a chip on his shoulder, McKenzie (Robert Prosky), Jones (Courtney B. Vance), Brandon (Mif) and Lopez (Angela Alvarado) among others. Polly Walker plays Jenny a sympathetic nurse and Tom Berenger and Stephen Lang as two suspicious workers at the facility.

It turns out that the serial killer that Malloy thought he had killed earlier, has in fact infiltrated the D-Tox Center and has begun systematically murdering the people there. But who is he or she?

Director Jim Gillespie gives us a murder mystery rather than an action film. It has the isolation and claustrophobic feeling reminiscent of John Carpenter's "The Thing" (1982) except in this case the killer is human and not alien.

Stallone is good in the lead role experiencing a wide range of emotions. Its one of his better performances in recent years. Of the supporting players, Patrick stands out as well as Fulford, Dutton, Prosky, Vance, Alvartado and Lang. Berenger hardly has anything meaningful to do and is wasted here. And watch for Ron Howard's dad Rance Howard as the proprietor of the lodge that Dutton stays at. "Eye See You" is an under appreciated film and deserves a chance to find an audience. It is hoped that the video release will give it proper visibility.

Sly Stallone stars as an FBI Agent who turns to drink when the love of his life becomes the victim of a crazed serial killer who has been targeting cops for death. So struck by the tragedy, he is coerced into signing up for a rehab programme at a remote asylum facility, but soon it becomes clear that the serial killer is still in his midst.

Famously delayed from being released for quite some time, D-Tox is like an itch on Stallone's CV that he will never be able to scratch. In truth it's quite serviceable as a formulaic thriller, but it's so derivative and, yes, dumb, it's hard to recommend with any sort of confidence.

Any number of thriller films you have probably seen will spring to mind when viewing this, but in short it's like a "10 Little Indians" meets "The Thing", with a side order of "Seven" thrown in for good measure. The first half is actually well built by the makers, establishing Stallone's emotional chaos, his dive into the bottle, and then setting him up in an institution that is frighteningly monolithic in a grey and steely way. His co-patients are all troubled coppers in search of a dry run, and this also sets things up neatly for some rich characterisations, unfortunately it all descends into cliché hell and wastes what is a rather superb cast - while Stallone unfortunately shifts from a believable tortured soul into a muscle head with a gun. Cest la vie!

Good moody atmosphere and some heart jolting deaths keeps the pic on the boil, but ultimately the pandering of the norm renders a promising thriller to being distinctly average. 5/10