Nell'occhio del ciclone

Major Jack Holloway is the pilot of a revolutionary new fighter jet that is totally invisible to all forms of radar when it goes into stealth mode. When ever someone steals the jet, they frame him for the crime and kidnap his family in order to force him to fly it (he being the only person able to). However Holloway escapes from the group and enlists the help of technical wizard Sparks Johnson to out smart the group.

I'm not a big Lundgren fan but I'll always give his movies a go when they come on TV as I tend to hope that they will at least give me some cheap thrills as an average action movie. This film was a major disappointment in many ways. First of all the plot is not exactly clever but it hasn't been developed well enough to make it plausible, it feels like they wrote it with 8 key scenes in mind but were unable to make good links between them – hence we have bad guys simply bursting into Holloway's home etc. It all feels very bitty and this also affects any excitement or tension it may have been able to have – it simply doesn't flow as a film. In fact it is hardly developed at all when the climax occurs – I had to wonder about the extent of the chief villain's plan, his claims were grand on a global scale but we had seen no evidence of the might he would need to pull it off, all I'd seen was a few guys who had been mostly dispatched by Holloway!

However a bad plot and poor development could easily describe many average action movie filling up the late night TV schedules, but this one has other flaws. The direction is indicative of the whole film – rushed, untidy and uncaring. The camera swings around wildly, but not like is the fashion with NYPD Blue or H:LOTS but really wildly so that the mildest scenes are supposed to feel exciting and frantic – they don't. The production values feel cheap with few special effects and al aerial stuff clearly stock footage. The most laughable thing (spotted as well by another reviewer) was when the unit came for Holloway's family and burst through his windows you could see the fake silencers on the toy guns bending all over the place! This is one example but it was full of cheap touches that gave me the overall impression that they just wanted to get the film finished and damn the quality.

The acting is poor at best. Lundgren is poor as he clearly has no character and has been given no direction and is thus not involved with his character. Therefore he seems relaxed in the plane (despite the seriousness of the situation on the ground) and also doesn't even convince when cheering his daughter on at a football game. Only in the fight scenes (of which there are few) does he seem to be trying and even then it's temporary. Clark is a typical `comedy black sidekick' and just exactly what he has seen done in other films before and just mugs his way through. Bax is annoyingly wooden as Holloway's wife and has a grating cut glass English accent which I can only assume the casting crew thought would `add colour' to the film. Miano is a really poor villain and never gets even to the standard of average thrillers. His character has no teeth and I never really saw his plan as realistic or something that couldn't be easily overcome – his failure to be a threat really knocked whatever small amount of interest I still had out of me.

Overall even people who look forward to the next Lundgren film will be disappointed with this. In every area it feels cheap and rushed – it is a product rather than a film. I had to wonder why I was bothering to watch this when it was so clear that everyone involved had put so little effort into this. Poor even by Lundgren's low standards.

I have to say that this movie gets an "A" for effort for at least trying to be a good action movie. And although on some points it fails to deliver, it is still however an entertaining action movie. As a said above there are a few things that aren't that good about this movie. There are only really too things that stand out to me:

1- The needless graphic, and sometimes slow motion, violence. We don't need a closeup, slow-motion shot of a guy spitting blood just to make the movie better.

2- Some of the camera angles- In some of the more "dramatic" scenes in the movie, the camera tends to have a life of its own and seem to shake quite violently. This is so bad that you can barely see what is happening in the scene and it ruins it. Another thing is the excessive use of slow-motion. Anthony Hickox, as you will notice, is no John Woo. Except for one scene I can think of, this type of filming doesn't work in the movie.

Apart from that this movie is rather entertaining and, aside from the usual B-Movie plot-holes and bad acting, can provide a decent nights entertainment. I give a 6/10 purely on entertainment value alone.

PS: Notice how in one shot of the StormCatcher, one of the control panels looks somewhat like a control panel from The Enterprise? See if you can spot it at the beginning of the film.

On the final stages of testing a military top secret stealth bomber, Air Force pilot Major Jack Holloway ( Dolph Lundgren ) is accused of stealing the aircraft and being part of a conspiracy. On his way to prison Major Jack Holloway is captured by a military special forces unit called the "Serpent Killers".

With his life on the line, Major Jack Holloway ( Dolph Lundgren ) must do everything he can to escape their captured and find out who they are and what their plans are with the stolen military stealth aircraft bomber. With no one to turn except his friend Sparks, both must find out the "Serpent Killers" true intentions with the Storm Catcher.

I really liked this movie, it's got great military stock footage, which is very well put together with the movie. The story is simple but it will keep you guessing till the end of the movie. It's got great action moments both in the ground and in the air, which i quite enjoyed.

The only negative thing i did not like in this movie was some of the acting by some actors, which was really poor. Dolph Lundgren was the better actor from all the cast and Robert Miano was also good playing the General. In the end if you like action a little bit of drama and a twist in the end of the movie, then you will like this movie.

Quite bad indeed. Why on earth Dolph agreed to do this I'll never know. Maybe he just had some spare time. But he could have done something more worthwhile than this bore.

The story focuses on Jack Holloway who test flies a top secret plane (stock footage of a real plane that is not called Storm Catcher) and is framed for stealing it and hiding it in a hut out in the desert...or something. The way the story develops is VERY clichéd although I never did see the "twist" coming so it kind of did succeed there.

There are a few redeeming features, such as Mystro Clark as "Sparks" (desperately trying to add some black jive to the movie) and there are two oddball special agents who crop up every now and again but serve no real purpose other than to look like Hugo Weaving from The Matrix. I tell ya, the resemblance is uncanny. The woman who plays Holloways wife is badly miscast (and has found it difficult to get work since admitting her fondness of anal sex on the Howard Stern show) although the kid playing his daughter is a rather good actress.

Director (and Hugo Weaving lookalike) Anthony Hickox insists on using hand-held cameras in scenes that don't them and steadicam on scenes that do. I don't know what his method or technique of film-making is but it sucks.

The tagline is totally wrong too and gives you the impression that the story is going to build to a more satisfying climax. But it doesn't. Dolph is neither convicted nor is he sentenced so that is a huge lie.

Watch this movie on TV but do NOT rent it and do NOT buy it like I did. Save your money for Dolph's best movie...Joshua Tree.

There is nothing wrong with the plot itself, but the actors/actresses can't really carry the heavy load of bringing the thin dialogue to the level expected for a movie with this magnitude.

The tear-jerker scenes in Storm Catcher (there are more than one would think) doesn't really do the job either.

Since i myself like Dolph Lundgren as an actor and was looking forward to some real action, i was disappointed with this movie. Storm Catcher lost it's momentum after only a few minutes, and wasn't able to really draw my attention until close to the end.

There are better action movies around, although Lundgren's performance was pretty good compared to some of his older ones.