Hounds of War

First let me say that I'm a fan of Grillo - he always holds his own and never needs cast direction, thus why even newb/terrible directors seek him out as he makes them look good. However, that also means he'll keep doing B movies, and I feel he deserves better than that, as he's been in a few of my top B films.

Yesterday I saw him in Long Gone Heroes and I was really disappointed in that movie. It was very slow and the long 2 hour runtime dragged on and felt much longer in a cliched storyline that was rather dull and boring. I rated that movie a generous 4/10.

Today I saw Hounds of War, and I enjoyed it much more. Sure it's not a perfect film, and there certainly were many plot and technical issues, bad editing, and the directing had some flaws, BUT the storyline kept me engaged (and sort of unique and not riddled with the typical cliches), and had excellent pacing and non stop action and suspense. The 95 min runtime flew by almost too fast. Even the action scenes (although not perfect) were much better than yesterday's movie. Plus the set/location shoots were beautiful, and I've never seen Malta as beautifully as it was shown in this movie. So from an eye-candy perspective, this movie was amazing, not to mention the beautiful and lovely Rhona Mitra was very easy on the eyes. Plus the soundtrack theme song at the end (Vladtoseeu - Nosence, you're welcome) was amazing, and I've already added it to my playlist.

So this movie had lot's going for it, and undeserving of all the current 1-3/10's from the wannabe critics. Go see Long Gone Heroes, that once certainly deserves those low scores. This is a very well done B movie and deserving of the 7/10 from me.

Colonel Hart (Robert Patrick) directs operative Ryder (Frank Grillo) and his comrades on a mission in Libya. It's a trap. The task force is massacred. Sole survivor Ryder recruits Selina (Rhona Mitra) and goes on a revenge mission.

This is strictly an action B-movie. The writing is clunky. The story is simple to the point of simplistic. I'm not getting lost here, but I am getting bored. This movie is boring whenever there is no action. There is some interesting action, but nothing ground-shaking. There is a nice chase through the narrow streets of Malta, but like everything else in this movie, there are some clunky stuff whenever the action stops.

I think I'm being generous with this rating. Hounds Of War the latest film from prominent DTV director Issac Florentine and the second Grillo film of the year so far following Lights Out, is derivative, poorly paced and worst of all boring.

Robert Patrick can play roles like this in his sleep at this point. Same could be said for Rhona Mitra. Mitra and Grillo are supposed to play an ex couple here but without this movie telling you that you likely wouldn't know, since they have virtually no chemistry at all in their scenes together. Grillo even though he's the lead barely has any screen time or lines of dialogue for some odd reason. The action scenes feel drawn out and like pure visual noise to draw out the runtime and make up for the fact that this movie barely has a story.

Grillo has another movie, Long Gone Heroes also releasing this week. Hopefully it's better than this.

I was actually looking forward to watching this. Frank Grillo movies are decent for the most part and after seeing Isaac Florentine was the director I figured it would be on the lower budget side but with good/solid action sequences. I've always enjoyed Florentine/Adkins collaborations. Unfortunately this one fell short. The action just felt choppy and off the mark. It had its moments but all the hand-to-hand, well, wasn't good. Replace Frank with Scott Adkins and it most likely would have been better. It's entertaining enough but it's one I don't think I'd sit down and watch again. It's to bad, I really wanted to like it.

This is a bog standard B movie actioner with a surprisingly good cast. It is also pretty dark at times and cynical about politicians. The fight scenes are pretty good and the supporting cast is packed with minor martial artists from round the world.

Frank Grillo is always good value and Robert Patrick reprises his bad guy role from Season 3 of Reacher. He really does a good slime ball!

It clocks in at 90 minutes and is set in Malta which makes a change, although Accident man 2 was also filmed there so maybe they offer tax breaks. The only thing it lacks is Scott Adkins doing his terrible American accent to make it the perfect Friday night no brainer!