Atos de Violência

Acts of Violence (2018) This is an action film about a woman kidnapped by human traffickers. Her fiance and his ex-military brothers set out to track her down and save her before it is too late. It stars Bruce Willis, Mike Epps, Cole Hauser, Shawn Ashmore, Sophia Bush and Melissa Bolona. It has received generally unfavorable reviews and hasn't done well at the box office. This film was mishandled from an advertising standpoint. Sure, Bruce Willis is a selling point, but unless he's the main star, he shouldn't be advertised as such. The film itself is pretty good. It's a common theme recently popularized by the Taken series. Someone has been kidnapped or killed and our hero/anti-heroes come to the rescue and/or seek revenge. Throw in a cop who's trying to do things through legal means, and you have a film. It can be executed well, i.e. the aforementioned Taken. It can also be managed poorly, there are too many of these to list. This film falls in the middle.

I never review movies here. All I want to say about this movie is that I was suspicious of this movie from the start. I was almost certain I was going to be turning this off after 5 or 10 minutes. But an hour in and I'm still watching it. I actually paused it to look something up about the movie, and happen to catch some of the reviews.

So I read in a few of them that this movie is basically a revenge fantasy for gun nuts(That's an actual quote(paraphrased) from one of the reviews). Well this isn't a spoiler, and I'm only saying it becuase it's only spoken for a second and then forgotten, but the 2 older brothers are rangers. That's all I have to say. The rest of the movie is exactly what would happen if 2 rangers had their sister kidnapped, and they knew where she was.

Wow after reading some of the bad reviews, I almost didn't watch it. I love the way people go out of the way to watch a movie that they know is a B grade action movie and then come on imdb and write a review that discredits everything you SHOULD expect in a B grade action movie. So let me write a list of things that you should expect in a B grade action movie and check those off first: Amateur script- check, Amateur story - check, Amateur acting - check, but above expected, Amateur camera work - check, but again better than usual, Plot Holes - Check. I like B grade action movies and when compared to the rest (and I've seen a LOT), I'd give this a solid 6.5 as it kept me interested and entertained for the majority of the 86 minute run-time and that's all that really needs to be said.

Three brothers take on human traffickers after the youngest has his wife snatched after a night out with her girlfriends. The acting was passable; the script could have been made up as they went with just some ad-lib tough guy talk. There were some plot holes as expected with a B-grade action flick but nothing that a few shootouts couldn't overcome. Lots of angry people in this one but living in Cleveland might do that to a person. I've seen enough of Bruce Willis' latest movies to know that he'll basically make a cameo appearance so he doesn't need to be on set for more than a day or two. He gets his check and they can use his face to attract an audience. This followed the same scenario but at least he does get to shoot a few bad guys in this one. He had one facial expression the whole time...annoyance. I didn't go into it expecting much so I wasn't disappointed. A quick time-waster that won't strain your brain.

So, this obviously isn't the best movie out there, but it's defiantly not that bad. Some of these reviews are ripping this film apart, but for it only being filmed in 15 days on a low budget, it is what it is. The action is pretty entertaining, the acting is believable, the editing is sub-part, unfortunately the script is the weakest part. It's a little simple, cheesy and overdone. I would watch if you are bored, want something simple, and are a sophia bush/bruce willis fan.