Operação Nervos de Aço

Mario Van Peebles plays Max Dire, a cop going through some rough times. He's seen some weird and supposedly tragic things happen to his partner Jim (Tony Denison), and of course his marriage is on the rocks as well. Then a fellow cop named Garou (Bruce Payne) who heads a "special squad" goes about trying to induct Max into his team. They're supposedly dedicated to wiping out crime, but in truth they're not much better than the bad guys on the streets.

If you get a kick out of genre crossovers, this action-cop-melodrama-horror flick may provide you with enough amusement. Overall, it's pretty standard - the writing, the acting, the effects, etc. Still, its central hook is enough of a hoot to reel in the viewer, and the filmmakers try to draw parallels between the actions of the special squad and drug addiction (these guys and gals regularly inject themselves with something that gives them superhuman abilities). But at least it gives a little fresh life to the ultra-predictable "dead partner" trope.

Van Peebles has some good chemistry with the smouldering Patsy Kensit, as a member of Paynes' team. He himself does an okay job, but it's Payne, an actor who's typically specialized in villain roles, who dominates much of the film. It IS fun to see him and Kensit play Americans; for the most part, they are able to suppress their natural accents. And there's a steady stream of familiar faces in the supporting cast: Jason Beghe ("Monkey Shines: An Experiment in Fear"), Paula Marshall ("Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth"), Dean Norris ('Breaking Bad'), Willie C. Carpenter ("Hard Target"), Victoria Rowell ('The Young and the Restless'), Scott Paulin ("Teen Wolf"), and Mel Winkler ("Devil in a Blue Dress").

This is preposterous stuff, but it's slickly made (genre veteran Anthony Hickox ("Waxwork" and its sequel, etc.) is the director), and reasonably paced, wrapping up in a fairly trim 98 minutes, and it includes enough sex and violence to hold the attention of its audience.

Six out of 10.

This action-packed thriller is more of a twist on the traditional LAPD action movie rather than a twist on the werewolf movie. It's starts off with two cops, Max Dire and his partner, and his partner is telling him how he's going to quit the force and get married. And he gets shot in the first ten minutes. Also, Max himself has a troubled marriage. But just as I was about to sit back and let ninety minutes of cop movie clichés wash over me, the movie goes in several new and interesting directions ... it's not great, but it definitely kept me entertained.

It comes from director Anthony Hickox, who's first movie was Waxwork in 1988 (which also featured werewolves), and he does a particularly good job here at emulating John Woo -- the action sequences are very exciting, adrenaline-fueled affairs and in the other scenes there are plenty of close ups and interesting sound effects to set the mood of the movie. Mario Van Peebles does his usual action hero thing with great flare, and Bruce Payne makes an excellent villain as Mr A Garou (Garou is French for werewolf, see -- pretty much the only high-brow werewolf reference in the movie). All in all, the directing is expertly done, the script is decent enough and the acting is competent.

But as a movie, it has it's problems. It doesn't really pick up it's pace until the the second half, when Max Dire becomes one of the pack, and that's when things really start to get interesting. The characters aren't really that likable or original, although the cast on the whole do their best. But as a pilot for a TV series, it almost works, and that's what I initially presumed this was. Or perhaps it just sets itself up for future movies. Who knows. If it was intended as a pilot, that kind of explains why the first forty minutes of the movie are so dull.

In conclusion, it's a fairly entertaining movie elevated by some great directing, but the storyline could definitely have used a bit more work. If you're in the mood for a decent action movie, this is one that I might recommend.

The title explains it all.

If you get a bunch of friends together, on a rainy Saturday night and all of the new releases are gone from the shelves, make you own horror festival: BLADE, VAMPIRE$, FROM DUSK UNTIL DAWN and this kick butt flick. Like the aforementioned movies, it is a purely escapist fantasy, done just well enough as to not insult your intelligence TOO MUCH. A good sense of humor, some snacks and some suspension of disbelief will help make this movie more enjoyable.

There is some sex,plenty of gore, fangs, claws and guns...

The cast seemed to have had a blast in this movie. If you like this kind of stuff, you will enjoy this film.

Let's face it this is a bad movie. It has a TV-movie average budget and an average b-list cast. But it keeps the pace up throughout most of the movie, yes a bit slow in places but if you like cheesy aging actions you will probably go in for Full Eclipse.

If you want something just a little better try *One tough Bastard*. It doesn't have werewolves, the main actor is torture and the child's character is dumb as a fence post but Bruce Paine as the villain saves it with some of the best one liners you are likely to get in an action movie - much better than any of the Die-hard sequels anyway! Plus it scores about .4 points better than Full Eclipse. You can't lose!

I really enjoyed the first part of this movie. It seemed like a really solid action thriller up through when the partner departed. After that, it felt like the production value, acting, directing, editing... all went down a notch. The rest of the movie seemed cheaper. It still had some fun ideas, but it didn't impress me very often. There was a lot of posing and it felt like posing.

Patsy is slinky, Mario is suave, and Bruce is sinister, but that's about all I can say for this one. I just got done watching it and I can't even remember what ultimately happened to Patsy's character.

On the whole, I still enjoyed watching the movie enough to give it a 5, but the letdown after the opening part prevented me from going higher.