F/X2: Ilusão Fatal

Rollie Tyler (Bryan Brown) is no longer in the movies. He's now a toymaker with a girlfriend named Kim Brandon (Rachel Ticotin). Her ex-husband NYPD detective Mike Brandon asks him to use his skills to help catch a killer. As the other cops go off to take down the suspect, a mysterious assassin kills Mike. Rollie records Lt. Ray Silak tampering with the murder weapon. The assassin tracks down Rollie and Leo McCarthy (Brian Dennehy) saves him in the nick of time.

The most memorable thing in this movie is Rollie's man-size mechanical clown with a control bodysuit. It's a double-edge sword. It's fun at first but Rollie looks sillier and sillier with the control suit. In fact, a lot of this movie is pretty silly. A lot of the traps are reminiscent of "Home Alone" with chemicals and bigger tech.

Along with all the gadgetry, one of the things that Rollie is known for is his avoidance of guns. He's a MacGyver in that way. However this can go too far. In one scene, he grabs the assassin's gun in the aquarium while he's being drowned. Then for some reason he leaves it behind for the assassin to pick up and shoot at him. It's annoying when smart characters do stupid things. This is simply inferior to the original. It's not as much fun. It is sillier and not as compelling. It's not terrible but it's not good.

The original F/X was a moderately successful movie. It certainly wasn't anything great but it did have unmistakable quirkiness in regards to how it approached the action genre. This sequel took five years to follow it, which does seem quite slow by the standards of the day. It teamed up the duo of Bryan Brown and Brian Dennehy again, the former playing the lead character, special effects artist Rollie Tyler.

The film opens once again with another amusing opening that turns out to be a film-within-a-film, featuring a transvestite alien lunatic. The story kicks into gear when Rollie's police detective friend is killed on a sting he was roped into. He has evidence of foul play though, so he joins forces with his private investigator buddy to get to the bottom of the conspiracy. Truthfully, the story is not very good and ultimately is only there to serve as a means to connect various action and jovial banter scenes together. In fairness, like the first movie, there are some entertainingly different action scenes to enjoy. Especially good was the robot clown fight, which was a refreshingly different way to approach an action movie punch up; also amusing was the shop sequence where the bad guy is finally dispatched when he has his head mechanically cellophaned like a supermarket chicken! But all-in-all, irrespective of these occasional original moments, F/X 2: The Deadly Art of Illusion is nothing to get too excited about. It's a passably entertaining action flick and no more really.

Decent if somewhat belated(5 years??) followup to the '86 suprise hit, has Dennehy and Brown in fine form, some involved monkey business with Vatican medallions, bad cops and computer records. You gotta like the MacGyver-ish stuff they throw in, the indestructible hit-man and of course, That Clown. The Fighting, Animitronic Klown. Quite funny in it's way.

This thing is def. tongue in cheek, at little on the confusing side if you try to think about the flips and flops in the plotting; but hey-it's all in fun. Dated but good.

**1/2 outta ****.

F/X2 was actually a good sequel. But I think that's because it is very much like the first movie. And, F/X itself was a great movie because of the idea of a special effects artist trying to get himself out of a mess. Rollie Tyler (Bryan Brown) is now a toy inventor, having retired from the special effects business. His girlfriend's ex-husband, a cop named Mike, employ's Rollie's special effects expertise to set up a sting operation. But, something goes foul and the cop winds up dead. Like F/X 2, Rollie becomes once again involved with crooked cops and has to solve the whodunnit. And, part of what made the first movie great, too, was Brian Dennehy as detective Leo McCarthy, who Rollie Tyler calls on for help.

As far as the story goes, it involves a bigger scale of corruption in the law enforcement circle, but the movie is just as enjoyable. And, you still get to see Rollie Tyler using his special effects abilities, which I always thought was the best part of the first one. If you have seen the first F/X, it's probably very likely you'll like the second one. It's one of the few movies I have seen where I can say that the sequel was pretty good.

Everyone has one or two films which they know in their heart of hearts isn't a great film, maybe not even an average one but for whatever reason it crawls inside your head and wont let go. You just can't help but love it and this is one of mine. The acting is OK, the story idea is kind of cool if a little un-believable, the bad guys are inept (why doesn't anyone just shoot the guy!) but none of it matters I love this film.

Bryan Brown is excellent as the FX Man on the run and Brian Denehhey is up to his usual standards as good backup. It's a fun run from start to finish if you sit back and let it go this is a great way to pass 95mins. The FX tricks employed are clever and gosh darn it there's a happy ending maybe i'm just sentimental!! I hope more people see this film I highly recommend it, now i'm off to write a review of my other guilty pleasure the Secret of My Success.....

8/10