Estado de Choque

I haven't made it all the way through this movie yet, but I have to say that this is one of the best terrible movies I have ever seen. It's an almost standard "good guy vs. cop gone bad" story, but the level of "bad" that the cop has going for himself is ridiculous. The bad guy is so bad that in the first scene that I saw him in he shoots up a room full of drug dealers, then someone else comes in to shoot him and he shoots them too. Blood all over the place. Again, standard fair for a movie like this. The best scene in this movie was where the bad guy is talking to an informant while holding an ice cream cone. The informant doesn't give him the information that he wanted so out of nowhere the bad guy kicks him in the crotch so hard the informant throws up. I hadn't really been paying attention to the movie up until this point, and maybe it says something about my generation, but I couldn't stop laughing at that. It's like the script writers went "OK, he's bad sure, we've shown him smuggling drugs and shooting people and being in general a terrible person, but what can we do to make it clear that this is the bad guy? I know! Let's have him kick a guy in the crotch really hard! BRILLIANT!" Of course, the other possibility is that the actor was a method actor and this was an improved action on his part. If so, that is the most brilliant director in the world to allow it to be kept in, since that's not what's happening, it's still a really odd action movie.

I saw this movie on HBO about a year and a half ago, and I absolutely loved it. I've never heard of Brian Bosworth, who seems to be the typical American action movie star (he's better than Jeff Speakman by far, though). The throwaway plot in this film deals with the not-so-accidental death of North's wife and child at the hands of a couple of street hoods working for a Disney Dollars counterfeiter or an herbal tea smuggler or something. Johnny sets off in pursuit of the dudes and is led to Karl Savak (Bruce Payne from Passenger 57), the aforementioned bad guy.

There are some very well-done fight scenes here, and the story actually develops (somewhat) as North tries to lure his nemesis out of the woodwork by posing as another criminal, and is eventually offered a chance by Savak to avenge his family's death. The dialogue is laughable at points, mainly Bosworth's lines, but for the most part this movie is well-paced. Payne is right at home as the villain, and the showdown at the end is incredible. The supporting cast did well with what they had, also.

If you find this one at the bottom of a sales bin, you would do well to pick it up. Hell, I'll buy it from you. No rental store around Chicago has this film.

I love this film. Yes its crap but its brilliant at the same time. This is due to an excellent, camp and totally over the top performance by Bruce Payne. He takes the character of Savak to a totally new level by being ruthless, daring and funny at the same time. The bit where he throws his burger meal over marcus and screams 'horse-sh*t' at him is pure class. So is the bit in the drug dealers den 'tsk tsk' and 'ive got the guns'. It seems that Bruce Payne has the knack of taking psycho characters and turning them into something complicated (such as he did with Charles Raine in Passenger 57). I thought the long blond hair and the nose rings really added some presence to the character of Savak in this film, although how plausible it would be to have a CIA / FBI agent looking as he does, I really don't know. Great escapism - 10/10.

A run of the mill revenge flick. It is basically a movie version of the hit game "Max Payne" but the story is told in a bleak and rather dull manner.

The hero goes around beating people up and teaching a kid that that is actually a bad thing to do. Pretty funny if you think about, but it manages to be half-way entertaining. Kurt Wimmer, in his pre-Equilibrium days, displays some directing talent, but this is nothing when compared to Equilibrium.

The undisputed highlight of the film is a great performance by Bruce Payne as a corrupt FBI agent. Complete with a 80's metal hairstyle and a nose ring, he makes one hell of a funny, though very improbable villain. His constant sarcasm and wit save this movie from being totally generic and uninspired. 5/10

Rated R: violence and profanity

Found on NETFLIX-had so many of my fave 'character actors': Bruce Payne, (WARLOCK 3, CHARMED, SWITCH), Jeff Kober, (everyone's fave bad guy!), MC Hammer, Neal McDonough (Desperate Housewives, TIMELINE, BOOMTOWN,) Robert LaSardo (Nip/Tuck, General Hospital) among others, just had to watch! Stayed interested; well paced. Though I still can't understand how Brian Bosworth ever became a movie actor, this is one of his 'better' roles and very believable. Don't agree with the goof-looks like one side of the windows exploded, then the others, which would make sense. Not too much blood, though lots of guns and kicks. If you like these guys, well worth the 90+ minutes!