Stiletto

The movie itself is styled in the late 80's/early 90's B films. The soundtrack is built into the cinematography. Yes!!!! There is a lot of action, a lot of killing but again relatable to the B genre films of past. Sure we have stars (again of the 80's/90's) in Berenger, Sizemore, Biehn and even Russo. It is not a stupendously acted story but has a unique flavor to it. We have a female antagonist who powers the film and others fall flat in their roles. A film to watch if your busy doing something else.

Here's a bad female assassin film attempting to be a cross between le femme nikita and the godfather; both far superior movies.

A Russian woman(Stana Katic who is actually Croatian and Serbian) as a deadly girl seeking revenge for her sisters' gang rape by a bunch of neo-Nazis somehow tied in with a Greek mafioso type played by veteran actor Tom Berenger in a Brando like Don Corleone lite. what's missing is Coppola and every other aspect of the great Godfather and of course the awesome Marlon Brando.

Every gangster cliché is used here from missing money to torture scenes and rival Mexican bad guys in night club shoot out that borders on the ridiculous. I'll give it a 5 as a very average crime- drama with decent acting and a by the numbers script.

I was expecting very little from this, given the low rating here, but found myself pleasantly surprised. This is really a much better film than it's being given credit for. There's a depth of characterisation in the script that you don't find in the average B-movie. The cast, too, are well above average. Most of the actors are past-their-prime Hollywood notables who may not earn the big bucks any more but can still turn in a decent performance.

The action sequences are decent and, for the most part, realistic.

I was surprised to discover that the burly cop was actually the writer of the script.

All in all, this is definitely worth a watch.

After watching hundreds of films, you almost know what's going to happen next and often becomes somewhat predictable. Not so with this film. The minute you recognize the main movie star and his acting is par, you can sense the movie is going to be interesting. That's what this film is all about. It was entitled 'The Velvet Spider' 's abroad, but " Stiletto " in America and tells the story of a vengeful female assassin (Stana Katic) who believes some mobsters and their leaders are responsible for her sister's death. However, the main gangster is unaware of her assumptions or her quest, is only concern with the recovery of his two million dollars. Although aware of the assassin, he believes a single cop (Paul Sloan) can stop her, if not his top hit men (Michael Biehn and William Forsythe) in his organization will. The movie is exciting, action-packed and strewed with murder, violence killings and general mayhem. The actors in the cast are superb and very convincing. It's not often a director like Nick Vallelomga and a writer like Paul Sloan are teamed to create a gritty film like this one. ****

This ultra violent female revenge film does not reveal the motivation for all of Stana Katric's carnage until it's almost over, so what precedes the revelation seems like random nonsense. If you are into this for the cast, beware that Tom Berenger is corpulent with dyed blonde hair. Tom Sizemore actually gives the best performance, expounding priceless dialect inside a strip joint, but his part is small. The movie has many problems, confusing and meaningless script, mostly bad acting, and zero likable characters. The ending is especially weak and a ridiculous conclusion to everything that precedes it. Very definitely, a movie to be avoided. - MERK