Remembering the feverish delirium of violence and madness that was ‘Ricochet’ (1991).
Russell Mulcahy will forever be beloved by action fans for Highlander. After the colossal failure of the sequel in 1991, he redeemed himself in the same year with Ricochet. Teaming up with genre expert writer Steven E. de Souza (Commando, Die Hard), John Lithgow and rising star Denzel Washington for Ricochet, he created a totally bonkers action thriller masterpiece.
LAPD officer Nick Styles (Denzel Washington) captures psychopathic criminal Blake (John Lithgow). The arrest is filmed, and the publicity helps Styles to rise through the ranks of the department, eventually becoming assistant district attorney several years later. During his stay in prison, Blake becomes obsessed with taking revenge, and when he escapes, he is hellbent on the utter destruction of Styles’ life and sanity.
This sound like a generic cop/revenge thriller type of story? Maybe, but what Mulcahy made of it is a film that is in total overdrive mode almost every minute. It’s not an all-out action fest, even though the visuals and characters are firmly rooted in classic action genre territory a la Die Hard, with the mandatory overabundance of testosterone-charged men.
This is especially true for our main protagonists who are intensely portrayed by Washington and Lithgow, and the two are almost solely responsible that Ricochet works so well. Ever since The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Lithgow’s true calling was to be a villain in movies, and in Ricochet he goes just as nuts, a cold-blooded psychopath with a piercing stare. He goes so over the top that he frequently rivals Gary Busey’s best moments.
Washington also gives it all, even though he is not a complete psycho cop, but also a family guy and city slicker. He does get his fair share of wacky moments, and occasionally blows a fuse during his police work. Ice-T also joined the cast in one of his early roles. His character undergoes a baffling transformation from Style’s basketball buddy into drug kingpin who finally discovers his honor and agrees to help Styles in taking down Blake.
Both main characters are deeply flawed, with sadistic impulses on one side, and an overdose of pathological overconfidence on the other, even though there’s never any doubt who is good or bad in this film. Blake wants to get his revenge on Styles, but instead of just killing him, he creates a sophisticated sadistic scheme. A big chunk of the film is dedicated to Styles’ astonishing ordeal that leaves him mentally crippled. The sheer insanity makes it hard to take it all fully serious, but it’s a terrific setup for the final confrontation fueled by hate and rage on both sides.
A Beretta in the Butt Beats a Butterfly in the Boot
There’s only a handful of action sequences, but Mulcahy moves the proceedings at a swift pace, and makes sure you’ll be at the edge of your seat all the time. One absurd scene follows another: Washington takes off his clothes during a hostage situation, Lithgow kills Jesse Ventura with a katana while both are wearing phone books as armor, and drilling tools are the weapon of choice during Blake’s escape from prison. Styles also shows unconventional negotiation tactics, when he walks into a drug lab with an unpinned hand grenade, to convince the gang that they better stay away from a newly built children’s center in the neighborhood for their drug sales.
Ricochet is an A-list production that was created from the crackpot pile of Hollywood scripts. I think it is a terrific film, just don’t question anything that happens, and just enjoy this feverish delirium of violence and madness.
It was about time action fans got their violent spin on the Disney princess films.
Director Le-Van Kiet, who landed the action masterpiece Furie in his home country Vietnam in 2019, shows us what happens if there is no valiant prince coming to the rescue: the Princess Bride needs to become the princess bad-ass! The Princess is his first venture into US action movie territory, so let’s have a look if he landed another instant classic. The princess is locked up in the castle’s tower after refusing to marry the malignant Lord Julius, who also seized her father’s kingdom. With her family and the kingdom in peril, the princess starts a desperate fight to escape from her prison and to take vengeance on Julius and his goons.
The plot has no surprises and progresses exactly as one would expect, but this is fine for a film that puts all its focus on the action. Our nameless princess fights her way out of the tower filled to the brim with baddies very much in the spirit of Iko Uwais in The Raid, who took the opposite route. And our main protagonist embarking on a dangerous quest alone is more than a nod to the self-empowerment of the Disney princesses in the last two decades, and the film was even co-produced by Walt Disney Studios.
Joey King takes center stage as the princess with an impressive physical performance doing a whole bunch of fighting on her own, and sporting the irresistible and fashionable combination of wedding dress and combat boots. This one-princess army is also getting thoroughly battered during the course of the film, which always gets extra sympathy points in my book (and is also why John McClane and Ash really are the most ultimate action heroes of them all).
Kiet also brought Vietnamese superstar Veronica Ngo along for the ride, and her weapon master Linh is even more of a kick-ass warrior than the princess. On the villain team Olga Kurylenko and Dominic Cooper ham it up magnificently. Dressed in black with the ultimate evil hair (no better way to describe it), their characters get sadistic pleasures out of every scene.
The production quality is solid, and Kiet manages to hide the budget constraints effectively. You also won’t get a chance to have a closer look, as the film moves at such a relentless pace. Kiet also knows his stuff in the action department, and even though the Princess doesn’t come close to his masterpiece Furie, he unleashes an impressive staccato of brutal brawls and sword fights. Thankfully for us viewers the castle is packed with enemies running the stairs up and down all the time. And every villain the princess encounters becomes bigger, nastier and more absurdly armed and armored.
The fight scenes pack a serious punch, with an awesome lot of bloody kills achieved with a nice variety of medieval weapons, including a few castrations by sword. The overall quality and excitement level of the fights (even none are overly inventive) are absolute A-tier! And while the action sequences are slick and pretty brutal, they all look somewhat sterile with the usual CGI blood, and absence of true full-scale carnage. Replacing grittiness by cleanliness even in genre entries of strongly violent caliber has become all too common, and The Princess also follows this path.
But this is a minor flaw really, and thanks to the enthusiasm and skills of everyone involved in the production, The Princess entertains from the first to the last minute. It may not be destined to become a classic, but it’s action fast-food of the most delicious kind!
Nintendo 64’s popular video game GoldenEye 007 was separated from its source film by almost two years. The film, released in November 1995 and putting a rotund end to the rumours that assured James Bond didn’t have a chance in a post-Cold War setting, instantly established Pierce Brosnan as the Bond of the new millennium and generated a new era of Bondmania almost comparable to the days of Goldfinger and Thunderball in the mid-1960s. The video game missed the chance to take advantage of both the theatrical release date and the home video launch in May 1996, coming to stores in North America on August 25, 1997, not much time before Tomorrow Never Dies, Brosnan’s second Bond outing.
The game had many delays due to improvements made by Rare, the developers. Improvements that proved to be among the most appreciated aspects of this product such as the ability to move Bond through the whole map opposing the original “on-rails shooter” idea a la Virtua Cop and the famous Multiplayer which had kids glued to their tube TV screens and N64 consoles. It is important to note that Nintendo’s 64-bit console wasn’t released when the Rare team began to work on the project, as early as January 1995 when GoldenEye the film started shooting at Leavesden Studios – a place they visited to get blueprints of the sets and reference shots of the costumes to make the digitalization as faithful as possible. The game was originally intended for Nintendo’s Virtual Boy console and then as a Super Nintendo game in 2D before the team decided to raise the bet and make GoldenEye 007 a 3D title for Nintendo’s sixth generation console, first known as Ultra 64.
For many, the game has overshadowed the legacy of the film: its innovative playability and features that are now the standard of the first-person shooter genre have cast the source material aside. Former MGM/UA Vice-president even admitted that the popularity of the game helped to boost the success of the Pierce Brosnan films and it’s no secret that many people became Bond fans thanks to this product: not only GoldenEye 007 followed the film’s story quite closely, but the bonus levels Aztec and Egyptian were inspired by Moonraker and Live And Let Die as the player had to face Jaws and Baron Samedi in familiar surroundings. Oddjob from Goldfinger and May Day from A View To A Kill were unlockable characters in the multiplayer mode and Francisco Scaramanga’s Golden Gun was available in one of the levels as well. Those who were curious about these details went to a video store and ended up discovering not only that GoldenEye was a film, but that it also belonged to a series of films dating from 1962 and novels written by a Royal Navy officer and journalist named Ian Fleming some ten years earlier than that.
In an attempt to avoid making a straight copy of the film’s script, the team led by Martin Hollis added some original levels that would have been good to see in the film assuming it wouldn’t have affected its sharp pacing and 130-minute runtime. Some of these levels take place in Severnaya, a desolated city in the North East of Russia where a Space Weapons Control Centre is located. In the film, the leading lady Natalya Simonova (Izabella Scorupco) works there along with her friend Boris Grishenko (Alan Cumming). Everything changes when Boris makes a deal with General Ourumov (Gottfried John) and Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen), Red Army officers in league with the Janus Syndicate run by Bond’s former friend Alec Trevelyan (Sean Bean). Ourumov uses his authority to enter the installation and request the GoldenEye key that activates a dangerous satellite. As a duty officer surrenders the key, Xenia opens fire and kills everyone, minus Boris (who conveniently went out for a cigarette) and Natalya, who managed to hide somewhere in the kitchen. Believing everyone is dead and the jet patrols won’t make it on time, the General and her accomplice set the GoldenEye to fire over the installation and they fly away on a stolen EMP-hardened helicopter. Avoiding all kinds of exploding artefacts, Natalya manages to escape from the burning place and her quest for survival will lead her straight to 007 later in the story, joining forces with him to put a stop to Janus’ plans.
For the game, the developers placed James Bond in Severnaya in two missions taking place in 1991, where he is first assigned to sneak around the snowy plateau stealing maps and disconnecting the communications link to the installation’s interior (the “bunker”) before infiltrating the place. In the level following this one, the player controlling Bond must do a series of activities that involve creating a copy of the GoldenEye key and downloading data from a mainframe, for which he has to hold Boris Grishenko at gunpoint to enter a password (“KNOCKERS”, as we’ve seen in the film for another use). As this happens, an alarm will wail and Bond will have to escape avoiding heavily armoured guards. These two missions, Surface and Bunker, will be repeated later and take place in the story’s present day, 1995. Under the red sky of night, Bond destroys the communications link to the bunker and a Spetsnaz helicopter, only to be captured as he enters the compound. The second part of Bunker proposes an interesting scenario as the secret agent is locked in a cell next to Natalya. After a quick exchange and knowing she’s locked in because she has seen too much, the ace of spies uses his magnetic watch (Live And Let Die, anyone?) to get the key to his cell and free the girl after incapacitating the jailer. Things don’t end there: the place is crawling with guards and there are no silenced weapons in the place except for two handguns inside a safe and a throwing knife. Unfortunately for Bond, he’ll have to perform many activities there such as destroying all the CCTV cameras in the compound and getting a videotape along with some documents. The passing of time is made strongly evident because we see security has been tightened in the compound, which has now been expanded and with automatic machine guns attached to the roof. If the player manages to do all that, Natalya will inform him that Ourumov set the GoldenEye to fire at the installation and both will have to escape.
Another of these original missions occurs on a Soviet missile silo in Kirghizstan. It is 1993 and MI6 suspects the place is a cover for the launch of the aforementioned GoldenEye satellite. Bond has to destroy the place and take shots of the satellite besides picking up circuit boards and DAT tapes. As the countdown for the destruction of the place runs down and 007 goes through the claustrophobic corridors avoiding hitting scientists and getting in firefights with guards, Ourumov will ambush him near the end.
Other levels were considerably expanded from the original film: in the Arkhangel dam, Bond shoots a couple of guards patrolling the compound and installs covert modems and extracts information before taking that 640 feet bungee jump as we’ve seen in the film. One of the film’s scripts, however, also extended this opening moment as 007 terminated two guards playing chess with expansive Glaser bullets as we know from John Gardner’s GoldenEye novelization. An interesting twist is given in the Frigate level, taking place in Port Hercule at Monte Carlo: while in the movie Bond simply makes an ill-fated attempt to prevent Xenia to steal the Tiger helicopter, in the game the vessel has been assaulted by Janus’ special forces who have taken crewmembers as hostages and placed two bombs, on the bridge and the engine room. It will be the player’s duty as 007 to disable those bombs as he rescues the hostages and plants a tracker on the helicopter, renamed Pirate in this version. The jungle showdown with Xenia Onatopp was also expanded in the video game, as both Bond and Natalya have to avoid Janus’ troops and automatic drone guns before fighting Onatopp who is armed with a grenade launcher and a sub-machine gun.
These are some of the things GoldenEye 007 has that might have enriched the experience of the film for adrenaline addicts, but there are also many things the film has that the game can’t compete with, and that has to do with the literary aspect of the product. The race between the Aston Martin DB5 and the Ferrari 355 through the mountain roads of the Alpes Maritimes is completely omitted in the game and was one of GoldenEye’s most celebrated moments. Then there is the casino scene, where Bond and Xenia play baccarat and he immediately follows her lead. The possibility of a casino level with a card game wasn’t even given a thought, as it might have lowered the potential of a first-person shooter or what players expected of it. Fortunately, this idea came to fruition in the 2000 title The World Is Not Enough, published by Electronic Arts, where reuniting a sum of money by playing blackjack is a requirement to pass to the following level in the PlayStation version.
Despite this happening for obvious reasons, something we have to regret is the fact that Xenia Onatopp’s role in the game has been considerably reduced to just another boss level. All the interactions with James Bond and the sexual tension between the two are limited to a “cameo” appearance on the train level and a shootout in the jungle where the phrase “This time, Mr Bond, the pleasure will be all mine” feels out of place precisely because of the omission of this sub-plot. General Ourumov is another character that barely resonates in the game outside its short appearances in Facility, Silo and Train (by heading to the goal after all of your objectives have been completed before the alarm sounds, he won’t appear at all in Facility). On the bright side, players who are enthusiastic about the film will take a crack at the dialogues with Valentin Zukovsky and the idiocy of Boris Grishenko, which has been perfectly adapted into the game: “Please, don’t kill me. Trevelyan asked me to do it!”, he will say after he threatens the player with a gun in the Control level and the gun slips from his hand. Of course, the player might not resist the temptation, but that will cause Natalya to get mad at Bond and the mission will fail.
Looking at the big picture, the success of both variations of GoldenEye is complementary. It was indeed the game that heightened the film’s popularity, it is even reasonable to point out that many levels from the game would have been a delight to see on the big screen, let’s say if we hoped for an action-packed three-hour film and to give the developers some thought for these original ideas to keep the gamers hooked. However, there is still a lot beyond the playability and the technical specs that made GoldenEye 007 a commercial success and this is where the source material can’t be cast aside: the rivalry between 007 and 006 steams directly from Michael France’s story, eventually reworked by Jeffrey Caine and Bruce Feirstein; the locations are inherently Bondian, the fact that you are driving a tank through the streets of St Petersburg or sneaking through a warship harboured in Monaco is owed to the movie. In the recently released documentary GoldenEra, an interviewee comments that most first-person shooters were set in fantasy worlds where the player had to fight monsters and demons or zombies. GoldenEye 007 changed this by making players enjoy a real-world experience, interacting with men and women as we walked through maps that were based in places that could exist in our reality. And thus, games like Medal of Honor took the player to fight Nazis in World War II. The point is that this change is initially attributed to the game, but this “real life” feeling was given by the film and, to a larger extent, to the world of James Bond. Opposed to franchises like Star Wars or Mortal Kombat, to mention products that were exploited as films and games in the past decades, the Bond series is based on a reality that is always five seconds into the future – things don’t happen in a galaxy far and away, there aren’t Outworlds or Netherrealms, and all of the places Bond goes are places we can gain access depending of what our profession or clearance is. Other than the slight supernatural ambience of Live And Let Die, also replicated on the Egyptian mission of GoldenEye 007, Bond is a man of our times and our world.
Phil Méheux’s cinematography is another of the beautiful things from the film the video game can’t capture: how he evokes the contrast between what is claustrophobic, cold and depressing (the chemical plant, the interrogation room) and what is rich, sunny and exotic (the beaches of Puerto Rico, the skyline of Monaco). This is somehow perceived in the game: Facility is clearly different to Streets as Jungle is to Silo, but never with the finesse and depth of Méheux’s style.
But this happens only for an obvious reason: a film is a film, and a game is a game. They just can’t compete. It would be unfair to expect in a Nintendo 64 game to get a seductive render of Famke Janssen and Izabella Scorupco or a quaint landscape of a beach in the Caribbean, just like maybe the film doesn’t have those “how we never thought of this before” moments of Bond escaping the bunker and blowing the Silo to bits.
In short, both were wonderful in their way and that’s why GoldenEye was the most lucrative James Bond film in 16 years by the end of 1995 and why GoldenEye 007 became the third most sold Nintendo 64 cartridge by 2002 when the console was discontinued.
Ranking the best cyborg sci-fi action films of all time.
The success of films like The Terminator and Robocop triggered an avalanche of direct-to-video copycats. What they lacked in budget and brains, they more than compensated for it with relentless action. In this article, we’ll present the Top 20 classics of this exciting sub-genre, a world where C64-style CGI and home-made cybernetic augmentations are mandatory!
The great Evan Lurie would appear in a dozen low-grade action flicks throughout the 1990s. Our list features three films graced by his presence, and Shadow Warriors is the first. Taylor (Lurie), a security offer at Global Cybernetics Inc, is killed on the job, and transformed into a cybernetic bodyguard, the “Techno Sapiens”. When another unit goes rogue, Taylor is sent after him.
You know you’re in ultra-low budget territory when a machine gun doesn’t even fire blanks, but only smoke. The film is a big trash fest, but it’s perfectly watchable not least because of Evan Lurie’s enthusiastic performance (and his uncannily large neck muscles). The action comes almost non-stop, even though the editing is atrocious with some sequences looking suspiciously like stock footage. But there’s helicopters flying around, a boat chase, and plenty of frantic running and shooting. Shadow Warriors is a film that becomes better with every portion of your favorite intoxicant.
Solo feels like a spiritual predecessor to Soldier at times, even though it doesn’t come even close to the awesomeness of Kurt Russell’s Sci-Fi inferno. And just like Russell, Van Peebles convincingly does what his role demands: looking dumb and being jacked. Solo is a cyborg super soldier who develops a conscience, when he refuses to kill civilians during his first combat mission. He is designated for shutdown but escapes, and the US military goes after him.
The film saw a theatrical release and has some good production values, but the mindset of a C-grade action flick. Viewers need to endure tedious dialogues, cliched characters, and rather uninspired action sequences. Solo is average is almost every respect, but is ultimately worth a watch because of William Sadler as hateful military commander. His Colonel Madden blows a whole fuse box in the explosive finale with a fun twist, taking sadistic pleasure in blasting everything and everyone to pieces (”First rule when you’re dealing with the devil? Don’t!”).
Our next entry is another Evan Lurie banger, and of course he plays a cyborg super soldier. The cyborgs of the Terminal Force (among them Lurie’s Adam) are brought in to end a hostage situation which ends in a massacre. The government attempts to shut them down, but the T-Force goes rogue and embarks on a killing spree. There are two large and pretty neat set pieces at the beginning and end, with the middle part of the film featuring a couple of subplots that are glued together surprisingly well.
Lurie’s Adam is given plenty of time to philosophize about the ordeal of being an android, and Jack Scalia makes a good showing as charming alpha male cop with a disdain for anything cybernetic. Maybe there’s a bit too much talking and not enough kaboom for a production from action masters PM Entertainment, but T-Force is still an entertaining flick, and it introduces a new term into the already confusing world of cyborg terminology: the Cybernaut!
The film that put Frank Zagarino on the map as reliable muscle in DTV action flicks is also his best. The plot: Die Hard in a hospital with an evil cyborg. Zagarino tries his best to give a veritable Terminator impression, but whenever he’s on screen you will only be able to stare at his haircut which is one of the most ultimate in action movie history.
We also get Martin Kove in non-villain role for a change. He gives a decent Bruce Willis impression, spending half of the film crawling through vents and never being short of a witty remark. The action is solid, but rarely exciting, making Shadowchaser your typical middle-of-the-road B-actioner.
KNB effects group founder Robert Kurtzman’s directorial debut is a shameless Robocop rip-off. Police officer Alyssa is killed by gang boss Mad Dog during an undercover operation. She is brought back into the world by Project Lazarus. Imbued with superhuman power thanks to nanobots circulating through her body, Alyssa is out for revenge.
The hazy blue DTV thriller look was never as strong and persistent as in this film, and everything looks pretty slick for a 1 million dollar production. While the plot and dialogues are as cheesy it can get, the action doesn’t disappoint with a solid level of level of bloody violence courtesy of the KNB crew. TV starlets Nicole Eggert and Richard Grieco frequently look like they don’t know how they ended up in this film, but it doesn’t matter, The Demolitionist is a fun, silly ride that never steps on the brakes.
The Vindicator is a Robocop ripoff that was made one year before Robocop came out! Carl is a scientist who dies in a dubious laboratory accident. His remains are integrated into a cybernetic body, and he becomes the ultimate killing machine. Carl escapes the laboratory, with a thirst for vengeance towards his creators.
The film is rooted in the tradition of horror films and urban exploitation flicks, with dark visuals, a creepy atmosphere and some sleazy kills. There is still a good chunk of action, thanks to Carl’s superhuman powers who easily rips apart everyone who has done him wrong. The Vindicator is a low-key effort, but it’s all put together competently to become a fine piece of gritty 1980s Sci-Fi fare.
The original Screamers was an atmospheric Sci-Fi thriller, and in 2009 we were treated with the late DTV sequel. After receiving a distress signal, a group of soldiers is sent to a desert planet that was terrorized in the past by the killing robots Screamers. After their arrival the group gets the unsettling news that the Screamers are still around, some of them having evolved into human shape.
The sequel almost feels like a reboot of the original, as all the elements from the first film make a return, with the addition of some over-the-top gore effects that look appropriately disgusting. Even more than the first film, the second installment has Aliens and The Thing vibes all over it, and the humanoid Screamers are a creepy mix between cyborgs and zombies. Screamers: The Hunting delivers a healthy dose of old-school Sci-Fi horror entertainment.
Straight out of the random cyborg movie name generator comes Cyber Tracker 2, the much improved sequel to its not-so-spectacular predecessor. Don “The Dragon” Wilson is back as undercover police agent. When a cyborg doppelganger of his wife kills the governor, Eric starts his own investigation to clear her from the charges, which quickly escalates into a demolition derby with his adversaries.
The second Cyber Tracker features a ton of awesome cyberpunk nonsense, including the inevitable VR martial arts sequence and a hacker battle. And the action dial was cranked up to the absolute maximum with an endless display of explosions, and cars flipping while being catapulted over other burning cars. The film also unashamedly copies entire sequences from the Terminator franchise such as the flood channel chase and the attack on the police station, but there’s nothing wrong with stealing from the best!
The first Cyborg had almost no cyborg stuff, so this awesome film cannot be our on our list, unfortunately, but there were sequels! Lets forget about the tedious second part, Cyborg 3: The Recycler gives us the real deal of humans vs. cyborgs! In a post-apocalyptic world, humans and cyborgs dwell in the desert. Cyborg Cash finds out that she is pregnant, and wanders to the mythical Cytown, where she hopes to find some help. Cyborg recycler (and killer) Lewellyn and his gang have plotted a course for Cytown, too.
The film has a fairly upbeat mood, with a bunch of silly humor and goofy characters, plus some funky techno beats. We also get to see Evan Lurie again, this time as part of the Cytown cyborg crew. Together with a bunch of cool action sequences for its budget Cyborg 3 becomes a worthy entry to the franchise.
Automatic presents another variant of the “cyborg to the rescue” scenario. Home protection android J269 (Olivier Gruner) saves a woman from attempted rape by an executive of the corporation who built him. He kills the perpetrator, and the company sends a squad of mercenaries into the office building to cover up the incident. In the future, everyone is sitting in dimly-lit rooms, even top executives. It’s a laudable message for saving energy, and also a great trick to save money for set design.
Gruner is fun to watch as always with his totally ice-cold performance and top notch fighting skills. The film is a frantic chase through elevator shafts, crawlspaces and ventilation chutes, with a couple of nice fight sequences thrown into the mix. Automatic is a fun Die Hard ripoff that also does not take itself too serious.
Philip J. Roth has an extensive back catalog as a director, but most of his films are below the pain threshold even for hardened DTV consumers. Digital Man is an exception, and easily the best film he ever made. The D-1 Weapon System (Matthias Hues = The Digital Man) is sent to take down terrorists who have stolen nuclear missile launch codes. After completing the mission, his shuttle crashes into a desert village, and a team of elite soldiers is sent after him to secure the launch codes.
Mattias Hues stomps from one end of the village to the other – with one the biggest guns you’ll ever see – until his pursuers catch up with him. His initially friendly attitude towards the locals ends tragically (for them) as they are all too trigger-happy towards out-of-town folks. The frequent action sequences are shot well, with lots and lots and lots of colorful explosions. Digital Man is an upbeat and action-packed spectacle with a healthy dose of humor.
In the early 1990s, legendary director Sam Firstenberg retrained from ninjas to cyborgs, and with his Cyborg Cop duology he was able to preserve the spirit of his classics. The first Cyborg Cop was decent, but only the second film became the cheerful piece of carnage we came to expect from Firstenberg. After becoming self-aware, a cyborg super soldier decides he wants to take over the world with his fellow constructs. Only DEA agent Jack Ryan and his belly bag can stop them.
The film’s title is one of the biggest scandals in movie history, there is no cyborg cop in this film, only non-cyborg cops and non-cop cyborgs. But all is forgiven, we’re treated with a non-stop action fest with lots of gunfire, things exploding, people exploding, and a few creative kills (strangled with a tail pipe!) David Bradley is back driving his motorbike, beating people up, and just being a cool and funny chap in between the mayhem. Cyborg Cop 2 shows Firstenberg and Bradley in absolute top form!
The 2000s saw a rather abrupt decline in high-entertainment low-budget actioners compared to the previous decade, but action maestro Jesse V. Johnson came to the rescue! In the future, humanity has lost the war against the cyborg drone police. One of the last survivors is Tallis (Don “The Dragon” Wilson), a genetically engineered supersoldier. He rescues a resistance fighter from a drone police squad, and together they devise a plan to save what remains of humanity.
Wilson delivers a surprisingly convincing performance as disillusioned and depressed combat veteran. The film also has a good mix of ingredients, among them cyborgs, swordfights and talking weapons. There’s a lot of spectacle with explosions and shootouts by the minute, and gallons of blood being spilled. The Last Sentinel is an action inferno that looks a lot better than it should considering its budget.
The infernal martial arts quartet of Billy Blanks, Bolo Yeung, Matthias Hues and Jalal Merhi duke it out in TC-2000. After an environmental disaster, the privileged few live in underground cities. Jason (Blanks) is member of a cybernetically enhanced police force that patrols the entrance to the complex. Niki Picasso (Merhi) and his gang want in, and launch a plot that involves the high-heeled killing machine TC-2000. TC-2000 is cheese of the purest kind. The underground is a giant boiler room, and the cyborgs are so advanced that we cannot distinguish them from real humans.
The plot takes many abrupt and absurd changes of direction, so we are always in for a surprise. And there is some actual quality in the fight scenes! Every five minutes someone is getting roundhoused, and we can marvel at lots of oiled topless fighters. Yeung does some crazy kills, among them one where he punches into a one-foot-thick steel door, and the poor fellow on the other side just dies from the shockwave. TC-2000 is just a ton of fun!
The late Joe Lara’s masterpiece has a great title, and you can even shuffle the words around to come up with new awesome names for movies such as American Warrior: Steel Cyborg or Cyborg Warrior: American Steel! After a nuclear war, the remaining humans live in misery enslaved by cyborgs. Radiation has also rendered them sterile, but scientists of the resistance created an embryo. Mary is tasked to bring the specimen to safety, but she is pursued by a cyborg killer, and only the mysterious loner Austin (Lara) can protect her.
The film is a relentless chase through ruined city blocks, filthy sewers and abandoned factories. Joe Lara does a good job as kind, but lethal protector going against a psychopathic drag queen gang, mutant mummy cannibals, and his ultimate nemesis, a blonde mustache terminator with glowing eyes. American Cyborg: Steel Warrior is action-packed and atmospheric, a true low-budget gem!
With Manborg, director Steven Kostanski and his Astron-6 collective created the ultimate homage and parody of pretty much every other film on this list. Count Draculon and his army have destroyed human civilization. The Manborg and three human heroes are forced to fight in the arena for the pleasure of the demonic hordes, but break free to save what remains of humanity. The film is a blindingly colorful montage of 8-bit video game visuals, lots of creative special effects and cheesy humor.
Besides the Manborg, our quartet of warriors features Kung Fu master #1 Man, action hero Justice with a Power Glove for the extra punch, and knife-fighting expert Nina, this list of characters coincidentally being almost identical to the main protagonists to the next film on our list, Eliminators. Manborg is ultra-low budget and ultra-violent chaos that also doesn’t overstay it’s welcome with 60 minutes of total insanity.
If you would have asked a child in the 1980s what ingredients are needed to create their favorite action movie, cyborgs, ninjas and time travel would likely be on the list (plus of course laser guns and lots of explosions). And this is what we get in Eliminators! The evil genius Reeves wants to dispose of his cyborg servant the Mandroid, and has big plans to change the course of time for his own advantage. The Mandroid escapes, assembles a crew of adventurers, and together they set out on a quest to defeat Reeves.
The Mandroid is the most gentle and honorable cyborg in movie history. And his mobile battle unit (a mini-tank he can mount by taking off his legs) is an absolute highlight of the film! All is well on the action front, too. The heroes’ jungle trip is hindered by motorboat chases, moped squads, and cannibals. Eliminators is is infectiously cheerful, and maxes out on creativity and excitement as much as possible for a movie on a budget.
Vampire cyborg knights and humans beat each other up relentlessly in this terrific action extravaganza from Albert Pyun. A cyborg army roams the post-apocalyptic land, draining people’s blood as fuel for their bodies. Nea is rescued by the rogue cyborg Gabriel who teaches her secret martial arts techniques to become a cyborg killer (the secret: putting a stake into their head).
Five-times world kickboxing champion Kathy Long takes it up for the humans, hammering whole squads of cyborgs and their human minions into the ground. The action keeps coming almost non-stop, and the fight sequences are some of the best you’ll find in a DTV flick from the 1990s. As so often, Pyun created an eccentric and beautifully filmed action flick out of almost nothing, and Knights is one of his ultimate achievements!
Mark L. Lester’s sequel in spirit to his classic Class of 1984 carries the same cartoonish vibe, but delivers a huge upgrade on the action front! In the future, high schools have become lawless zones ruled by gangs. The school board deploys three android teachers to restore order. Their hard-line attitude initially seems to work but when they start killing students, the class fights back. The Tactical Education Units (the teachers) are characters you will love to hate; who doesn’t remember a slightly sadistic gym instructor or the overly pedantic history teacher?
The urban wasteland is a deadly, but rad playground for adolescents, and what Lester puts on display rivals it’s A-list action peers of the time. The violence goes completely over the top, with ripped hearts, drilled foreheads, and a perfectly staged finale full of cyborg prosthetics, endless gunfire and explosions. Class of 1999 is perfect entertainment, and also a great recommendation to watch for every stressed out teacher!
Our number one is the ultimate masterpiece from the grandmaster of cyborg cinema Albert Pyun. Cybernetically enhanced LAPD cop Alex Rain (Olivier Gruner) gets entangled in a conspiracy that involves his employer, a data chip with the mind of his android ex-lover, and a sinister plot for world domination. No one ever looked as bad-ass as the violent cyborg vandals in this film with their Armani suits and Gucci sunglasses.
And what Pyun puts on display in the action department is the crowning achievement of his career. Every single action scene becomes a playground of massive destruction, with complex set pieces that are executed flawlessly. Hundreds of bullets are flying left and right, unleashed from gigantic weapons that are fired from the hip with magazines that never run empty, and there’s explosions everywhere. Nemesis puts the “Punk” back into Cyberpunk big time!
There’s enough promise (and action) that you shouldn’t ignore this epic sci-fi action horror banger.
In the mid-2000s, films like 300 and Sin City were all the rage with their shtick of applying CGI to every frame, which gave them a (at the time) unique glossy and highly artificial look. One of the films that followed swiftly in their footsteps, was 2008’s Mutant Chronicles.
Based on the tabletop role-playing game and miniatures franchise of the same name, it remains the only movie adaptation based on this kind of game other than Dungeons & Dragons to this day. The movie incarnations of the latter did not fare so well, so let’s check out what Mutant Chronicles did with its template!
A long time ago, an extraterrestrial giant machine arrived on earth, and started to turn mankind into deranged mutants until a few brave humans buried it for good, or so they thought. In 2707, the world is ruled by corporations that are waging constant war against each other. During a battle above the burial location of the machine, a seal in the ground is broken, and an endless swarm of bloodthirsty monsters crawls out. The monk Samuel assembles a suicide commando of elite soldiers to descend into the pit and save mankind.
I do not know how faithful the film is to its source material, but what I can say for sure is that it features a truly unique and bizarre premise. We dive into a world tormented by a ferocious war, deadly machines and blood-thirsty monsters. The setting is a wild mix of 1920s-1940s visuals (think World War 2 meets Metropolis), a steampunk vibe with coal-powered machinery (including air crafts), and a Templar order as protector of humanity’s most dangerous secret. It’s a chaotic and often hilariously cheesy combination in some moments, but as a whole Mutant Chronicles has an incredibly inventive and haunting imagery, and scores high on atmosphere.
A cast of esteemed character actors (among them Thomas Jane and Ron Perlman) play the hardened battle veterans descending into the underground. Their roles are not overly demanding, they are given a whole bunch of awkward and pseudo-religious dialogues, but together they form a bad-ass commando unit! John Malkovich is on the film poster, but during his two-minute appearance he just slouches in a chair, and seems to almost eagerly await his dismemberment by the approaching horde of mutants.
Director Simon Hunter and his team realized their grand vision with an excess of CGI and full green-screen shots. The end result is a bit mixed, some images look stunning with awesome details, and others are so bare as if they were shot after the budget was already consumed. Despite the visuals not always being convincing, it’s clear that a lot creativity and dedication went into them.
After the atmospheric exposition we’re in for a massive slugfest. The dirty war in the trenches between the human factions goes completely insane when the mutants go on their rampage over the battlefields. And the trail of blood gets even longer when we our heroes start to traverse the mutant-infested ruins of civilization until they reach the entry to the underworld, and make their descent into almost literal hell.
The mutant attacks turn the screen dark red as these horrid creatures have giant blades instead of hands. The saviors of humanity likewise are heavily armed with big-ass swords and machine guns, and they leave plenty of perforated and exploding bodies in their trails as they plow through hordes of enemies. Things get a bit hectic occasionally, with some wonky editing here and there, and sometimes you won’t really know what’s exactly going on. But that’s a minor flaw, the action set pieces are all imaginative and intense, including a slightly nonsensical obstacle course towards the end of the film that feels like a level from a platforming video game.
Mutant Chronicles is far from the perfect, but it shows us a unique world with tons of crazy action. It has all the ingredients I loved to see in an actioner when I was a teen, so if you have kept at least a part of that mindset, I’m sure you will have a great time with it!
Thomas Cruise Mapother IV, otherwise known as Tom Cruise, is one of the world’s leading actors. First appearing on the big screen in the 1980s, his breakthrough role came in 1983 with the comedy-drama, Risky Business. This was the first time Cruise had taken the lead and, following his portrayal of Joel Goodsen, his star was shining brighter than ever before.
By 1986, Cruise was one of Hollywood’s rising stars, which made him the ideal candidate for Tony Scott’s Top Gun. Cast as the slick-talking, high-flying Lieutenant Pete “Maverick” Mitchell, Cruise quickly went from rising star to action man of the moment. And, as we all know, he’s been flying high ever since.
Cruise is an Inspiration
You only have to look through his body of work to see that. From Top-Gun and Minority Report to the Last Samurai and, of course, the Mission: Impossible franchise, Cruise is Hollywood royalty when it comes to action movies. In fact, it’s not just his presence on the big screen that’s made him an icon. Some of Cruise’s best roles have inspired creative types across the entertainment industry.
For example, there are plenty of online casino slots inspired by movies such as Top Gun and the Last Samurai. If you scroll through the gaming lobby at a top-rated casino, you’ll see a game called Samurai’s Path. This slot alludes to the story of Captain Nathan Algren, the man portrayed by Cruise in the Last Samurai. Then, of course, there is the Top Gun slot from Playtech. That’s yet another example of a game inspired by Cruise and the movies he’s starred in.
By this measure alone, it’s fair to say the American is among the best action actors of all time. Indeed, anyone that can cross boundaries and inspire creative types outside of their own industry must be doing something right. However, that’s not the only reason Cruise has been making hit movies for more than 30 years or why he’s just reprised his role as Maverick. In our opinion, he’s also one of the greats for these reasons:
Looks
Cruise doesn’t have the grizzled look you’d normally associate with an action hero. For example, he’s not Harrison Ford in his prime or Arnold Schwarzenegger. Despite this, he’s managed to convince audiences that he’s a badass who also happens to have boyish good looks. Perhaps even more impressively, Cruise doesn’t appear to have aged.
Awards
Awards aren’t necessarily a mark of greatness because they’re simply one voting committee’s opinion. However, it’s hard to say that someone with over 100 nominations and 38 awards, including three Golden Globe Awards, isn’t a top actor. The only problem here is that Cruise has never won an award for best actor in an action movie. He’s been nominated countless times but, at the time of writing, he’s fallen short of this accolade.
Stunts
Okay, so he looks good, and he’s won plenty of awards, but the real reason Cruise has to be considered an action movie great is his willingness to do things other actors won’t. Specifically, Cruise does almost all of his own stunts. That’s impressive in its own right. But, what’s more impressive is that his most death-defying stunts, such as hanging from the side of a plane, have come in later life. Cruise is still risking his life in his 50s. That’s the mark of a true action hero and, for us, the main reason he has to be ranked among the all-time greats.
A look back at Sam Raimi’s high-octane, action-packed modern western spectacle The Quick and the Dead (1995).
Sam Raimi is a master of relentless high-octane cinema. In his early works, he hijacked the horror genre (Evil Dead), superhero films (Darkman), and even Sword & Sorcery flicks (Army of Darkness) to showcase his vision of kick-ass entertainment. Continuing in that vein, his venture into another classic genre, the Western, seemed only logical. Most 1990s Westerns were either dead-serious (Wyatt Earp, Dances with Wolves) or outright depressive affairs (Unforgiven), but in 1995 Raimi grabbed the template and upgraded it into the action-packed spectacle The Quick and the Dead.
The small frontier town of Redemption is the stage for the annual shooting contest that is organized by the tyrannical Herod (Gene Hackman). Several gunslingers arrive to show off their skills, among them the mysterious Ellen (Sharon Stone). Her reason to participate is not the prize money, and as the tournament becomes more and more deadly, her fate becomes intertwined with that of the priest Cort (Russell Crowe), and the cocky gun shop owner The Kid (Leonardo DiCaprio). The overarching plot is simple (a gun fighting tournament), but maestro Raimi takes everything that is exciting about Westerns and molds this sequence of showdowns into a crazy genre medley.
The film has a stunning cinematography with images shot in a sunset color palette, mixing Leone-style close-ups and zooms with classic wide shots, and the characters casting long shadows onto the sand. The set design is astonishingly beautiful and atmospheric. Main street and building interiors never looked so good, same goes for the costumes and weapons. Everything is accompanied by an epic killer soundtrack from Alan Silvestri, so on the production side, things are pretty much as perfect as can be.
Raimi was also provided with a spectacular cast that gives it all! Sharon Stone is a certified bad-ass, who would make Clint Eastwood proud. Yet her character has a deep sense of empathy that is severely lacking in almost all famous Western heroes of the past. Ellen just being a woman already brings an interesting dynamic to this film, as she is pitted against an array of archetypal macho male characters, that are thoroughly confused and aggravated by a female shooter.
Gene Hackman’s Herod is a perfect villain, well-dressed, well-spoken, yet underneath this attire he is still the same disgusting scumbag he was when he roamed the country as a criminal. Russell Crowe as preacher with a dark past and Leonardo DiCaprio as Herod’s tormented bastard child complement the main cast. The script renders them all walking clichés on the surface, but each actor brings a surprising depth to their protagonists, and all of them deliver fantastic performances. The side characters are less nuanced (the convict, the pervert, the colonel etc.) and this is where Raimi puts the tongue-in-cheek humor and a chunk of awesome physical jokes (often related to someone’s demise).
We’re Gonna Have to Bury This Old Man Deep. He Stinks Something Awful.
The film revolves around the duels of the contest, and Raimi makes each one of them a highlight. All these showdowns will have you bite your nails in excitement, with classic montages of twitchy trigger fingers, sweaty foreheads and piercing stares. When the action starts, the camera goes completely nuts, and almost becomes the central participant in the action sequences. Just as in the Evil Dead films, it is whirling around with ultrafast zooms and spins, odd angles galore, and projectiles flying in first-person view until they hit their pitiable target.
Raimi’s trademark comical bloody violence is also included. He makes no compromises here, with a whole slate of absurdly awesome and funny kills, including the ultimate see-through bullet hole. On top of that we get a couple of intense incidents in the saloon, and the partial annihilation of the beautiful Western city by some massive explosions marks the crowning end of the film.
With The Quick and The Dead, Sam Raimi showed his love and enthusiasm for film-making in every frame. It’s hard to overstate how awesome this movie is, one of the best modern Westerns to this day that transforms its decades-old template into cinematic perfection.
In the world of film, foley artists are charged with recreating everyday sounds on the fly to match what is happening on the screen. This contrasts with a regular sound effects editor who will usually use a variety of pre-recorded sounds they have stored in a well-organized soundbank instead. With computer storage capacity increasing every year, you might think that the days of the foley artist are numbered; on the contrary, the results produced by a foley artist are often far superior to what can be done using pre-recorded sounds.
Foley artists are not responsible for recording dialogue or music – these are handled by different departments with specific duties in each of these areas. Vocals that could not be captured perfectly during shooting will be re-voiced by their respective actors for a dialogue track, whilst dedicated musicians and sound effects engineers will combine songs, royalty free music, and foley work into a final master soundtrack.
The Foley Artist Setup
The most common setup for a foley artist will usually include a dedicated foley stage with viewing equipment, recording equipment such as microphones and a mixing desk, and a variety of props which are used for re-creating a wide range of different sounds. At least two foley artists will usually work together with a mixing engineer on a single foley stage so that multiple different sounds can be combined to produce a larger number of effects.
When such a setup is implemented correctly, a very high-quality selection of sounds – each of the perfect lengths for each scene – can be produced. These well-recorded sounds will then be used to substitute for almost all the sounds that were captured during the shooting phase of the project. This is essential because microphones cannot always be positioned in ideal locations during filming, and instructions from people working on the video side of the project will often leak into the sound that was captured naturally whilst on set. There are many other reasons to use foley artists too, including:
When sound is recorded on set it will often sound poor compared to a foley artist working in a recording studio. Sounds may seem muffled, unclear, or too quiet to be realistic when combined with visuals.
Foley artists will record every sound on a unique track, allowing the production studio to compress, EQ, and alter levels for each sound individually. This is essential to ensure that the dialogue can be understood even when several other sounds can be heard.
The effect of a given scene can be dramatically increased by a talented foley artist, as the sound effects they can produce are far more realistic than what can be recorded using a long-distance microphone on set.
Foley artists may decide to add additional sounds where none were originally present to add atmosphere to a scene that previously felt sparse or incomplete.
Recording sound effects separately from the dialogue track makes it far easier for overseas studios to dub a new voice actor in when producing a version of the film for foreign markets.
The Origins of Foley Artistry
You have probably wondered by now where the term “foley artist” came from; it’s a job title that pays tribute to the creativity of a legendary soundman named Jack Foley, who worked with Stanley Kubrick during the mid-to-late 20th century. Jack is believed to be the world’s first foley artist and came up with several of the most common props that are still used in the movie industry for foley work today. Jack’s work was uncredited at the time despite his enormous contribution to much of Kubrick’s work, so the fact that an entire profession is now named after him is surely a fitting tribute to his innovation in this area.
Jack Foley broke his work down into three main areas, signifying the importance of parts of a film that you may not have considered until now:
Footsteps
Whenever an actor is moving around the set with only atmospheric sounds in the background, the sound of their footsteps is almost certain to require exaggerations to set the scene. Foley artists will have a variety of different shoes and surfaces available to them – a shallow pool of water, a pit of gravel, and so forth, and will also pay attention to the shoes that the character is wearing, their weight, how fast they are moving, and their general demeanor, to try and capture the correct atmosphere in sound.
Movement
When people move, they will often make noises other than their footsteps – think of batman’s cape blowing in the wind, or the sound of a leather sofa squeaking as a person shifts their weight.
Specifics
Finally, specific sounds are created using props that mimic the sound of every day (and not so every day!) objects that can be seen on screen. Sometimes the prop used by a foley artist will mirror that which is genuinely making the sound – for example, a person writing a note on a piece of paper. More often than not, however, a foley artist will have a more… dedicated technique for re-creating certain sounds.
A famous example of this is the cracking of celery to mimic the sound of a bone being broken, but there are dozens if not hundreds more. A garage door being hit hard with a ball can create an amazing authentic thunderclap if the materials are correct, a fact you are probably aware of if you have both children and a garage! Foley artists can also be masters of simulating sounds with their voices too.
Our tastes in music tend to change through the generations, but the very best movie soundtracks have a timeless quality to them which transcends changes in the wider popular music market. Today, we’ll be looking at the best and most memorable movie soundtracks of all time, with a focus on the action genre.
When many of these movies were released, the musicians and sound designers did not have access to the wide variety of tools and resources available today. If you are a musician and are currently working on a music-for-video project, get inspired here and go seek out some royalty free music for your project. You’ll be amazed at how much time you can save without sacrificing quality!
(In no particular order)
Top Gun (1986)
The recent release of Top Gun: Maverick has brought this 80s classic and its star Tom Cruise back into the limelight again, so it seems fitting to mention it at the top of the list. Tony Scott’s iconic blend of action and drama just wouldn’t be the same without its over-the-top, melodramatic 80s pop soundtrack. Each song has been masterfully paired with a similarly over-the-top film sequence for maximum effect to produce a film that stands up every bit as well in 2022.
From the “Top Gun Anthem” to the Oscar-winning hit “Take My Breath Away”, the Top Gun soundtrack captures the mood of the 80s decade perfectly. Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” perfectly sets the stage for many of the aerial sequences, and is probably our favourite of the bunch.
Lethal Weapon (1987)
Here’s another wonderfully 1980s movie, featuring Michael Kamen on soundtrack duties who started work on Lethal Weapon within weeks of finishing his work on Highlander – another film with an unforgettable soundtrack! The first track “Jingle Bell Rock” seemed to strike a particular chord with viewers, especially those on the television stations who seem determined to play Lethal Weapon or one of its sequels every Christmas until the end of time.
The soundtrack caters for every mood, with plenty of distinct highs and lows; Eric Clapton’s huge guitar riffs can be hitting in time to the action one minute, then before you know what’s next you’ll be humming along to David Sanborn’s saxophone. A masterful audio rendition.
Kill Bill (2003)
Quentin Tarantino’s films are known for their superb soundtracks and noughties martial arts thriller Kill Bill is no exception. Interestingly, Kill Bill was later voted as being one of the most heavily sampled films for dance music production later in the decade – great soundtracks can breed further (probably great) soundtracks, it seems!
Tarantino’s films always pair an eclectic mix of musical scores perfectly to the energy level of his movies scenes. Take Nancy Sinatra’s “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)”, for example, a sombre track to set the stage before the action, or the high-paced energy of “Green Hornet” as the Bride arrives in Tokyo. The second part had a great soundtrack too, of course, but we believe the first just about has the edge.
Indiana Jones & The Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
We couldn’t write a list of soundtracks without getting Indie in here somewhere; the “Raiders of the Lost Ark” soundtrack was nominated for an Academy Award, but the competition was strong that year and John Williams ended up being beaten by Vangelis’ and his score for Chariots of Fire. Despite this disappointment, there is no denying that “Raiders March” is one of the most iconic themes in cinema history!
The Indiana Jones movies have an undeniably old-school style, and Williams orchestral soundtrack complements that style perfectly. Combined with Spielberg’s directing and Harrison Ford, for us, this was the movie of the year.
Batman (1989)
There have been numerous attempts to surpass Tim Burton’s groundbreaking adaptation of the caped crusader since 1989, but in our opinion, nobody has managed it yet. The soundtrack is an interesting mix of a traditional score and a selection of original songs by Prince, and the theme song is one of the most iconic, well-known themes of all time. When Batman: The Animated Series was created a few years later, the original melody was licensed from the 1989 film.
Some members of the audience weren’t as convinced by Prince’s contributions as they were Danny Elfman’s score. Nevertheless, the result is undeniably unique and haunting, which fits well with the surreal, gothic atmosphere that Burton was trying to create.
Ranking the best action films from legendary star Wesley Snipes!
BLADE: TRINITY, Wesley Snipes, 2004, (c) New Line/courtesy Everett Collection
Wesley Snipes is one of the grandees of action cinema who had a big contribution in shaping the genre in the 1990s up to the early 2000s. His acting talent and charisma also earned him plenty of roles outside action films, and these traits together with his multi-disciplinary martial arts skills were a killer combination for his parts in action flicks. Swords, guns and fists, Snipes mastered them all, and in this article we’ll list his top 10 ultimate action classics!
Money Train is a buddy cop flick that picks the unique setting of the “money train”, a guarded subway picking up the collected passenger fares from each station. Foster brothers John (Snipes) and Charlie (Woody Harrelson) work as transit cops for the New York Metro. Charlie’s gambling addiction, love troubles and a subway train full of money turn out to be an explosive combination. Harrison and Snipes have a solid chemistry, and their funny banter turns even the most mundane conversations into entertaining moments.
The biggest problem of the film is that all the story hooks are not that exciting, and we just follow our two main protagonists through their daily lives and struggles. Fortunately, in the last third of the film, the brakes finally come off (literally). The big finale is absolutely worth watching with spectacular stunts and demolitions on a subway train out of control. Despite some issues, Money Train is an easy-going actioner with funny and relatable characters.
The third reunion with our favorite action heroes brought even more star power to the table: Harrison Ford, Mel Gibson, Antonio Banderas and of course Wesley Snipes! Barney and his crew take it up against former team member Stonebanks (Gibson), who has chosen the path of evil. Barney decides to bring in some fresh recruits, which does not sit well with his old brothers in arms. The proven formula of over-the-top set pieces and cheesy one-liners also worked for the third installment of the Expendables franchise, even though everything may be just a tad less exciting compared to its predecessors.
But it’s an old-school action fest yet again, and Snipes’ performance as Doc (aka Dr. Death aka The Knife before Christmas) shows that he’s still a formidable action hero. Being part of an ensemble cast, his screen time is limited, but after a decade of low-budget flicks, it’s great to see Snipes return to the big screen, and he even is able to poke some fun at his real-life prison stint!
For some people, the United Nations has the reputation of a paper tiger, but in The Art of War this global organization employs a group of secret agents to execute a “policy of aggressive peacekeeping”. When a Chinese diplomat is murdered during the celebration of a US-Chinese trade agreement, UN operative Shaw (Snipes) chases the killer, but ends up on the run himself after being framed for the crime. The idea of secret UN operations to enforce world peace is intriguing, and this actioner with political undertones has a lot to offer.
Snipes gets plenty of opportunity to display his martial arts skills frequently and impressively. Besides the kicks and punches there’s a nice suite of shootouts, chases and explosions to keep the adrenaline going. It’s all stylishly filmed, with lots of high-tech spy equipment being showcased, and yet the film retains a pleasantly old-school vibe with straightforward storytelling. The Art of War kicks some serious ass, and shows Snipes in top form!
U.S. Marshals is a sequel to the Harrison Ford classic The Fugitive, which earned Tommy Lee Jones an Oscar in 1993 for his intense portrayal of U.S Marshal Sam Gerard. Mark Warren (Snipes), has been accused of murder of two federal agents, and escapes in the aftermath of a prison plane crash. U.S marshal Sam Gerard and his team pick up his trail, and embark on a turbulent chase that is also littered with hints of government machinations.
The film is a copy of the original, but we don’t not mind. The plot moves at break-neck speed with plenty of twists to keep you hooked every single minute. Tommy Lee Jones is the epicenter of the movie, and delivers yet another performance with almost uncanny energy and intensity. Snipes provides a formidable counterpart, though, and is certainly a lot more menacing and bad-ass than Harrison Ford in the first installment. U.S. Marshals will keep you at the edge of your seat, guaranteed!
Snipes’ first role in a major action feature put him on the map as A-tier action hero. Passenger 57 is one of the numerous “Die Hard on a moving vehicle” films, and arguably one of the best. John Cutter is on his way to his new job as airline chief of security. Convicted terrorist Charles Rane (Bruce Payne) is on the same plane for transfer to his trial. Rane’s associates hijack the plane, and the mayhem is on! This non-stop thrill ride delivers fights and shootouts on and around the plane (after landing), all expertly executed.
In his role as airline security specialist, Snipes convincingly demonstrated that he is both a charismatic actor and a skilled martial artist. Snipes and Payne’s characters propel the film, and keep coming up with new ways to make each other’s life miserable. A healthy dose of tongue-in-cheek humor and a tight runtime with just above 80 minutes, and no idle moments, all contribute to make Passenger 57 a fantastic old-school actioner.
1994 was the year of skydiving action when Terminal Velocity and Drop Zone both hit theaters. Both of them are fun flicks, but only one of them featured another slam dunk performance from Wesley Snipes! When U.S. Marshal Pete Nessip escorts convicted hacker Leedy, the plane is hijacked and the kidnappers escape with Leedy by jumping off the plane in mid-air. Pete’s brother gets killed in the chaos, and he goes undercover into the skydiving scene to track down the criminals.
This Point Break clone has a simple setup, but the film is just a fun ride from the first minute with breathtaking skydiving sequences, and some highly creative villain deaths (exitus by copy machine!). Snipes once again shines as a formidable action hero with a coolness like liquid nitrogen, and goes after the great Gary Busey, who delivers another unhinged master villain performance. Drop Zone is classic of 1990s action cinema with the perfect package of amusing characters, cheesy one-liners and spectacular action.
The directorial debut of Mario Van Peebles takes the backdrop of the devastating 1980s crack epidemic to create an action-packed gangster saga. New Jack City tells the story of drug kingpin Nino Brown (Snipes) and his gang, their rivalry with the Italian mafia, and an undercover police unit going out of their way to make an end to the drug business.
The film is ripe with death and tragedy, and yet there are many genuinely funny moments. Vivid performances by everyone (among them future stars Ice-T and Chris Rock) propel the film towards awesomeness, but center-stage is taken by Snipes as flamboyant and ruthless drug kingpin with an otherworldly performance that is campy and yet frequently terrifying at the same time. There is also no shortage of action with brutal gang violence and police raids, all brilliantly filmed. New Jack City is as unique as it is awesome, and carries a message that remains relevant to this day.
Guillermo Del Toro is a master of modern Gothic Horror, and with Blade 2 he also showed his talent for creating spectacular action films. The vampires are threatened by the Reapers, a new breed of blood-thirsty monsters led by the tormented Nomak. Blade is persuaded to team up with the Blood Pack, a group of elite vampire warriors, to annihilate Nomak and his Reaper army.
In Blade 2, darkness and shadows replace the glossy and sometimes glaring visuals of the first Blade. The martial arts sequences are even better than in the first part, the action is relentless, and there’s vampire ninjas and Lovecraftian monsters everywhere! Snipes is just as awesome as in the original film as cold and charismatic avenger, slashing and gunning through hordes of enemies. Frenetic fights, a healthy camp factor and stunning visuals make Blade 2 another genre masterpiece!
“Send a maniac to catch one.“ One of the great 1990s action classics gave us one of the best movie villains of all time. In 2032, violent criminal Simon Phoenix (Snipes), who was put into cryo-stasis in 1996, escapes during a parole hearing. The police do not know how to stop him, as crime has been eliminated from society. John Spartan (Sylvester Stallone), who captured Phoenix and was sent into cryo-sleep along with him, is defrosted and assigned to employ his archaic 20th century police methods to capture Phoenix.
The jovial psychopath Phoenix holds up a mirror to this Brave New World society that is completely unprepared for his sadistic escapades. Rarely were villain and cop both as funny and bad-ass as in Demolition Man, and their cat-and-mouse-game leads to plenty of shootouts, bloody deaths and, of course: demolitions. Like the best of satires, Demolition Man does not moralize with a sledge hammer, but embeds its message into an incredibly entertaining actioner with an endless stream of awesome one-liners. It’s a classic for the ages, not least thanks to Snipes hyperactive and hyperviolent performance.
If a movie would ever be used to define the word coolness in a dictionary, it would be Blade! Blade (Snipes) is the Daywalker, a vampire hunter who is a vampire himself, but suffers from none of their weaknesses. After assaulting a vampire night club, he gets into a lethal feud with vampire yuppie Deacon Frost who is researching an ancient prophecy that promises infinite power. Director Stephen Norrington infused his film with techno music, martial arts and an overkill of 1990s party fashion, and radically disposed of the old vampire flick cliches.
The action is slick, fast and violent, and will get your blood pumping. Snipes owns every scene with an almost arrogant ruthlessness, and displays some impressive swordplay and martial arts skills. Blade set a standard for high-octane comic book adaptations that has not yet been surpassed. It’s the greatest superhero flick ever made, and one of the ultimate classics of 1990s action!
