Review: Vanquish

A reclusive and disabled retired cop (Morgan Freeman) gives a single mother (Ruby Rose) with a special set of skills (she’s a former drug courier for one thing) instructions to collect money from five different sources. In order to coerce her into doing this, Freeman has kidnapped Rose’s daughter and placed her in an undisclosed location. Patrick Muldoon plays a crooked federal agent, Julie Lott is a crooked governor.

 

The futile attempt at turning Ruby Rose into someone worth watching on screen continues with this utterly boring 2021 “John Wick” wannabe. Director George Gallo (the terrible “The Poison Rose” with John Travolta and Morgan Freeman) and co-writer Samuel Bartlett (writer-director of the Australian film “Found Footage”) there’s barely a commendable thing in it besides maybe an OK slimy turn by Patrick Muldoon, sporting the worst ponytail since James Woods in “True Believer”. Sadly, Muldoon’s character ends up largely wasted and pointless despite his solid efforts in the part. Morgan Freeman is especially hard to watch and listen to here, he looks utterly soul-crushingly bored and sounds like he’s wearing Danny Glover’s ill-fitting dentures from “Saw”. He’s not being deliberately flippant in-character here, he’s just giving no shits as an actor. The difference is obvious and sad. He’s even worse here than in “Dreamcatcher”, and that film had ‘shit weasels’ in it. Freeman played a villain expertly in 1987’s “Street Smart”, but he has failed to pull it off again ever since.

 

The best I can say for Ms. Rose is that the director is smart enough to let her use her native accent, rather than strain to speak with an American accent. She’s typically robotic nonetheless. Her attempts at swagger in particular fail because this is Rose’s first day pretending to be human. I don’t understand how someone with no talent or charisma manages to get work in films and on TV. Rose isn’t an actress, she’s just a ‘look’. She’s an image or a pose, a cosmetics poster image perhaps. As a director, Gallo seems to have come from the Roger Christian (“Battlefield Earth”) school of awful, in-your-face direction. It looks so awful that you’d swear it was a Steven Seagal vehicle from the early-to-mid 2000s.

 

Terrible, badly made, mostly badly acted action film with zero excitement or energy. Frankly depressing, and the action is completely lifeless. 

 

Rating: D

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Hellraiser (2022)

Recovering junkie Odessa A’zion accompanies scuzzy boyfriend Drew Starkey on a break-in where all they find is a weird puzzle box. A’zion later opens the box and after some weird shit happens, A’zion and Starkey figure it might be a good idea to learn more about this messed up trinket. Goran Visnjic plays a millionaire who possessed the box before our protagonist nicked it.   Is there any point in remaking/rebooting “Hellraiser” when the 1987 adaptation of Clive Barker’s original text was written and directed by Barker himself? And is considered a horror classic? On evidence here, absolutely not. Directed by David Bruckner ( “The Signal” ) and scripted by Ben Collins ( “The Night House” ) and Luke Piotrowski (ditto) this is an entirely tedious affair. I took a long time to get on board with the 1987 “Hellraiser” , I have to admit. It was wildly imaginative and original, like a nightmare transplanted on to film. However, the characters were stone cold and left me similarly chilly t
Read more

Review: Cinderella (1950)

The story of poor young Cinderella (voiced by Ilene Woods), treated as a servant by her nasty stepmother (voiced by Eleanor Audley), and dismissed by her thoroughly rotten, ugly stepsisters. Her only friends are a group of mice, who are forever being menaced by a cat named Lucifer (or as I call him, Grumpy Cheshire Cat). The King (hoping to find a wife for his charming son) is throwing a ball and every available young woman is invited to attend, and Cinderella is most excited to go. However, her stepmother and stepsisters do all they can to prevent this from happening. But with help from the mice and one fairy godmother (voiced by Verna Felton) later, and Cinderella looks set to attend the ball. You know the rest, folks.   Lovely 1950 Disney animated movie from directors Clyde Geronimi ( “Peter Pan” , “Lady and the Tramp” ), Wilfred Jackson ( “Fantasia” , “Alice in Wonderland” , “Peter Pan” ) & Hamilton Luske ( “Pinocchio” , “Fantasia” , “Peter Pan” ), that is a bit too s
Read more

Review: Eugenie de Sade

Eugenie (Soledad Miranda) makes a deathbed confession to author/biographer (Jesus ‘Jess’ Franco himself), recounting the tale of how her depraved stepfather (Paul Muller) groomed her into a life of depravity, debauchery, and murder.   Not to be confused with the similarly titled “Eugenie…The Story of Her Journey into Perversion” (by the same director) or “Justine de Sade” (which is not to be confused with Franco’s own “Justine” for that matter), this 1973 Marquis de Sade adaptation from writer-director Jesus Franco ( “99 Women” , “A Virgin Among the Living Dead” ) is perhaps the perfect marriage of Franco, sleazy material, and actors. Basically this is what Franco’s “She Killed in Ecstasy” might’ve been like if it were based on a Marquis de Sade work. There’s a few slow spots here and there, but overall I actually think this is Franco’s best film. Yes, even better than my previous choice “Vampyros Lesbos” , and better than his more ‘respectable’ films like “Count Dracula” (a
Read more