Panama

The one thing I can say about Mel Gibson is that unlike Bruce Willis, he still brings his "A" game when he's trying to make a buck, but the rest of these no-acting clowns wouldn't make it in a high school play.

Really amateurish acting, stupid effects in the fight scenes, and chock full of goofy, you should steer clear of this one.

Not even Cole or Mel could save this unimaginative story with cliché cardboard characters and a freshman-level script. The dialog was remarkably poor, spotted with unnecessary narration and definitions and, of course, incompetent bad guys that have guns but attack with their hands, then miss every time by firing wildly. The pro-level production was wasted on this borefest.

Around the time of the US invasion of Panama the CIA decides to make a deal with some contra guerilla fighters. Mel decides to recruit some buddy of his, Becker, who is currently a mess because his wife died. Along for the ride monitoring things is another agent, Burns. Becker is supposed to make the deal happen: he has to buy a Soviet chopper from some bad guys in Panama and deliver it to the guerilla guy. The Panama guys are involved in drugs and Becker has to go undercover and work in a casino where the gets to meet hot girls and the partying bad guy who is supposed to sell him the chopper. He is also contacted by a DEA agent who offers help if he helps them out in turn. Things of course don't turn out as expected at all and Becker ends up stabbed in the back from all sides just as the full invasion breaks out. Yet he somehow has to make it out alive and try to make some deal happen.

Panama has a good idea and story. The cast does the best it can. Mel always delivers but here he is a tertiary character. Kiara Liz is absolutely adorable. Cole Hauser isn't the most compelling lead but does alright. The problem of course is that this was done with a 3rd of the budget necessary to make it a solid international spy undercover thriller. It's not as bad as the rating here suggests but this is an unfortunate case, where they should have really desisted with the project unless they could procure the appropriate budget but instead went ahead and ended up producing a C-level movie.

And not one of them noticed the sloppy incoherent lazily-written convoluted and cliched nonsense of a so called screenplay? And they all greenlit the final cut to market? Like what was with the long dragged out and boring intimate scenes? It seems the writers put all their effort in those parts. Everything else seemed like a bunch of screenplays for this genre were put in a shredder then randomly pieced together for this story. To make things worse, this was directed by the Crank movie series Mark Neveldine. Isn't experience supposed to make you better, instead of giving the viewers this sub-par 1980's slow-mo-filmed amateur nonsense? I guess we now know that Neveldine's partner in the Crank series Brian Taylor was clearly the brains and talent of the two. I'm assuming this was a low budget film, but the horrible shaky cam filming is inexcusable. A handheld gimbal stabilizer for an iPhone only costs $50. This felt like it was filmed on a flip-phone by someone having a seizure. Between the horribly confusing writing and shaky camera work, I still have a headache. The only thing this film was missing was Bruce Willis. Then I could understand the failure. But I feel bad that Gibson got stuck in this mess, he's better than this. It's a generous 3/10 from me, all going towards the hotties (only worthwhile viewing) and sympathy points for Gibson.

Only watched because I like Cole in Yellowstone. Where do I start, load music played over every conversation, you can't hear a word people are saying. It looks like it may been filmed using an iPhone 1, camera is constantly shaking. No plot to speak of, but that may be because I had to stop watching 30 mins in. Do not waste your time.