One day, as I was heading to work, my nose detected a funny smell. Turns out, I just stepped on a pile of dog excrement. This unfortunate incident kind of sums up my viewing experience of "Walang Awa Kung Pumatay" ("Killing With No Mercy").
This is most likely Robin's worst film. In fact, it's so bad that I always wondered about the missed opportunity that was squandered here. The only redeeming value of the whole film is obviously the movie's promotional poster (As a 13 year old back in the year 1990, I thought the movie was about a hired killer or a Frank Castle style vigilante, based on the poster and movie title but boy I was wrong about that); the actual film is simply a stinker from start to finish. To be fair though, the movie actually begins with promise, with Robin's character struggling with anger issues in a thug infested neighborhood; unfortunately, this is where things start going downhill for the entirety of the movie's running time.
The film has a lack of direction and vision because of its non-existent script and most obviously, it's lack of production budget. With better funding, Robin could have hired a more imaginative writer to make a decent screenplay; he could also have acquired the services of a more competent movie director instead of the goofball who directed this turkey (Just kidding though, while Junn Cabreira is a competent director of action films, I always find his work to be average at best and mediocre at worst. Except maybe in that scene in "Ebok" Ala where Jeric's character is pounding a goon's head to fine paste with a big hunk of rock).
What I find very amusing in this film though is Robin's constantly metamorphosing hairdo. With each change of hairstyle, there's also a corresponding revision to the script, proof that they had no actual working script but just made things up as they went along. This is why it feels very amateurish and has the look of a no-budget home movie. There's a scene in the film where Robin attempts Steven Seagull's car stunt from Above The Law, though the sequence is just mildly interesting and definitely not something to write home about.
The entire motion picture feel like three different short movies cut and pasted together. In the middle of the film, Avila's character is introduced into the picture to shoehorn a new romantic angle into the script after the first leading lady was killed off but this doesn't really elevate the film from its obvious lack of any interesting ideas. Robin dying after he is riddled with bullets was better handled in his first starring role (opposite Dawn Zulueta); here it is just met with indifference because there was not enough reason for the audience to empathize with his character. The use of Rey Valera's cheesy song during the credits does not make the ending any less cringe or nauseating.
Honestly, this movie sucks. Rita Avila is great though as eye candy but that's it. Best to avoid.
