Long Gone Heroes

If you see the name Frank Grillo in something, just go ahead and pass on by. Especially if they are trying, again, to make him the leading "actor". He brings absolutely nothing to anything he is in, except a reminder about those horrid hair-club commercials. And even then, you might think they aren't the best club to be in. You'd be right, it shows.

I'd like to know who is is related to, because I've not seen this many attempts at a leading man since Chris Pine was an actor...oh, he still is you say? I kid, kind of.

Cliches and tired tropes are what you are after? Acting that makes you know you could be a star? This is it.

Melissa Leo and Andy Garcia must have been doing a friends kid a favor. This wasn't terrible but certainly could have been better. A bit of a lazy, cliche script/plot, but not badly acted. A few other familiar faces that performed well with what they were given. The action is okay, at times as unbelievable as any other hero rescue film, but overall okay. I guess these kinds of movies need to exist, and people in the industry need work. Every film doesn't have to be Oscar worthy.

I am a big Grillo fan , a fan of Beau Knapp and either actor will make me want to see a movie they are in. Both in one picture with strong performances from Melissa Leo, Eden Brolin , Josh Hutcherson, George Carroll and Juan Pablo Raba, it was surprising how good this was. All of these actors really shined in their roles, most likely because this movie actually had a real script with character development. The writer took the time to give this a story where I could actually understand what was going on and these actors brought the story to life. Is this a big budget Hollywood production, obviously not, but in my mind that is a plus. Grillo makes movies I want to see. He's incredible and he's backed up here by a fine cast and a movie with some real tension and some horrific scenes. My only complaint would be while there is a fair amount of action, I would have liked a bit more. On the other hand, by the end of this movie I really cared about the characters and I've seen so many poor movies lately where everyone is the bad guy so you end up rooting for no one. This was very good. A character driven thriller.

What was the point of this movie? It's something that's been done hundreds of times and all much better. The directing and editing were terrible, and it took two writers to come up with every predictable cliche and a lackluster story that made the dragged poorly paced two hour runtime feel much longer. Most of the action scenes were poorly filmed and choreographed.

The casting was great, although some actors needed better cast direction, and Frank Grillo as usual carried this movie. He's an underrated actor who deserves bigger and better roles. And although casting Andy Garcia may be a draw to see this movie, his max 5 min screen time didn't add any value to the movie, and it felt like he just called his lines in. It's a generous 4/10 all going to Grillo and the decent cinematography and location sets.

The only good part of the movie is when they speak really bad about the political situation in Venezuela and the government. After that, the movie is too bad, non of the landscapes are from Venezuela, they didn't make an effort staging Caracas, and come on... Colombian accents in every actor who speak spanish? We have good actors such as Edgar Ramirez, Wilmer Valderrama, etc..., and if you want a cheaper actor, please contact me, I could teach you all about my culture, how the military are, the expresions for high and low class people, even the cars and bikes are too wrong. Have they ever been to Venezuela? Or perhaps seen a yt video of the country? It wasn't that hard, was it?