ZombieRanger

I had the honor, I suppose, of seeing this as a convention last year. After a meet and greet with some of the cast and crew, the theater went dark and this movie flickered up on the screen. Roughly 7 minutes in, I turned to my friend and told him every plot twist we were going to see, the order the characters would die in, and how the movie would end. I was about 94% dead-on, and the row behind me started laughing out loud every time one of my predictions came true. The film looked alright and had a decent score, but the characters were not well written and the plot was so by-the-numbers it killed any chance for suspense to build. What we do get is some long slooow character development of several unlikable people and when the horror does kick in, it makes little sense and doesn't seem to fit the tone that led up to it. I hate to say it, because the cast/crew were very supportive and proud of their work, but I've essentially seen this movie before, and seen it done better. The only recommendations I can give are for James Duval and Robert Patrick, both of whom give inspired performances with pretty bare roles.

Alright I'll start this off by saying the box cover is a lie, and a confusing lie at that. Leo Rossi is featured prominently there, but has about 12 minutes of screen time and is not the focus of this movie. Despite appearing nowhere on the front cover, this movie stars Jeffrey "Re-Animator" Combs as a reporter(?) who captured footage of a drug deal/political agenda killing(?) and is being chased by drug dealers/cops/crooked and/or non-crooked government agents(?) You'll notice there's a bit of uncertainty in this statement, and that's because despite having watched this movie in its' entirety I'm not quite sure what happened. This movie is either the greatest action movie spoof of all time, or the most clichéd attempt at a serious action film of all time, all I know for sure is that I loved it. This movie has a downright stellar cast, Ashley Laurence(Hellraiser series), Lance Henrickson(everything ever made), David Warner(everything else), Charles Napier(that guy that's played a general in everything for the past 30 years), and the man himself, Joe Don Baker. The strangest thing about this movie is its' focal point. For the first 30 minutes or so it's nearly impossible to figure out who our star is. The movie jumps from character to character almost desperately searching for someone to follow. It almost feels like this was supposed to be a vehicle for an 80's action star, but the filmmakers couldn't secure one so they just shot the movie based on the secondary characters from the script. It really does play out like the intended gun-toting catchphrase spouting protagonist just forgot to show up. The movie gives us shootouts, car chases, explosions and double crosses, and you'll be hard pressed to figure out what's going on even when they explain it. This may not be your cup of tea, but I was absolutely astounded.