FILM REVIEW OF "BRIGHT" (2017)

Clearly, Netflix wants to go toe-to-toe with Hollywood, and they are challenging it with their own provocative, slam-bang, $90-million, pulp-fantasy-thriller “Bright” (*** OUT OF ****), toplining Will Smith and Joel Edgerton as a rare pair of LAPD beat cops.  Although Smith plays a human, Edgerton is cast as an Orc!  Essentially, “Suicide Squad” director David Ayer has taken his superb police procedural “End of Watch” (2012) and retooled it as something like director Graham Baker’s “Alien Nation” (1988) with the fantastic beings from Peter Jackson’s “Lord of the Rings” franchise.  Clocking in close two hours, “Bright” conjures up non-stop action, nail-gnawing suspense, unbearable tension, complete with surprises and revelations galore.  Smith is as charismatic as ever, but he isn’t mimicking his “Bad Boys” character Mike Lowery, a role that he plans to reprise in two forthcoming sequels: “Bad Boys Forever” and “Bad Boys 4.”  As veteran patrolman Daryl Ward, he is mired up to his neck in devastating debt, and his chief aim in life is to survive long enough to get his pension.  Meantime, Ward finds himself in a predicament like nothing any policeman has confronted.  The world of “Bright” is as gritty, violent, and racially charged as 21^st century America, but this imaginative epic takes place in an alternate universe where far-fetched creatures, such as Orcs, Fairies, Elves, and others have been co-existing with humans since the dawn of time.  Were it not for these extraordinary characters, “Bright” would amount to little more than another foray in urban crime.  Sadly, this inventive hokum suffers from two shortcomings.  First, predictable plotting undermines the outcome because Ayer and “Victor Frankenstein” scenarist Max Landis paint themselves into a corner. Second, the filmmakers provide only the most basic backstory about this bizarre new world.  Meantime, the original “Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” actress Noomi Rapace keeps things exciting as a demonic elf who tries to ice our heroes, while Edgar Ramirez is equally as tenacious as another kind of Elf with a badge. 

Patrolman Daryl Ward (Will Smith) isn’t ecstatic about having an Orc as his partner.  In the alternate universe of “Bright,” Orcs are savage, toothsome creatures who resemble a a synthesis of olive-skinned albinos and ghoulish vampire of the 1922 silent horror classic “Nosferatu.”  Basically, Orcs are blue-collar, bottom-feeders who stick together inseparably and rank beneath the most woebegone ethnic groups ravaged by poverty and racism.  Nick Jakoby (Joel Edgerton of “Smokin’ Aces”) is a typical Orc, and his fellow Orcs display nothing but contempt for him.  Since they have no use for him, Nick has no use for them.  Indeed, Nick has always dreamed of wearing a badge.  Imagine his surprise when his dream comes true, and the LAPD hires him on the grounds of diversity.  Meantime, Daryl is desperately trying to hold onto his job.  Unfortunately, riding with Nick is no bargain as Daryl discovers when out of nowhere a shotgun-wielding Orc blasts him with a shotgun.  Fortunately, Daryl survives, but he isn’t happy that he must resume riding with Nick.  Ward’s irate fellow police officers heap endless criticism on him for tolerating Nick. They argue that he should charge Nick for incompetency, so the LAPD will fire the rookie.  Daryl’s fellow officers fear that if Nick proves himself as a valuable contribution to the force, more Orcs will follow.

Word has spread like wildfire around Los Angeles about a virulent league of Elves known as the Inferni. Moreover, these Elves have been toiling to resurrect a renowned ‘Dark Lord’ warrior to subjugate mankind.  Legend has it the Inferni can with a magical wand deemed "a nuclear weapon that grants wishes." The Inferni are ranked as ‘bright’ because they can wield this wand.  Furthermore, accounts claim there may even be some humans who can brandish it.  Meanwhile, anybody else who dares to touch it is doomed to incinerate themselves before they can realize their dreams.  Daryl and Nick stumble onto a wand one evening in a hood when they respond to a shooting and find themselves in the middle of a supernatural showdown.  They help a renegade young Elf, Tikka (Lucy Fry of “Mr. Church”), who has slain another Inferni with that deadly incandescent wand.  Dumbfounded by these circumstances, Daryl summons his watch commander, Sergeant Ching (Margaret Cho of “One Missed Call”), and his fellow patrolmen, to make sense out of this uncanny situation.  No sooner have they arrived than the police see the wand as an answer to all their troubles.  Furthermore, they conspire to kill Daryl and Nick, so nobody will know how they acquired the wand.  Daryl turns the tables on them, then Nick and he realize they are now being stalked by a more formidable Inferni, Leilah (Noomi Rapace), who wants the wand and is prepared to kill anybody who gets in her way.  Indeed, Leilah is ten times more powerful than Tikka, and Leilah’s posse is pretty much indestructible, too.  If Daryl and Nick don’t have their hands full enough, they must contend with a crippled gangsta, Poison (Enrique Murciano of “Collateral Beauty”), who needs the wand, so he can walk again.  Poison rules an army of trigger-happy, machine-gun toting thugs.  Adding to the complications is another Elf, Kandomere (Edgar Ramirez of “Point Break”), a government agent who supervises a Federal Magic Task Force that wants the mysterious wand, too.

Director David Ayer rarely lets our embattled buddy cops catch their collective breath as they run a gauntlet consisting of the ruthless Inferni, Poison’s homicidal hellions, and corrupt LAPD officers.  Before everything works out for them, Daryl and Nick must dodge barrages of bullets and discover that the wand can resurrect the dead.  Ayer intersperses the careening car chases, harrowing shootouts, and high-octane explosions with plenty of exposition, so we learn little by little the amazing powers of the wand and the various characteristics of the heroes and villains. “Bright” delivers more than enough wattage to keep audiences enthralled before its obligatory feelgood ending

FILM REVIEW OF ''SICARIO" (2015)

“Prisoners” director Denis Villeneuve’s menacing manhunt melodrama “Sicario” (**** OUT OF ****) treats the war against drug cartels and their smuggling operations with even greater cynicism than even the recent David Ayer’s opus “Sabotage” with Arnold Schwarzenegger.  Imagine combining “Silence of the Lambs” with “Zero Dark Thirty,” and you’ve got the essence of this no-nonsense, atmospheric epic that boasts more shades of gray than black and white.  Emily Blunt plays a by-the-book FBI agent who wades into the murky depths of corruption and evil that threaten to undermine her sanity.  Josh Brolin and Oscar winner Benicio Del Toro co-star as the hardcases who need her shield so their shady business doesn’t violate the letter of the law.  “Sicario” isn’t a slick, superficial, standard-issue, shoot’em up with sensational stunts.  Primarily, “Sicario” argues that the best way to eliminate drug cartels is to fight fire with fire.  Similarly, “Sabotage” appropriated that attitude toward the cartels, but it lacked the credibility that “Sicario” delivers.  The good guys don’t wear white hats in “Sicario.”  They display the same conspicuous lack of regard for human life that their adversaries espouse.  You don’t walk out of “Sicario” feeling relieved so much as horrified by what it takes to conquer the evil that cartels do.  This spartan crime thriller features enough twists and turns to keep you guessing right up to its ending that may abrade your sense of moral rectitude.

“Sicario” opens with a bang as FBI agent Kate Macer (Emily Blunt of “Edge of Tomorrow”), her partner Reggie (Daniel Kaluuya), and the Bureau’s Kidnap Response Team smash into a residence in a sleepy little subdivision in sunny Arizona and discover the cartel has been using it as stash house.  They scramble inside to rescue hostages, but they find the walls of the house conceal 42 corpses like a contemporary catacomb.  Two agents tamper with a booby-trapped outside tool shed, and the explosion shreds them and flattens everybody else.  Afterward, a nonchalant guy in flip-flops, Matt Graver (Josh Brolin of “Gangster Squad”), schedules a meeting with Macer’s superior, Dave Jennings (Victor Gaber of “Argo”), and invites Kate to accompany an inter-agency task force bound for Mexico to pick up a cartel informant.  Macer signs up.  Later, she watches in horror as Graver and a convoy of black government SUVs careen into Juárez, Mexico.  Graver’s tight-lipped, second-in-command, Alejandro (Benicio Del Toro of “Savages”), warns Kate not to trust their Mexican Federal Police escort.  The naked bodies of dangling corpses garnish the perimeter of this eerie setting.  Everything boils down to pulling one individual, Guillermo Diaz (Edgar Arreola of “Machete”), out of a safe house and hauling him back across the border for interrogation.  Not surprisingly, the trip into Mexico is a picnic compared with the trip out.  The Task Force finds themselves snarled up in a traffic jam at the border crossing.  They aren’t entirely surprised when they spot cartel gunmen itching to waste them, and an inevitable shootout ensues.  Just as Alejandro warned Kate, the corrupt Mexican Federal Police side with the cartel gunmen and our anxious heroine takes out an MFP officer with well-aimed shots.  As suddenly as the shootout erupted, it concludes.

 

All is not what it appears, and Kate suspects that Graver is a really a CIA agent and Alejandro is a freelance enforcer.  “Nothing will make sense to your American ears,” Alejandro assures Kate. “And you will doubt everything that we do. But in the end you will understand.” Eventually, she realizes she is being used to lend Graver’s operation a semblance of legality.  When she confides her fears to his superior, Dave reassures Kate that everything is above-aboard and Graver’s mission has the blessings of highly placed elected officials.  Graver explains that Alejandro and he aim to create so much chaos within cartel ranks that the Mexicans will turn on themselves and start killing their own men. This strategy is designed to flush out an anonymous cartel chief whose identity remains a closely guarded secret. Alejandro promises Kate that exposure of this figure will prove catastrophic for this coldblooded criminal organization.  The biggest action scene in “Sicario” has Kate and company entering a covert cartel tunnel, shades of the Vin Diesel thriller “Fast Five,” and wiping out cartel henchmen in those subterranean depths with a clandestine army of SWAT shooters equipped with night vision technology.

“Sicario” qualifies as an impressive, but cynical crime movie.  Apart from the heroine and her partner, the protagonists are as unscrupulous as the villains that they keep in their gun sights.  Meantime, Kate Macer cannot believe that she has gotten herself trapped in this web of amorality.  As idealistic as she is, Kate believes in the rule of law, but she emerges tarnished mentally if not physically by the experience with Graver and Alejandro.  Although the talented Emily Blunt toplines this law & order saga, an unshaven Benicio Del Toro claims top honors as a PTSD-afflicted gunman.  He plays a former Mexican prosecutor who has suffered more than anybody.  The cartel decapitated his wife and drowned his young daughter in a vat of acid, so he shoots first unless he has to ask questions before he obliterates his enemies with lead.  Del Toro gives a smoldering performance.  Josh Brolin isn’t far behind as an enigmatic CIA agent who deals with every encounter with his adversaries as if he were a surfer gauging waves at the beach.  Nothing in “Sicario” comes off feeling contrived, glamour, and formulaic.  Canadian director Denis Villeneuve stages the action scenes at the border crossing and the tunnel with an impersonal air of solemnity.  British cinematographer Roger Deakins of “No Country for Old Men” depicts these escapades in dark, muted colors reminiscent of the classic Dutch painter Rembrandt that effectively captures the moral depravity perpetrated by the principals.  Watching a movie like “Sicario,” you have to wonder whether the wholesale legalization of narcotics—repellent as a solution might seem--wouldn’t offer greater salvation as a whole for everybody rather than futile free-for-all combat. 

FILM REVIEW OF ''KID RODELO" (U.S.-SPANISH 1966)

"Four Guns to the Border" director Richard Carlson helmed this thoroughly lackluster Louis L'Amour western "Kid Rodelo,"(** OUT OF ****) with Don Murray, Janet Leigh, and Oscar-winner Broderick Crawford.  This straightforward, humorless, horse opera concerns survival of the fittest on the frontier. Appropriately enough, lean, handsome Murray is cast as the virtuous hero, while paunchy, gravel-voiced Crawford excels a treacherous outlaw with an itchy trigger finger. Eventually, these two wind up on a rugged desert trail transporting $50-thousand in gold with remorseless Yaqui Indians shadowing them like vultures. The prison hires Yaquis to bring back escaped prisoners, and the Yaquis usually bring them back face down and draped across the saddles of their horses. Unlike the Rangers, the Yaquis need not bother with the same pesky jurisdictional issues that the Rangers must contend with when crossing the border into Mexico.  These Yaquis are particularly proficient at what they do, and their leader, Cavalry Hat (José Villasante of “Django the Condemned”), covets the hero's boots.  The only thing that distinguishes this western is the eponymous hero’s knowledge of desert plants, specifically cholla cactus with their poisonous spines which can lame a horse.

Kid Rodelo (Don Murray of "From Hell to Texas") has been released after serving a year inside Yuma Territorial Prison, while villainous Joe Harbin (Broderick Crawford of "All the King's Men") sweats out a life sentence because he shot his partner. Meantime, Harbin's accomplice, Thomas Reese (José Nieto of "Dr. Zhivago"), hatches a plan to break out of Yuma. He has stolen two wooden matches from the kitchen. Harbin and he toil in the stone quarry where they hammer holes into the rocks with a drill to insert dynamite to blast the formation. They plant some extra sticks of dynamite and all hell cuts loose. In the novel, Joe's accomplice is named Tom Badger and he survives until the finale, whereas Reese dies not long after they break out of prison. Anyway, Harbin and Reese take the Warden (Emilio Rodríguez) as a hostage to make good their escape. They shoot their way out of Yuma using the Warden as a shield and dump him once they have gotten away.

Now, they light out in hot pursuit of the Kid who has caught a ride with another some other suspicious characters who are conveniently watching for him to show up.  Link (Richard Carlson of "Creature from the Black Lagoon") and his girlfriend Nora (Janet Leigh of "Psycho") are waiting for the Kid as he trudges on foot along the trail from the prison.  Link wants the money, too, and he has hired another gunslinger, sleazy Balas (Julio Peña), to help him.  After they reach a largely abandoned town, Link and Balas enter a house and find a box concealed beneath the wooden floorboards.  They get into an argument over Balas' percentage of the loot.  The greedy Balas insists on a greater share and guns down Link without a qualm.  Later, Balas joins Joe after he guns down Reese, but they don’t trust each other.  Gopher (Alfonso Sanfélix) dies later after they have crossed the border.  Balas takes the gold piece that Joe gave Gopher after he made him a partner.  Balas suggests that they flip for the coin, and Joe grabs the coin before it hits the ground and appropriates it as his coin.  Eventually, Cavalry Hat picks off Joe as he is about to gun down Rodelo.

This threadbare oater was lensed on location in rugged Spain.  Strangely enough, the pinch-penny producers filmed this outdoors yarn in black & white.  This Paramount Pictures release seems unusual because most westerns by that time were photographed in color, even those old timer oaters that producer A.C. Lyles made.  "Badman's Territory" scenarist Jack Natteford departs drastically from the source material in at least one crucial respect, and this change might upset hardcore, morally rigidly, L’Amour fans.  For example, Link is named Jake, and Balas is named Clint.  Nevertheless, this is nothing compared with the outcome of the action and the disposal of the gold.  The characters amount largely to stereotypes as they did in the novel.  Like most L'Amour heroes, Kid Rodelo knows his way around the desert like an expert, particularly the whereabouts of water holes.  Carlson and Natteford exploit Rodelo’s environmental familiarity, such as knowing about the flora and fauna to keep them alive.  The performances are okay, while Leigh appears as little more than window dressing.  She does do one important thing at the end. This gritty western tries to imitate the Spaghetti westerns, but Carlson imparts little color or charisma.  The villains are cutthroat dastards, willing to kill anybody to keep from sharing the loot.  The simple Johnny Douglas orchestral score represents an exercise in minimalism.  The finale on the shore of the Gulf of Baja differs from most westerns because you don’t often see the action end on a beach.  Altogether, as a film, “Kid Rodelo” doesn’t surpass the L’Amour novel despite the scenic splendor of the Spanish landscape and the obvious amoral Spaghetti western influence on the ending.  The chief difference between the novel and the film is Rodelo planned to return the gold to the authorities to clear his name for his supposed part in the robbery.  In the novel, he was arrested because he was caught riding with Joe, but Rodelo didn’t know anything about the robbery. The film concludes with Rodelo and Nora bathing in the surf then walking off as permanent partners.

FILM REVIEW OF ''THE TERMINATOR'' (1984)

"Piranha 2: The Spawning" director James Cameron scored his first major cinematic success with "The Terminator" (*** OUT OF ****), a gritty, but gripping low-budget science fiction horror actioneer about time travel with a curious twist. Austrian body builder Arnold Schwarzenegger virtually guaranteed that this 107 minute exercise in murder and mayhem would qualify as a blockbuster with his villainous, straight-faced portrayal of a relentless cyborg that allows nothing to stand between it and its programmed objective of executing a woman, Sarah Connor, in the past. The chief science fiction element in Cameron's film is the use of predestination paradox where it appears that history is being altered, when in fact, it is really being fulfilled. Cameron rehashed much of the "Terminator" action in his superior sequel, but he made the Schwarzenegger more sympathetic by having him serve as young John Connor's bodyguard in the follow-up film. Ironically, this $6-million plus movie wasn't that original because cybernetic organisms have been around in fantasy literature as early as Edgar Allan Poe. Nevertheless, "The Terminator" put cyborgs on the map more than "The Six-Million Dollar Man" and eventually inspired the "Robocop" franchise.

"The Terminator" opens in Los Angeles in 2029 A.D., at night while enemy Hunter Killer hovercraft prowl the post-apocalyptic rubble of the city for human prey. Heavy combat vehicles with massive treads crush hundreds of human skulls into powder while human survivors exchange fire with skeletal metal terminators with fiery red eyes. A preamble of sorts comes up and sets the scene: "The machines rose from the ashes of the nuclear fire. Their war to exterminate mankind had raged for decades, but the final battle would not be fought in the future. It would be fought here in our present . . . tonight." The actual story unfolds at 1:52 AM when a garbage truck driver watches crackling blue plasma-type waves envelope him and his vehicle.

A garbage truck operator is emptying trash bins when a plasma-like web of jagged blue lighting bolts envelopes his vehicle and shuts the vehicle down. He flees when the T-101 Terminator assassin (Arnold Schwarzenegger of "Conan") appears naked out of nowhere. Skynet has dispatched the T-101 from the future back to the year 1984 to assassinate the mother of resistance leader John Connor. The naked T-101 saunters up to three punks at the Griffith Park Observatory overlooking Los Angeles. An obnoxious, blue-haired punk (Bill Paxton of "Aliens" and "Twister") and his friend (veteran heavy Brian Thompson of "Sudden Impact" and "Cobra") ridicule the T-101. The Terminator kills both of them while the third strips off his clothing. Meanwhile, elsewhere in L.A., another naked man, Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn of "The Rock") materializes from the future. He steals a homeless man's pants, evades the L.A.P.D., breaks into a clothing store, steals Nike sneakers and a trench coat. Whereas the T-101 wants to kill Sarah, Kyle sets out to save this damsel-in-distress! Not surprisingly, young Sarah Connor doesn't have a clue that anybody yearns to either murder her or save her.

Sarah works at a fast-food restaurant. The T-101 finds three Sarah Connors in the L.A. phone book and kills the first two and then invades Sarah's apartment and kills her roommate Ginger and Matt (Rick Rossovich of "Top Gun") her boyfriend. Eventually, Sarah discovers what is happening and holes up at the Tech Noir nightclub where the T-101 tracks her down. Kyle Reese rescues Sarah, and they flee, but the L.A.P.D. capture them.  Reese has to cough up his far-fetched story to a by pompous psychologist Dr. Peter Silberman (Earl Boen of "Alien Nation") who doesn't believe a syllable of his saga. Silberman diagnoses Reese as suffering from paranoid delusions and boasts that he make a career out of analyzing the guy's stories. During Reese's interrogation scene at police headquarters with Silberman, Cameron and co-writers Gale Ann Hurd and an uncredited William Wisher, Jr., provide audiences with crucial expository information about Skynet and the war with the cyborgs that seek to annihilate mankind.

The bulk of "The Terminator" concerns the T-101's tireless efforts to kill Sarah while Reese struggles to lead her to safety. During their flight, Reese and Sarah become romantically involved and Reese gets Sarah pregnant with future resistance leader John Connor. Talk about twisted time travel?! Cameron intersperses a flashback to the future where a T-101 (Schwarzenegger's pal Franco Columbu of "Beretta's Island") invades a resistance bunker and goes on a murderous rampage before he is eliminated. Throughout the blazing action sequences, Cameron gradually strips the T-101 down to its alloyed metal endoskeleton. Reese explains to Silberman that a Terminator is a cyborg, half-man, and half-machine that will never stop until it kills Sarah. Everybody at the police station regards Reese as a fruit cake with his unbelievable story until the T-101 shows up with an arsenal of weapons and shoots up the premises, killing at least 17 cops. Reese and Sarah escape, hid out in a motel where they build pipe bombs, but the resourceful T-101 finds Sarah's mother, kills her off-screen, and imitates her so that it can learn Sarah's whereabouts. Another ramped up chase ensues with the T-101 caught in a blazing 18-wheeler. The fire scorches its entire body in the last 15 minutes so that all that remains is the skeleton. Reese dies blowing the skeleton in two. The torso of the T-101 continues to stalk Sarah until she crushes it in a tool manufacturing factory so that only the hand and forearm, which appears in the sequel "Terminator 2: Judgment Day." James Cameron has more road trip action in this thriller than actual science fiction, but the action-packed scenes more than deliver their quota of thrills and chills. One of the earliest scenes in a pawnshop has the T-101 gathering an arsenal of hardware from an unsuspecting clerk (Dick Miller) and then killing him instead of paying for it. The "I'll be back" scene at the police station massacre is probably the best scene in this supercharged little spine-tingler.

FILM REVIEW OF ''HOMEFRONT" (2013)

Don’t let the title of the latest Jason Statham thriller “Homefront” (*** OUT OF ****) deceive you.  This is no soap opera about life in the boondocks.  “Things To Do In Denver When You’re Dead” director Gary Fleder and “Cobra” scenarist Sylvester Stallone should have entitled it “Hell On A Bayou.”  This exciting but formulaic revenge saga pits a retired DEA Agent against a murderous bunch of bikers and rednecks who resemble the hellions in the “Sons of Anarchy” television series.  Naturally, Statham plays the conscientious DEA Agent who witnessed a gross miscarriage of justice that his superior defends as ‘protocol.’  After an explosive drug bust at a New Orleans’ nightclub, our undercover hero’s brothers-in-blue mow down a clueless biker in a fusillade of gunfire.  Apparently, they suspected that the poor slob was reaching for a concealed weapon during a stand-off.  The blood-splattered experience sickened our protagonist enough that he resigned from the agency and settled down in a two-bit Louisiana town to raise his young daughter.  While he wants to put as much distance between his past as he can, our hero doesn’t realize that escaping his bullet-riddled past is easier said than done.  Basically, “Homefront” shares a lot in common with a witness relocation thriller, except the hero here is a cop rather than an eye-witness.  Stallone adapted Chuck Logan’s novel, but the filmmakers have altered the setting from Minnesota to Louisiana.  A former Vietnam veteran, Logan has published eight novels about his protagonist Phil Broker, and “Homefront” appeared in print back in 2009.  As it turns out, “Homefront” provides Statham with an ideal vehicle, and its rural setting and dastardly villains have the flavor of an Elmore Leonard novel.  Co-stars James Franco, Winona Ryder, Clancy Brown, Kate Bosworth, and Frank Grillo constitute a first-class cast for this gritty, hard-boiled, methamphetamine melodrama.

Everything goes wrong for our hero when his nine-year old daughter Maddy (newcomer Izabela Vidovic) picks on the wrong bully at her elementary school.  Fat Teddy Klum (Austin Craig) not only steals Maddy’s baseball cap, but he also terrorizes the willowy little darling on the playground.  Maddy warns Teddy twice to hand her cap back, but Teddy chuckles contemptuously at the defiant little waif.  Imagine Teddy’s surprise when Maddy socks him in the snout and knocks him on his obese butt!  Phil Broker (Jason Statham of “Safe”) is remodeling a house with his African-American partner Teedo (Omar Benson Miller of “8 Mile”) when he receives a call from the Rayville Elementary School.  School psychologist Susan Hetch (Rachelle Lefevre of “Twilight”) briefs Broker about the incident, and Sheriff Keith Rodrigue (Clancy Brown of “Highlander”) struggles to keep Teddy’s mom Cassie Bodine Klum (Kate Bosworth of “Straw Dogs”) off Broker’s back.  When she cannot slap Broker around, Cassie incites her husband Jimmy (Marcus Hester of “Lawless”) to rough him up.  Broker puts Jimmy out of action with the ease of a kung fu master, and the sheriff wonders where our hero got his training.  Later, Cassie resorts to her scumbag brother, Gator (James Franco of “Spring Breakers”), to take care of Broker.  Teedo warns Broker that Gator operates a local meth factory and discourages any competitors by informing on them to Sheriff Rodrigue.  Gator burglarizes Broker’s remote house in the middle of the woods and stumbles upon Broker’s files from his DEA days.  Furthermore, he discovers Broker was the anonymous snitch that sent Outcast motorcycle gang member Danny T Turrie (Chuck Zito of “Carlito’s Way”) to prison and put the first of the 47 bullets into Danny’s worthless son Jojo (Linds Edwards) on the street in New Orleans.  Gator concocts a hare-brained scheme with low-life waitress Sheryl Marie Mott (Winona Ryder of “Heathers”) to alert the Outcasts about Broker’s whereabouts.  Gator dreams in his naive mind that the Outcasts will repay him for his friendly little tip by helping him distribute his meth.  Outcast motorcycle chieftain Cyrus Hanks (Frank Grillo of “Disconnect”) and his best bangers roll into Rayville with payback on their brains. Meanwhile, our hero realizes that he is living in a land where feuding is a way of life.  At the last minute, after Gator has stolen Maddy’s pet kitten, Broker smells the stench of murder in the air and tries to clear out.  Unfortunately, our hero doesn’t get far before he discovers that there is too much lead in the air for him to hightail it without jeopardizing his daughter’s life.  

Mind you, “Homefront” would be just another entertaining but predictable shoot’em up, but director Gary Fleder has assembled a knock-out cast of celebrity talent and orchestrated some crowd pleasing action scenes.  James Franco plays Statham’s grinning redneck adversary with gusto galore.  At one point, he chides Phil Broker because our hero doesn’t “smell the wood burning” and “cannot connect the dots.”  Winona Ryder gives an electrifying performance as Gator’s scummy ex-convict accomplice who served time for smuggling narcotics into Angola Prison.  Topping both Franco and Ryder is sexy Kate Bosworth of “Straw Dogs” and “Blue Crush” as a housewife hooked on meth who ridicules her husband into doing what she cannot.  Seasoned character actor Clancy Brown emerges from the background a corrupt local sheriff who behaves with more discretion than the usual paid-off politician.  Essentially, nobody gives a bad performance in “Homefront,” and the children are incredibly convincing, too.  Of course, Fleder and Stallone shoot the works, and Statham displays his usual physical prowess.  Basically, if you enjoy watching the “Transporter” kick the crap out of his antagonists after they threaten his daughter, you’ll enjoy “Homefront.”  The close encounter combat sequence between our hero and two thugs at a local gas station is hilariously violent.  Statham is quickly turning into the new Steven Segal with the effortless aplomb with which he dispatches his opponents.  Dutch lenser Theo van de Sande’s cinematography of the swampy Louisiana locations is simply gorgeous; Sande shot the Wesley Snipes vampire opus “Blade.”  Clocking in at a nimble 100 minutes, “Homefront” never wears out its welcome.

FILM REVIEW OF ''THE COMANCHEROS" (1961)

John Wayne plays 'Big' Jake Cutter, a seasoned Texas Rangers captain, searching for an army of desperadoes in "Casablanca" director Michael Curtiz's "The Comancheros" (**** OUT OF ****) who are selling rifles, ammunition, and whiskey to Indians that have turned the border into a battlefield. This top-notch frontier fracas co-starred Stuart Whitman and Ian Balin along with a veteran cast of supporting players, including Bruce Cabot, Jack Elam, Michael Ansara, Edgar Buchanan, Henry Daniell, Lee Marvin, Richard Devon, and Nehemiah Persoff. "The Comancheros" turned out to be Curtiz's final film, and the legendary Hungarian helmer, who had been celebrated for his malapropisms, was ill throughout most of the lensing. Nevertheless, Wayne made sure that he received sole directorial credit.If you look carefully, you'll spot at least one Curtiz shot that only he could have envisaged. When Wayne makes his entrance, his shadow is reflected off the wall before we see him walk into the shot. William H. Clothier's sprawling widescreen Cinemascope photography, "Angel and the Badman" scribe James Edward Grant's memorable dialogue, and "Ten Commandants" composer Elmer Bernstein's epic orchestral score all to bolster this exciting action-packed horse opera above the usual run-of-the-mill oater.

The action unfolds 1843 in Louisiana when Paul Regret (Stuart Whitman) guns down an opponent in a duel. Regret observes ruefully that had his opponent not moved, he would have only have winged him. Since the dead man was Judge Bouvier's son, one of the dueling referees assures Regret that he will swing from the gallows after he surrenders to the law. Regret clears out of Louisiana and boards a riverboat. A beautiful young woman, Pilar Graile (Ian Balin of "Charro"), pursues Regret. They dance and retire to her bedroom. “What passes between us tonight has nothing to do with love,” Pilar clarifies their status.  An incredulous Regret wonders, “You don’t believe there’s such a thing as love?”  Pilar cherishes no illusions about love.  “I believe this very night all over the world, men and women are saying to each other, “I love you,” when what theyreally mean is, “I desire you.”  The riverboat docks in Galveston, and Regret awakens to find himself handcuffed and under arrest. Captain Jake Cutter points out that the state of Louisiana wants to extradite Regret, and they embark on their on-again, off-again journey. They ride across a ranch where hostile Indians have massacred all the occupants. Cutter and Regret bury the family, and Cutter turns his back for a moment on Regret. The gentlemen who wears $300 dollar suit clobbers Cutter with a spade and then hightails it.

  
Cutter recovers, suffers derision when he shows up at the Rangers' Headquarters riding a mule. He learns Major Henry (Bruce Cabot of "King Kong") has an assignment for him. The Rangers have nabbed a gun runner recently released from Yuma Territorial Prison, McBain (Guinn 'Big Boy' Williams of "Santa Fe Trail'), who has a rendezvous with a member of the Comancheros in the town of Sweetwater. “You want me to take his place, take those guns to Sweetwater and meet the contact men,” Cutter figures out what Henry wants him to do.  Cutter goes undercover as McBain and encounters a sinister, uncouth gunman, Tully Crow (Lee Marvin of "Attack"), and transacts a deal for a six crates of repeating rifle. Crow appears as menacing as he acts. Scar tissue covers part of his skull where the Indians scalped him. Crow like doesn't Cutter.  Later in the evening, Crow has a falling out with Cutter because the former believes that the latter has cheated him at poker. One of the participants is Paul Regret, but Regret keeps his mouth shut about Cutter's real occupation. When Cutter tries to leave the table, Crow pulls his six-gun, and Cutter shoots him stone dead. No sooner has Cutter gunned down Crow than he re-arrests Regret.

On the way to headquarters, Cutter runs into Major Henry and the Rangers at the Schofield grain ranch of his good friend, Pa (Bob Steele of "The Big Sleep"), who is preparing to move his family into town until the Indians abandon the warpath. Cutter has Regret cuffed to a blacksmith's anvil. After Major Henry and his platoon of Rangers ride out, the Indians attack. During the battle, Regret catches a horse and rides away. Texas Rangers' newbie Tobe (Patrick Wayne of "The Searchers") points out to Jake that his prisoner has gotten away again, but both men react with surprise when Regret returns with Major Henry and the Texas Rangers. After saving the Schofields from rampaging Indians, Cutter and Major Henry are reluctant it to expedite the well-dressed young gentleman to Louisiana lawmen. Instead, Cutter and Henry persuade Circuit Court Judge Thaddeus Jackson Breen (Edgar Buchanan of "Texas") to sign and swear to a statement that Regret is a Texas Ranger and cannot be arrested. Jake and Regret set out to find the men who supply the guns to a secret society of smugglers. Not long after they venture off into the arid, mountain-ribbed wilderness does a band of Indians Chief Iron Shirt (George J. Lewis of "Saskatchewan") over take them and escort them to the hidden camp of the gunrunners. Graile (Nehemiah Persoff of "The Badlanders") has Cutter and Regret tied up and left to bake in the blistering sun when her headstrong daughter demands that Cutter and hebe released. Secretly, Pilar knows about Cutter being a Texas Ranger, but she doesn't confide this privileged information to anybody. Initially, Graile wants to hang Cutter and Regret because anybody who enters their 'secret society must die before they can leave. Pilar intervenes on behalf of the good guys and warns her father that his evil ways aren't going to last much longer.

In the last ten minutes of "The Comancheros," when everything looks bleak for our heroes, Major Henry and his troop of Texas Rangers thunder to the rescue and scatter the few remaining Indians. "The Comancheros" ranks as one of John Wayne's best westerns with an inspired Elmer Bernstein score that captures the outdoors majesty of the mountainous scenery. Wayne's running gag where he refers to Regret as 'Mon-soor' is hilarious. There is more than enough gunplay for dyed-in-the-leather western fans. Action director Cliff Lyons stages several vast battles between men on horseback. "The Comancheros" qualifies as one of Wayne's best straightforward western as well as a must-see John Wayne aficionados.