In a way, this looks like a reworking of an old noir, "Street With No Name," or, if you like, Sam Fuller's "House of Bamboo," which has the same plot.
An undercover cop, in this case an investigator for the Army's Justice Department or whatever it is, is inserted into a suspected gang to get enough evidence on them to convict. In previous versions the gang were thieves. Here the unit consists of a handful of moral zealots. They execute soldiers who, in their judgment and in the judgment of a contact they have in the higher echelons, are guilty of some serious criminal act (a brutal rape and the theft of army weapons are used as examples). When the "target" has been selected, he is abducted by the gang, taken to the kind of densely wooded area where dead bodies are always found, and given ten seconds to run like hell before the Furies pursue him, blasting away with the ugliest guns you ever saw. The target having died what the reigning Lt. Colonel (James Remar) calls "a warrior's death," the body is buried and the next target selected. Oh -- and they also execute anybody who hesitates to perform his mission. In the end they all meet warriors' deaths, except the undercover cop.
The movie frankly sucks. All the soldiers are bulked up and carry their frames on huge bone structures. Yet when they punch and kick hell out of each other in training or for real, nobody bleeds. Nobody's even out of breath. Melissa Lewis, as Lee, the only woman in the group, turns out to have the heart of a marshmallow after all and receives a warrior's death from Col. Strauss. That is to say, she is shot full of holes for letting the undercover cop (Antonio Sabato) get away. Lewis is a beautiful woman and cannot act. She does have a nice uncomplicated, not to say unmotivated, sex scene with Sabato, which is the reason I suppose that a woman had to be a member of the unit. I can think of no other reason. She's a tough babe alright, but I don't see her standing up in toe-to-toe combat with Goose, a mean, bald black guy the size of Godzilla who could crunch one of her long bones between two fingers.
I said she can't act, but I don't mean to single her out. Nobody can act. Not even the players in featured bit parts. Except James Remar. He has a level, husky voice and a stern demeanor. Now, this may be all the talent he can muster -- I don't know -- but it fits the role rather well.
On the whole, you might consider skipping this and renting "Street With No Name." This one has more exploding fireballs and exploding heads but "Street With No Name" is far more exciting.
An undercover cop, in this case an investigator for the Army's Justice Department or whatever it is, is inserted into a suspected gang to get enough evidence on them to convict. In previous versions the gang were thieves. Here the unit consists of a handful of moral zealots. They execute soldiers who, in their judgment and in the judgment of a contact they have in the higher echelons, are guilty of some serious criminal act (a brutal rape and the theft of army weapons are used as examples). When the "target" has been selected, he is abducted by the gang, taken to the kind of densely wooded area where dead bodies are always found, and given ten seconds to run like hell before the Furies pursue him, blasting away with the ugliest guns you ever saw. The target having died what the reigning Lt. Colonel (James Remar) calls "a warrior's death," the body is buried and the next target selected. Oh -- and they also execute anybody who hesitates to perform his mission. In the end they all meet warriors' deaths, except the undercover cop.
The movie frankly sucks. All the soldiers are bulked up and carry their frames on huge bone structures. Yet when they punch and kick hell out of each other in training or for real, nobody bleeds. Nobody's even out of breath. Melissa Lewis, as Lee, the only woman in the group, turns out to have the heart of a marshmallow after all and receives a warrior's death from Col. Strauss. That is to say, she is shot full of holes for letting the undercover cop (Antonio Sabato) get away. Lewis is a beautiful woman and cannot act. She does have a nice uncomplicated, not to say unmotivated, sex scene with Sabato, which is the reason I suppose that a woman had to be a member of the unit. I can think of no other reason. She's a tough babe alright, but I don't see her standing up in toe-to-toe combat with Goose, a mean, bald black guy the size of Godzilla who could crunch one of her long bones between two fingers.
I said she can't act, but I don't mean to single her out. Nobody can act. Not even the players in featured bit parts. Except James Remar. He has a level, husky voice and a stern demeanor. Now, this may be all the talent he can muster -- I don't know -- but it fits the role rather well.
On the whole, you might consider skipping this and renting "Street With No Name." This one has more exploding fireballs and exploding heads but "Street With No Name" is far more exciting.
