I keep seeing a lot of praise for this film, saying it's "the best action movie ever seen". It's either they haven't watch that many action films or all the hype train is blindly choo-chooing around Gareth Evans whose work I recall was included in V/H/S/2 (2013). Maybe it's the result of such a low budget production that's sending off the horns here. After all, the entire movie takes place in that one old building seen in the movie poster anyway, kinda like Die Hard (1988). So I rented this on VUDU recently, and thought it was just good. The gritty nature of it is very typical to look at, that bland "Call of Duty" look or even that Dredd (2011) movie. Parts of the film and its premise reminded me of Tony Jaa's Ong-Bak series with the flying elbows and flying knees, while certain notable scenes (where the first bullet shot sends off an array of mayhem) reminded me a little bit of OLDBOY (2003); that grenade in the refrigerator is just like in Die Hard; and how the SWAT team head on upwards the building reminded me of infected going up that building in [REC] (2007)/Quarantine (2008). I do however very well respect how the main characters prefer fists over gun when they fight as a way of honor, a code to true fighters alike, which made me think of things like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. Tony Jaa, Donnie Yen, Jackie Chan, Jet Li all represent their country's action flick counterparts as does The Raid series for Indonesia. Give it a go if you're looking for more of that modern fist-pumping Asian action flick.
Review by RothSothyBlockedParent2016-11-23T05:45:20Z
I keep seeing a lot of praise for this film, saying it's "the best action movie ever seen". It's either they haven't watch that many action films or all the hype train is blindly choo-chooing around Gareth Evans whose work I recall was included in V/H/S/2 (2013). Maybe it's the result of such a low budget production that's sending off the horns here. After all, the entire movie takes place in that one old building seen in the movie poster anyway, kinda like Die Hard (1988).
So I rented this on VUDU recently, and thought it was just good. The gritty nature of it is very typical to look at, that bland "Call of Duty" look or even that Dredd (2011) movie. Parts of the film and its premise reminded me of Tony Jaa's Ong-Bak series with the flying elbows and flying knees, while certain notable scenes (where the first bullet shot sends off an array of mayhem) reminded me a little bit of OLDBOY (2003); that grenade in the refrigerator is just like in Die Hard; and how the SWAT team head on upwards the building reminded me of infected going up that building in [REC] (2007)/Quarantine (2008). I do however very well respect how the main characters prefer fists over gun when they fight as a way of honor, a code to true fighters alike, which made me think of things like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. Tony Jaa, Donnie Yen, Jackie Chan, Jet Li all represent their country's action flick counterparts as does The Raid series for Indonesia. Give it a go if you're looking for more of that modern fist-pumping Asian action flick.