"Hostage" - this is the director's eighth collaboration Isaac Florentine и Scott Adkins, who gave the world an undeniable hit about Yuri Boyka and a good duology "Ninja". Despite the fact that these films are the best films of Florentine and Adkins, in Florentine's filmography you can find quite good old-school action films: "Savat" with Olivier Gruner (1995), "Rebel" with Gary Daniels (1999) "Battle of Dragons" with Dolph Lungren (1999), "Special Assignment" with ZhKVD (2008) and "Vow of silence" with Antonio Banderas (2017). In a word, Isaac Florentine in the world of B-category action films, he has long established himself as a filmmaker of a certain quality, from whom you can expect a very good action movie for the evening, and in the case of “Undisputed” and “Ninja” in general, standard fighting games for your personal movie collection.
From a certain point Scott Adkins with varying success became in demand from another director - the great and terrible Jesse Johnson with whom he has already managed to make 4 films in 6 years. But unfortunately, such productivity is not particularly encouraging, since Johnson has proven himself to be unstable in terms of quality. A director who cannot pull off a project like "Triple Threat" with the coolest cast of action movie stars, but he can shoot two films a year “for an evening with beer.” And if we compare Florentine with Johnson, then, in terms of quality, Isaac WAS a cut above Jesse, or even at least two, if we talk about the action component, which is the main one in the action genre. But what happened was... No one expected it, but you can imagine that after watching Florentine’s new film you will suddenly find out that Jesse Johnson is not so bad, and in some places he’s even good!
So, "Hostage" directed by Isaac Florentine. Synopsis: The son of a former special forces agent is kidnapped in order to use his fighting skills in the fight against rival cartels through blackmail.
Already at the stage of reading the plot and watching the trailer, it becomes clear that the film will consist of clichés upon clichés. But we, fans of action films, are no strangers to this, as we have already seen many retired special forces soldiers and agents whose son/daughter is kidnapped, their wife is killed, or their dog is stolen, for whom they will have to fight. If only the action was cool. Yes, every second action movie has similar patterns in the plot, and if "John Wick" not only was it able to extricate itself from this primitive plot scheme, but also to become, to some extent, a cult action movie with a character with its own interesting and bottomless universe, from which a series can be made. But in case "Hostage" - this is several steps back both for Florentine personally and for the genre as a whole.
Okay, a simple and banal plot is far from uncommon in action films, but the most important thing is not what is filmed, but HOW it is filmed. Any plot can be enhanced by other aspects - good filming and editing of cool action, dosed addition of humor, a charismatic villain, a couple of funny characters... And that's all - we have already forgotten that all this noise is only because of the kidnapped child from the GG. But no, everything is serious here... And this is Florentine’s main mistake. Well, nowadays you can’t shoot such stories without a bit of self-irony and originality. The film has neither of those things, nor does it have cool action or charismatic villains, and Scott Adkins still plays Scott Adkins, even though we know he's a good actor who can play relatively varied roles.
As you watch, a comment may arise: well, everything can’t be so formulaic and unoriginal, the cinematic bottom has long been reached, this is Florentine after all - everything will pay off with action, beautiful and clear plans and angles, appropriate slow-mo and what something else. But no, the further you look, the more you understand what crisis the director has found himself in. From the very beginning of the film, one notices the cheapness of the visuals, the lack of individual color grading, very cheap and inappropriate visual effects in some scenes, cliched characters, cliched dialogues, the pretense and falseness of everything that happens.
What about the action? Everything here is standard for most films with Scott, absolutely nothing new in the fight choreography: the hero is attacked by inept no-names, flying off with one or two blows from Adkins; there are no real pyrotechnics in the shootouts - everything is as usual depicted in the After Effect; no global scenes, chases, explosions, stunts. By the end of the film there was no hope left except one: maybe Adkins' final fight with Uriah Hall - a famous and spectacular MMA fighter from the world's best promotion UFC, will turn out well, because in old action films the bets were always placed on the final showdown, which took weeks. But even here a miracle did not happen, to put it mildly, and when watching the final showdown there is a chance of breaking your face with an attack of facepalms. No, not because the staging was bad, everything started well: two bright and worthy opponents finally came together, there was a drive, full contact, confrontation, Thai clinches, knees, roundhouse kicks. The fight had just begun, but for some reason the director thought that they had enough screen time and began to simultaneously show the fight of the main antagonist and his woman against the bandits. Scott quickly became an MMA master, and the fight between the main villain and his woman goes on and on, unfairly taking up screen time. Why show that the main boss’s woman also knows how to fight, and the main boss himself, if they don’t even have to fight the main character? We actually wanted to see Scott Adkins and Uriah Hall fight. And why did Adkins kill everyone without thinking, but left the main villain alive - the main cause of all the problems, who kidnapped his son and used him for his own dirty purposes, only on the basis that he promised not to kill his son and did not? The final dialogue and the denouement in general completely knock out the cinema aesthete.
If the last joint film of Isaac and Scott "Close quarters" (2015) to put it mildly, also did not shine with originality, but it paid for itself with action, then "Hostage" - this is a few more steps back for Florentine as a director. This is the most mediocre, unoriginal, empty, formulaic and unnecessary action film not only of this year, but probably in the entire history of combat cinema. In any case, against its background it is difficult to remember something more mediocre and unoriginal. In the 90s one could forgive a lot of things about the film, but not now.
Looking at the overall quality of the film, one gets the feeling that Florentine was supposed to make another film under his contract with the studio bosses, but he had a deadline and only had a week left, and also his son was taken hostage, and he was in quarantine..., but you need to take it off...
Jesse Johnson - all hope is now on you! ( No )
Yes, people, what's with the gravatars, huh? I log in to the service, look - I have all the soap boxes with their own pictures, and then they show a standard silhouette, and in the admin they say: if you want to change it, change the gravatar.
Wave,
Let's decide. Everything will be beautiful, but not right away.
Hmmm. It's a pity.