Overview
The lone surviving thief of a violent armored car robbery is sprung from a high security facility and administered an experimental drug.
If you haven’t heard of this movie you should count your blessings. It’s an abomination. An action movie starring Sylvester Stallone and Matthew Modine doesn’t necessarily guarantee you’re in for something great, but you’d be forgiven for expecting at least something watchable.
Macdonald (Matthew Modine) survives a shoot-out after a heist gone wrong, but he has lost his memory and spends many a year in prison without knowing what really went on. Officer Sykes (Sylvester Stallone) was originally on the case and has kept a close eye on it as it went cold and colder. When Macdonald is sprung from prison after seven years, Sykes gets some help from the FBI to help track him down. The chase is on while Macdonald’s liberators help him regain his memories by means of some experimental drugs in order to help him figure out where he hid the money from the heist.
Cue an hour of watching Modine acting out his agony as the drugs do their painful work and his memories slowly and partially return, whilst the bullets begin to fly around them. Will they find the money? Will Sykes catch them before they can get away with it?
Who cares. This must be one of the most boring A-list-touting B-movies ever made. Actually, calling it a B-movie is too generous. It’s poorly directed by Brian A. Miller, who so far has taken up the director’s chair on four other movies, with respective Rotten Tomatoes ratings of 0% (Reprisal with Bruce Willis), 4% (Vice, again with Bruce Willis), 0% (The Prince, with -you guessed it- Bruce Willis) and 5% (The Outsider, with James Caan). Who on earth funds these things and why would Sly Stallone want to work with him you ask. The mysteries of Hollywood. Maybe it’s some kind of money laundering scheme for aging action stars?
Failing to make up for a thin plot, Modine’s acting is terribly annoying and Stallone’s is terribly lazy. The cinematography and camera work is at the level of an 80s tv show like The A Team, and the score is so bad it’s hard to believe anyone got paid for it. If you haven’t left the cinema, fallen asleep, or switched your tv off long before, this all culminates in a finale that is as weak as it is welcome to end the suffering.
Maybe there is one redeeming feature after all – it seems to solidify Brian A. Miller’s track record of making abominable movies, so you know to avoid them in the future.
★☆☆☆☆
