20140319: Action Review--Kill em All

Kill 'em All

1. Fundamentals, reception.
1. American live action feature length film, 2012, 86 minutes, action.
2. IMDB: 4.4/10.0 from 902 audience ratings. Estimated budget, 3.2 million USD.
3. Rotten Tomatoes: 'No reviews yet...' and 26% liked it from 83 audience ratings.
4. Netflix: 3.4/5.0 from 166,682 audience ratings.
5. Directed by: Raimund Huber.
6. Starring: Johnny Messner as Gabriel, Gordon Liu as Snakehead, Ammara Siripong as Som, Tim Man as The Kid, Rashid Phoenix as Mickey, Joe Lewis as Carpenter.


2. Setup and Plot
1. Set in Thailand.  A number of martial artists/assassins are drugged by one means or another, then kidnapped and placed in a prison/gladiator building.  The room where they wake up is where they get to fight to the death.   That is, the eight of them fight until seven are dead, and perhaps one is alive.  First a voice from outside the room introduces them and berates them one at a time.  The voice sees to it that one of them is killed just to be able to say, 'obey or die.'


2. There is a fatal encounter, then there is a box lunch session marked by stupid conversations, with the obligatory open mouthed sloppy eating.  Then there is a second fatal encounter.  The winners of the two fights get to choose weapons from a room off to the side.


3. Then they are supposed to sleep.  Right.  After more fatalities, a few break out of the room and start exploring the building.  There are more fighters from the 'cabal.'  The protagonists have to deal with them before the boss.


4. Lots of fighting.  Some trash talking.  Who cares.


5. Does anyone get out alive?  Do they defeat the boss?


3. Conclusions
1. One line summary: Terrible acting, screenplay in martial arts film set in Thailand.
2. One star of five.  Two black holes for acting and screenplay.


4. Scores
1. Cinematography: 5/10 Footage from many crappy locations.  Odd camera angles used to lessen one's enjoyment of the visuals.  Visual quality is a bit better than VHS most of the time.  Sometimes we view the movie from the CCTV view point of the observer who tells the fighters the rules.  Wretched colour palettes.


2. Sound: 4/10 Sound levels suck.  If the sound is set to withstand the overly loud poor choices of music, then conversation cannot be heard.


3. Acting: 0/10 Uniformly and completely absent.  The people in the film look athletic, but are not actors in any sense.


4. Screenplay: 0/10 Ridiculous fight choreography.  Dialog that is beyond stupid.