Wu Assassins

Surprise! You are now the chosen one!

One day a regular chef (Iko Uwais) randomly bumps into his destiny - granting him supernatural abilities (one of which is to make himself look like Mark Dacascos) and a quest to defeat all the elemental users known as Wu. As if dealing with the triad wasn't bad enough!

Some really good martial arts skills on display in this show.

While the triad / personal parts of this tale are passable, the whole concept of the Wu part and what they are trying to do is really flaky which they try to make up for by having some nice martial arts fight scenes. I'm almost inclined to say that it might have been better without the supernatural bit.

Anyway, this is squarely aimed at die hard martial arts (or Iko Uwais) fans - everyone else should probably just stay away. I give it 1.5 turtle shells out of 5.

John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

Folks still don't know to just leave him alone.

Picking up directly after the last movie, John (Keanu Reeves) is on borrowed time as a bounty is put on his head which sees spades of assassins hunting him down. There is brutal action a plenty as well as great fight scenes against various foes including one played by Mark Dacascos who is quite funny.

Because there are still bullets and people to put them in!

All up a very violently entertaining film with a plot no deeper than ankle height, just like the previous movies. Hence the short review! If you liked John Wick's previous adventures then this is a must see. If you didn't then stay away as it is more of the same. I give it 4 battle dogs out of 5!

Brotherhood of the Wolf

Hunting the most dangerous prey.

This French film follows a knight (Samuel Le Bihan) and his native American companion (Mark Dacascos) as they hunt the beast of Gevaudan. Story wise, from a high enough point, it is good - as are the martial arts action segments and the beast (when it eventually shows up). That said there are a lot of issues with it too, the main one being pacing.

Who the heck wrote this?

Especially at the start - it just drags. Too many characters with speaking lines and weak actors who don't need to be there, an unnecessary love story subplot involving strange facial expressions, and general filler. Yep. It's like they have a good movie, but said "we need x more minutes" and just piled it on with lousy content which is a pity.

Not one I can really recommend but if you are feeling in the mood for a B grade foreign semi-action film this one might take your liking. I give it one and a half agents of Rome out of five.