Avengement: Scott Adkins is Miffed

They are the low-rent British Michael and Fredo Corleone, but they are considerably more deadly. Cain Burgess (dig the subtlety of his name) blames his older brother Lincoln for his incarceration and the 20,000 Pound prison bounty on his head, so when he escapes from custody, he is eager for a family reunion. However, he was bones to pick (break) with some other acquaintances as well, so the younger Burgess Brother will have to be quite the busy beaver in Jesse V. Johnson’s face-stomping Avengement, which opens this Friday in Los Angeles.

Lincoln Burgess is a slimy gangster, who preys on the financially desperate through his predatory loan enterprise. Cain Burgess was not a bad bloke really, before he got nicked. Old Cain was supposed to take a dive in the ring for Lincoln’s outfit, but he knocked the other guy out instead. To make amends, he was supposed to pull a snatch-and-dash job targeting one of Lincoln’s “clients,” but things go tragically wrong. Condemned to the harshest prison in England, Cain essentially has to fight every second he is not in solitary. It makes him hard and scary looking. It also makes him rather disappointed in his brother Lincoln when he finally learns why everyone is out to get him.

Alas, Burgess and his police escort do not reach the hospital in time while his beloved mother is on her death bed. However, the field trip offers an opportunity for escape. Soon, Burgess finds his way to his older brother’s social cub, where he takes the low life thugs present hostage, if such a term can even be applied to such seedy rabble. As he waits for Lincoln to arrive, Cain catches everyone up on his activities through a series of flashbacks.

Wow, Avengement is about as brutal as an action movie can get while still being entertaining. Martial arts star Scott Adkins and director Johnson have worked together on a number of solid B-movies, but they really kick it up several notches here. Frankly, you really have to give Adkins credit for taking on this role. Technically, Cain is the good guy, but he is also an absolutely ferocious animal, who will be on both ends of some spectacularly bloody beatdowns. Of course, Adkins has the chops, but Johnson never whitewashes the reality of prison combat. Guys like Schwarzenegger and Seagal would never have the guts to play such a feral, blood-soaked part.

Adkins’ physical commitment is impressive. Consequently, just about everyone else withers under his glare, but at least Craig Fairbrass is more than convincingly thuggish as Lincoln. Unfortunately, Louis Mandylor, who was such a kick working with Adkins and Johnson in Debt Collector, is totally wasted as the honest Det. O’Hara.

Avengement definitely represents Johnson’s best stint as a director and some of Adkins’ best acting work, so far. Regardless, the fights are what are most important—and they are bracingly intense. This is definitely a film that will scare punky kids straight. Highly recommended for action fans, Avengement opens this Friday (5/24) in LA, at the Monica Film Center.

The Outsider: Craig Fairbrass Gets His Close-Up

By now, there is little the L.A. coroner’s office can do to shock Americans with their incompetence. Yet, a British military contractor is still rather aghast when they misidentify a corpse as his estranged daughter. (Still, that sort of counts as good news.) He will be getting to the bottom of it all in Brian A. Miller’s The Outsider (trailer here), which releases this Friday in select theaters and on VOD.

Lex Walker was never much of a father, but when his receives news of Samantha’s presumed demise, he goes AWOL to tend to his grim paternal duties. However, the body might be a twentysomething blonde, but it is not her. Somewhat agitated, Walker heads straight to her last place of employment, a dodgy financial services conglomerate, where Schuster, the sleazy CEO does everything possible to announce himself as the bad guy short of standing on his head and spitting nickels.

When Walker takes good-and-hard exception to some of some of Schuster’s muscle on the way out, he naturally gets arrested, thereby putting him on the radar of Det. Klein, the cop in charge of Samantha Walker’s case. Of course, they do not get along either. Walker’s investigation only starts to get traction when he bribes a lead out of Margo, a reluctant cocktail waitress, who quickly becomes part of the mess, regardless of her intentions.

So when you see Shannon Elizabeth and James Caan lined up behind a film, you know you are in serious b-movie territory. Jason Patric still ought to have some major studio cred, but it is not exactly shocking to see him here as well. As it happens, they are all largely enlisted to support British character actor Craig Fairbrass’s coming out as an action star. Craggy and hardnosed, he has at least enough old school presence to carry a light weight film like The Outsider.

As Klein, the reliable Patric helps to anchor the film—and between him, Caan, and Fairbrass there is certainly no lack of manliness. Naturally, Caan plays the villainous Schuster, hamming it up at every opportunity, because viewers would be disappointed if he didn’t.  In contrast, the character of Margo is so under-written, Shannon Elizabeth mostly just stands around looking for something to do.

Considering most Americans will be most familiar with Fairbrass as one of the Call of Duty voice-actors, a straight up military film would have be a more logical vehicle for his premiere turn in the solo spotlight, but it probably would have been much more expense than a riff on the Taken franchise. The Eastenders and Prime Suspect alumnus has appealing working class badassness, but The Outsider is just too workaday to get very excited about.  It may herald the arrival of the next middle-aged action star, but The Outsider is best saved for Saturday morning hangover streaming.  For diehard fans of Fairbrass and Caan, it opens this Friday (2/7) in New York at the AMC Empire and also releases on itunes.