Director:
Issac Florentine
Starring:
Michael Jai White ………. George “Iceman” Chambers
Scott Adkins ………. Uri Boyka
Eli Danker ………. Crot
Ben Cross ……….Stevie Parker
The Movie
DVD has changed the way we view movies. Most of the times we don’t want to venture out to the local theater to catch a movie we may or may not like. Why pay $8.00 or more when you can rent the DVD for half of that or less when it comes out four months later? For all the good that DVD has brought us, there is also some bad. Look no further than direct-to-DVD sequels. Better yet are sequels to movies that have long been forgotton. Enter Undisputed II: Last Man Standing.
You may remember the first Undisputed movie coming out in 2002. It had one thing going for it. Wesley Snipes and Ving Rhames were the stars. Rhames played George “Iceman” Chambers, a former heavyweight boxing champion. He ended up in jail and went toe-to-toe with the reigning prison champion, Monroe Hutchens, played by Snipes. The movie didn’t do so well at the box office. It barely made back it’s budget. Hardly any reason for a sequel. But if there needed to be a sequel, there had to be two things to make it work. Those two things would be Rhames and Snipes starring again. That’s not going to happen in a “direct-to-DVD” movie.
Undisputed II: Last Man Standing is still about George “Iceman” Chambers. Chambers, played by Michael Jai White this time. Chambers is again charged with a crime he didn’t commit. This time he is framed in Russia and thrown into a brutal prison there. The Russian mafia know when they can make money and they quickly arrange a fight between the reigning prison champ, Uri Boyka (Scott Adkins) and Chambers. This plot should sound familiar since I just explained to you what Undisputed I was about. It’s the exact same plot with just a different location.
The plot may be the same, but the actors are not. “Direct-to-DVD” movies usually have a small budget and one of the first things to get cut is the “star power”.
Michael Jai White does a fine job as Chambers, but he is no Ving Rhames. And Scott Adkins comes nowhere close to Wesley Snipes. There is no way this sequel can live up to the acting in the original, but the actors do a decent enough job to make the film work on some level.
So the acting doesn’t live up to the original and the plot is exactly the same. Is there anything good about this movie then? Yes, there is. That would be the fighting, which is the heart of the film. The fight scenes here are straight out of the Van Damme days. They are great. This is the best part of the movie and any fan of martial arts action will probably like this movie as a result.
You assume that most “direct-to-DVD” sequels are going to be bad. If they were any good, then they would be going to the theaters first. That’s mostly true, but sometimes these types of movies can surprise you and actually be entertaining. That’s what Undisputed II: Last Man Standing ends up being. It will be entertaining to a specific audience. That audience will be anyone who likes to watch martial arts. The fight scenes are great and make this film entertaining, if you like that sort of thing. If you don’t, well there is nothing for you to see here.
The Video:
The video is given in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen color. Pretty standard quality here. No real problems for it being a “direct-to-DVD” release.
The Audio:
The audio included is available in either English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround sound or English Stereo 2.0 Surround sound. There are subtitles available in English, and Spanish. No problems here either.
The Extras:
Audio Commentary –
This commentary is with the director, Issac Florentine, and the two main stars of the film, Michael Jai White and Scott Adkins. It’s fairly informative and entertaining. I’ve seen worse commentaries, that’s for sure.
“Behind-the-Scenes” Featurette –
Your standard behind-the-scenes stuff here.
Storyboard Comparisons –
This is comparing the script and pre-production stuff with the finished product on the screen. It’s interesting to see, but not a “must-watch” feature.
Fans of martial arts fighting will probably enjoy this film. There is not any one “star” of the film, though. Snipes and Rhames are long gone. Although this film will be entertaining to people who like martial arts, I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest buying this. It’s worth a rental for those people, but there is not much to watch over and over again. So a rental at best, but it’s not as bad as you might think.
