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Vern’s DTV Octagon: DMX Vs. DOLPH LUNDGREN!
Hey, everyone. ”Moriarty” here.
Okay, before you read anything else, you have to check out this interview with DMX if you didn't read it when it was first posted about two weeks ago. His reaction when told about the campaign of Barack Obama makes for some of the craziest reading of the year so far, and I find myself laughing each and every time. I want Vern to interview DMX next. My head would explode from happiness, I think.
In the meantime, enjoy another fantastic direct-to-video review column from my favorite author of a book about Steven Segal... the one... the only... Vern:
I've had this theory for a while now that DMX has great potential as a movie star. I enjoyed him in BELLY, EXIT WOUNDS, even CRADLE 2 THE GRAVE. His line-readings are always stiff, but I figure he can learn how to do that better, and he has something nobody can learn: an innate presence and charisma.
I've been saying that for years, but so far the theory has yet to be proven in clinical trials. The last big try was NEVER DIE ALONE. Directed by Ernest Dickerson and based on a book by the legendary black crime writer Donald Goines, it was a chance for a more meaty role. And he did fine, but the movie was poorly made and not really worth your time. Then DMX went a little crazy, had some problems with the law (dude, you're rich, you need to hire yourself a driver), and the only movies he's made since then have had a hard time getting a release. For example THE LAST HOUR, which comes out April 15th, has been sitting on the shelf since 2006. Anybody think it'll be good?
If you said "yes" you were wrong. I expected you to say "no." Sorry. I will give you one more guess.
"No"? Okay, you are correct. Good job.
There are a couple misleading things about the cover to this one, at least on the screener I watched. It's a giant picture of DMX with a couple of the other characters in the background. But DMX is not really the lead - he doesn't show up until 20 minutes in, and then he dies well before the movie is over. (SPOILER.) Another thing, the back of the box says "LAST HOUR IS PACKED WITH NON-STOP MARTIAL ARTS ACTION AND AN A-LIST LEADING CAST!" It would be more accurate to say "LAST HOUR HAS TWO MARTIAL ARTS SCENES AND PAUL SORVINO MAKES A CAMEO!" Nothing against Michael Madsen and David Carradine, but even if they were in KILL BILL (which in my opinion they were) that does not exactly make them A-list. And if it did this movie would definitely knock them down a couple lists.
The story involves a group of criminals, all with names like "Poker," "Casino" and "Blackjack," receiving letters from their fathers asking them to show up at this mansion in Hong Kong at a certain time. They all arrive, see each other, point guns at each other, and recite painfully bad tough guy dialogue. When they go inside somebody is trying to kill them off, they find little puzzles they have to solve, and David Carradine and the Hong Kong police are on the outside telling them to come out.
In many ways it's a throwback to all the bad '90s independent movies that came out after RESERVOIR DOGS and PULP FICTION. Some well-meaning but inept dude decides he's a director and hires a bunch of actors to wear leather jackets and point guns at each other, thinking that alone will create excitement. Like Tarantino this guy (a Frenchman credited as "Kobe") even cast himself as one of the parts, even though he doesn't look tough at all. At least he's light on the pop culture references (just a few mentions of THE TWILIGHT ZONE, THE SIXTH SENSE, and KOJAK).
The characters with the most potential are probaly Shang (Tommy Wong, aka Kwong Leung Wong, a veteran of Hong Kong movies going back to the CITY ON FIRE and THE KILLER days) and Casino (Tony D'Amario who played K2 in DISTRICT B13 and who I just learned from IMDb died in 2005). Both characters are dubbed with silly American voices by other actors.
Shang is the one martial artist in the movie. He's introduced as being involved in some kind of drug deal, then he goes home. He's gotta be in his 40s by now but he comes home wearing a backpack, he lives with his mom and he has a bunch of posters of martial artists on the wall in his bedroom, so I wasn't sure if he was supposed to be playing a kid or not. They establish he is a badass by having him flash back to a radio report: "A young Asian boy has just gotten the record for the fastest knockout in the history of Thai boxing!" (Who would've guessed it would be an Asian who would get a Thai boxing record?) Also, he has a tattoo of a demon face covering the back of his bald head. I can see why they thought that would make him tough, but it sure is distracting every time they show him from the back.
Casino wears a white suit like Biggie Smalls, and carries a cane around, and that's pretty much his whole character.
None of the "A–List Leading Cast" come out looking very good. DMX spends most of his time throwing tantrums: "This is bullshit!" "Are you fuckin kidding me?!" "You know what? Fuck you, suck a dick, I'm gone." "This weird noise is really startin to PISS me off!"
David Carradine seems to expend the most effort, but doesn't have much to do. His KILL BILL brother Michael Madsen comes out looking like an ass, though. He has a ridiculous hair-do like Michael Bolton just after he woke up from taking a nap on the couch. And he delivers most of his lines full of long, awkward pauses. "The gifts... that we receive from our parents... when we're kids... have a great... sentimental value. They also... remind us... of our mortality." "There's still... one part of this puzzle that's missing... and it might be... the key... to... unraveling... this whole mystery." Those are verbatim quotes. Motherfucker uses more ellipses than Harry does in his reviews.
So you can see the dialogue is terrible. I would like to point out also that before the first fight scene a guy says "You wanna play? Let's play," and before the second one a guy says "You wanna dance? Let's dance."
So some people might get a few laughs out of this but for me it's not a fun kind of bad. It's more the sad kind of bad where you can tell the poor suckers didn't even know how to shoot the right things and had a hell of a time figuring out how to get it to even fit together, and just scrapped together what they could and hoped it would be passable. At the end there is a voiceover that is supposed to explain a major plot twist and I think it's supposed to be Paul Sorvino, but it's clearly not his voice. I was surprised when Sorvino did KNOCK OFF, but this one... geez, this Kobe must be a real cool guy to hang out with or something.
There is some good news: the running time is only about 80 minutes, which is 25 minutes shorter than IMDb says. Thank the Lord. In Jesus' name we pray.
DIAMOND DOGS (April 29th)
This title could've actually been used for the DMX movie, but that one was about cash, not diamonds. Dolph isn't looking for diamonds either, he's looking for a sacred Buddhist text. So I guess it's a reference to the David Bowie album, which I'm sure it shares many themes with but I'm not too familiar with Bowie.
Anyway Dolph plays a highly decorated American soldier who got his whole platoon killed (that seems to happen to alot of soldiers), moved to Mongolia and opened a security business. But business has been dry so he is in debt, living only off the occasional prize fight. Suddenly this obnoxious rich prick named Chambers (William Shriver, who also appeared in THE LAST HOUR as the father of Kobe's character) hires Dolph to be his guide and bodyguard on a treasure hunt.
Reading about it I thought maybe Dolph was doing his version of an Indiana Jones type adventure story but it really doesn't feel like that. It's a more contemporary and less exciting feel. Some guys trodding through the desert, occasionally getting into firefights with mercenaries or bandits. When they get to the treasure it's far from awe-inspiring - just a little cave with some wooden spikes that come down when you take the treasure. The ancient Buddhist equivalent of some dude's garage.
Early in the movie Dolph is playing it pretty humorous, he's a big lug who can't help but make stupid mistakes but knows how to smile about it. After the mission starts the movie is a little dry, though. Still, this is one of his more likable characters, not one of the monosyllabic Russians he sometimes plays.
He has a couple good badass moments. My favorite is when he's on watch duty one night and the camp gets attacked. When it's the next guy's turn he finds Dolph kicking back at the campfire, surrounded by dead bodies and with about 8-10 rifles propped up next to him.
The credited director is Shimon Dotan, but IMDb claims Lundgren also directed some of it uncredited. I believe it because the documentary-like scenes of traditional Mongolian dancing as the sun goes down were very reminiscent of the way he shot Native American rituals in his last directorial work, MISSIONARY MAN.
Speaking of MISSIONARY MAN, I think that one was a little more enjoyable overall. But this is definitely a watchable DTV and casually obliterates the DMX movie in this round of digital combat. Dolph is on a roll now, having come out the best of three in my list DTV roundup, and having just announced his next directorial effort COMMAND PERFORMANCE is "DIE HARD at a rock concert" with him playing an ex-marine rock 'n roll drummer! If that ends up as good as it sounds, and that J.C.V.D. movie ends up as good as it looks, and if you consider that book about the films of Steven Seagal that some dude wrote that comes out May 23rd from Titan Books, we might just have on our hands a powerful revival of '80s and 90's action stars in DTV (or PROENASIDTV for those of you who enjoy using indecipherable abbreviations for everything).
In conclusion, Dolph Lundgren is the reigning intercontinental champion of DTV.
--Vern
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...if this talkback will explode into "Vern's DTV Triple Header" proportions.
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...if this talkback will explode into "Vern's DTV Triple Header" proportions.
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DMX's What's My Name and that one that goes, "Y'all gonna make me lose my mind. Up in here! Up in here!" rule.
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If I already own the black cover version of Seagology (which I do), do I need the new version? Does it have the review of Pistol Whipped?
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...and his work in Never Die Alone was laughably bad. Whoever decided that DMX should play narrator should be shot. Hell, DMX is so bad I don't think he could convincingly play himself. Fucker makes Ice T look like Al Pacino by comparison.
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"That ain't your fuckin' name. Your momma ain’t name you no damn Barack."
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It really kills me that brilliant researchers have to beg for grant money, while that empty vacuum makes millions.
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Cuz I'm dying of laughter.
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http://tinyurl.com/2gdubn
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http://tinyurl.com/2zbolj
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http://tinyurl.com/253d8w
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Well, you don't NEED it, but it is an improvement. I fixed a whole bunch of errors and I added a chapter on PISTOL WHIPPED. They also did a good job with the new fonts and everything. And it's only about ten bucks at Amazon. So it's a good deal and it will be the definitive version of the book. On the other hand there are only about 200 of the self-published version in existence so it's more rare than diamonds and on par with ancient Buddhist texts.
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OLEG!
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Especially when you consider that when he made that album they're celebrating the tenth anniversary of he was a pretty intelligent dude. I saw some of that reality show about him too and it was clear that he had already lost his mind up in here up in here. One scene involved him trying to figure out how to fry an egg in the microwave at AM PM while Timbaland or somebody was on a cell phone begging him to come back to the studio to finish recording before he has to turn himself in for two months. It was clear he was annoying the hell out of everybody in the show except the old cowboys he befriended in Arizona.
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"Obama. What the fuck, man?! Is he serious? That ain’t his fuckin’ name. Ima tell this nigga when I see him, “Stop that bullshit. Stop that bullshit” [laughs] “That ain’t your fuckin’ name.” Your momma ain’t name you no damn Barack." dmx is insane.
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Oleg! aicns own comic hero! http://tinyurl.com/2gabqu
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..I thought it was going to be DMX vs Dolphins. Man, that would have been awesomer. DTV!!! Dolphins!! Rapper!!! Underwater cage match!!! Soundtrack by reunited supergroup ASIA!
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makes you think you yourself are going schizo.
I used to love his music, then I kind of grew up.I'm not gonna lie, I still blast "get at me dog" or "up in here" in my car on my way to work ala Michael Bolton in Office Space. For that alone, Dark Man X gets a pass from me for life. -
every scene in goodfellas he was either cooking or eating sausages.
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can't see shit, captain!
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What´s that, a bike?
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http://tinyurl.com/2zmg5x
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That nearly killed me. Well played, DMX. Well played.
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Vern - tax exempt status. Think about it.
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dmx? and he wasn't aware of the Obama before?
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dweeb.
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And just take any small role as a villain/thug/prisoner in anything he gets offered as opposed to wasting his time on leading roles that waste his talent. Like Trejo, who sorta built his status from the ground up and is now the Machete we all know and love. DMX could become one of those special treats where you're watching some crappy movie and then he shows up for one scene as a mugger and dies and you love him for doing it and he can walk away from the crappy film unstained by not taking a leading role.
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Except my fuckin' schedule is full. Damn!
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unlike dmx, who named himself after the name of runoff from a korean nuclear waste silo
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we own the night!
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we own the night!
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A few years while taking a walk on my lunch break I 'm going down this street with a parkette, and I notice this a couple in the park guy talking on the phone , woman looking upset and a little dog. Wasn't really paying attention. Next thing I know the little dog is flying out of the park with the guy chasing angirly after it. He literally tried to kick it as hard as he could (luckily he missed cause he would have really hurt it if not killed it had his foot connected with it) I was shocked and startled and yelled out 'Hey!" next thjing I know the guy turns to me and just sceams "SHUT THE FUCK UP". My first thought was crazy ass crack dealer high on his own shit. I walked away (better a live chicken then a dead hero) and called the Humane Society. They and the police payed him a visit and basically told him in no uncertain terms to knock off the crap while in Toronto. Turns out it was DMX making a movie. One of our city counsilors told me later that he should never have been allowed into the country as he's a known criminal with a violent temper and no impulse control.
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Fucking stupid dumb piece of shit. Yo momma name you DMX? I bet she did too you ghetto rat.
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It's really not very good at all. :( Dolph only beats up like 4 or 5 people and even then it's like he's hitting them with camera movements. The highest kick he does barely even reaches the guy's belly.
And I didn't understand why he so brutally executed the guy with the beard at the end but let the real baddie go off to prison. I was pretty sleepy by the end though so maybe I missed something important. -
What's even worse is he's acting like it's a virtue being an ignorant ass-tool.
If you don't know shit, then just shut the fuck up. This goes for Miss Teen America contestants from South Carolina as well. -
Diamond Dog OLEG!The DTV rules us all!Way to go Vern!
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Lundgen's svelte-less silhouette, still sustaining stoic styles seems somehow seventies Swartzeneggeresk'.
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Or your plot synopsis of Stone Cold 2: Ice Bucket.
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Mar 29, 2008 10:52:08 AM CDT
RoseBuddy, you amuse Oleg, when the Oleg comes to america
by ironic_name
your name will be added to the list of allies. you saved yourself.
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What the fuck is going on here?
Plus, Vern, when are you going to get a forum or talkback facility on your own website? There was that Vernanda thing but come on if these guys can get thousands of hits on talkbacks about Mamma Mia and whatnot then I think you should consider it too. -
Aren't you afraid that watching these shitty movies will give you a brain tumor or something?
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Seems to be DMX's answer to a lot of things. Guess the dude doesn't think about very much.
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"Nothing against Michael Madsen and David Carradine, but even if they were in KILL BILL (which in my opinion they were)" so, in your OPINION, Michael Madsen and David Carradine were in Kill Bill? someone is smoking some DMX strain
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Mar 29, 2008 12:21:41 PM CDT
DMX don't know who Obama is?? The man just wants attention.
by the founder
When was the last time that DMX was relavent? With all the time he has on his hands I'm pretty sure he know who Barack Obama is. Hell 8 year old kids know who Obama, Hillary and even Mccain are, well maybe McCain not so much. DMX's time has passed in hiphop.
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If you disagree that is your right however I have seen KILL BILL many times and in my opinion they even share some scenes together. just my 2 cents. thanks bud.
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I wanted, no, needed, to be part of this TB before it gets to 6500 posts. NEVER FORGET, brevity is an art.
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"They should’ve done that shit a long time ago, we wouldn’t be in the fuckin’ position we in now. With world war coming up right now."
Riiiight. It's not like DMX and his ilk don't all carry guns around and create inner city warzones. Hypocrite. -
No, he said in the article that they keep taking his guns away.
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you think it would be a documentary.
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cuz the police done come and took 'em. Punk-ass police, picking on DMX for no reason.
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And I hope it does well enough to warrant Dolphology.
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"I don’t wanna be happy." Oh, man, thanks Moriarty, that made me very happy.
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Lets come up with an interesting acronymn, that truly describes the culture that DMX is supporting. Go!
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He's just keepin' it real yo! Moron.
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Dolph's film about him playing a secret service man was above board. Anytime you have Jerry Springer playing the President then you have to give it a shot.
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so I've been hoping he would make co-starring with talk show hosts a trademark. Morton Downey Jr. died so it's too late for that but Phil Donahue would be pretty cool. I miss that guy.
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Mar 29, 2008 5:02:12 PM CDT
Schwarzenegger should get in on the act and make a movie with th
by jim bolo
To Catch A PREDATOR.
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Mar 29, 2008 5:03:06 PM CDT
Schwarzenegger should get in on the act and make a movie with
by jim bolo
that Dateline NBC guy:
To Catch A PREDATOR. -
...would make a great villain, maybe one of those overzealous crusaders for some noble cause and Dolph or Seagal or whoever actually sympathizes with him but Phil just takes it way far and dishonors the cause and has to be dealt with. I would love to see him chewing scenery Pacino style.
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I'd love to have been watching the interviewer's face during that semi-coherent gibberish.
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I believe when i specified us to figure out an acronym, it was pretty much implied that DMX supports the "Keep it Real" T.H.U.G culture, though it is very similar to the "hippie' culture of the 60's except now the hippies have guns.
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You suck at the acronym game.
T. H. U. G
Theatrically Hairless Association of Unified Gangsters. -
ive talked to you about this before, if i like the 89 one a lot, a guy like you should LOVE this. it goes against all you've taught us about seagology and dtv. CMON!
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That movie was pure badass, and it was leaps and bounds above the lame remake. Why do modern day action movies have so little action compared with the 80's movies. It use to be the entire movie was the hero kicking ass, now you're lucky if there's 15 minutes of actual action
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I enjoy the '89 one but I just think the '04 works better as a character and a story. As you know I like Dolph, I just declared him Intercontinental Champion of DTV, but he is ridiculous in that role. I bet he could pull it off now but back then he was not convincing as a grizzled character like that. His facial stubble looks painted on like a kid dressed as a hobo on Halloween. And they keep cutting to him naked in the sewers!
I mean it has alot of good parts and it's some funny shit, I enjoy the ridiculousness (like the ninjas going down a slide firing uzis), but the '04 is more credible to me. I just think Tom Jane is great in the role, I love the fight with the big dude in the striped shirt, the evil mariachi who interrupts his breakfast, the fact that they not only gun down his family, but HIS ENTIRE EXTENDED FAMILY at the reunion. In the opening scene Punisher loses more loved ones than Charles Bronson did in the entire DEATH WISH series. But Jane still treats the role like it's a serious drama.
I haven't rewatched the movie since the first time, or seen the director's cut. Maybe when I go back remembering it as great instead of assuming it will be shit I will be harder on it, who knows. I hope not. But those are some of the reasons I like that one.
Bullet, you are very right, I agree with you. That's a part of the death of action. The other part is that when you do get action-packed movies most of the time the action is indecipherable and impossible to get wrapped up in, at least for me. I'm not just talking about Michael Bay either, I really thought about that while sitting there completely bored through DOOMSDAY. Action movies need to go to rehab. -
I especially liked the part where he says that Bush can "barely speak". Now, don't get me wrong: the asshat in the Oval Office is arguably one of the wost US presidents ever, but the very fact that a clueless, ignorant rich "artist" displays his stupidity with so much emphasis by taking aim at Bush while being obviously as moronic as him (if not as dangerous, culturally speaking)...
What pisses me off the most is that 2PAC was a moron too in interviews, and just because he's gone too soon some talk of him as a respectable opinion leader. DMX sells shitloads of records and so he gives interviews to enlighten people... Chuck D would spin in his grave if he was dead.
"Your momma ain’t name you no damn Barack." >> new AICN catchphrase. I'll make sure of that. -
that they have picked for the role now. i agree jane was a good punny, even if there were dumb things (travolta, popsickle torture), and the extended family killing was hilariously outrageous too! however my appetite for sociopathyness was unquenched... one thing i don't think they'll ever top on the 89 one is the orchestral score they composed specially for it, just majestic in awesomeness especially in the opening credits. something like if john williams did action movies. i cant believe they got a new actor though.
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Jeroen Krabbe was a hell of a bad guy. Dennis Dreith's score rocks. And the quartering machine was sick when I was 11 year old! Hell, the 80's were the acme of action flicks (and genre movies altogether).
I gotta disagree with you Vern about Doomsday, though. The movie suffers from many drawbacks, but I found the action crystal clear compared to recent big budget crap like Live Free or Die Bald. Different strokes, eh? -
his song "Changes" features lyrics about a black president - and it was written more than 10 years ago, which makes him automatically less stupid and clueless than this DMX ignorant fool. Not that I wanna get political over a dead man's legacy. My point is: rap ain't what it used to be, and it just shines a miserable light upon the failed abortions some of the cynical scumbags who run the business proved to be.
Not to mention sellouts like Sean "P Diddy" Combs. -
between Tupac and DMX. I think they are both popular because of that dichotomy. DMX is the incredibly macho dude but he's known for getting so emotional he cries on stage. He's talking about slitting throats but also praying (and he's working on that gospel album). There is even an intelligent/ignorant split. Sometimes he seems like a pretty smart guy, sometimes he's the moron in that interview. And he's supposedly a thug but he loves his dogs so much he tattoos their names on his back.
But now he's gone crazy, more and more he's just the stupid guy getting in baby arguments with other rappers and he can't learn to drive properly. He even got busted by the humane society for not feeding those dogs. Maybe he deserves to be in THE LAST HOUR. At least he didn't say "I love George Bush, he's a gangsta" like 50 Cent did.
Even moreso for Tupac it's those contradictions that made him fascinating to people. He's got "THUG LIFE" tattooed on his chest with bullets but he has these big feminine eyes. He's screaming "fuck the world" and then he has a song about how much he loves his mama or how Brenda's got a baby. Tupac was smarter than DMX ever was though. His mother was a Black Panther so he was very political when he was younger. In the Experience Music Project in Seattle there's an essay he wrote in school about the meaning of America. You can see that he was thinking about big ideas even as a kid. He was also a much better actor than DMX (although he couldn't have done EXIT WOUNDS). But after he got rich and especially after Suge Knight got him out of jail he just got more and more into stupid shit and that was popular so that's what he's remembered for.
But I think it's the combination of the evil and good Tupac that has made him so memorable. You don't hear people talking about Eazy E that much even though Tupac never made an album as good as Straight Outta Compton if you ask me. But he had more dimensions to him than Eazy.
the end. -
what do you think of OLEG's arrival on aicn?
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Who the fuck cares if they're a good business man? You have lots of money, but you talk like you got a piece of charcoal in your mouth. So maybe your job should not involve speaking into a microphone. I don't see anybody wearing a Lee Iacoca t-shirt. Guys like Diddy and 50 Cent should just be real estate investors and quit putting out music. Or they should go into DTV action movies at which point they will have DMX and Dolph to contend with.
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That movie should have been his breakout for solo stuff to give him his Rambo type of movie. Too bad that never happened. Oh well I will always watch Dolph movies on cable.
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"You're a retarded person, aren't you? Seriously. You're a fucking man-child."
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"You don't hear people talking about Eazy E that much even though Tupac never made an album as good as Straight Outta Compton if you ask me. "
Easy E was all voice and image though. He didn't write any of his lyrics (at least in the NWA era) or music, and was even coached on his vocal delivery by better rappers...Ice Cube, D.O.C., etc.
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