Released: 2018
Director: Mathieu Weschler
Run Time: 85 Minutes
Rated R
Distributor: SP Releasing, LLC.
Genre: Action
Cast:
Steven Seagal: Axe
Louis Fan Siu Wong: Chen Man
Rudy Youngblood: Infidel
Kat Ingkarat: Yinying
Sergey Badyuk: Hollywood
Ting Sue: Tara
Kang Yu: Qmom
Cha-Lee Yoon: Black Claw Ma
You want to know what I hate about Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, and all those other digital platforms for movies? Exclusives. What I mean about exclusives is the fact that certain movies are only available on certain platforms. Movies like Maria, Apostle, and The Night Comes For Us are only available digitally on Netflix. Will they ever show up on DVD/Blu-Ray? That’s entirely up to Netflix, but my guess is no. Amazon has films like the Suspiria remake and You Were Never Really Here. The difference between Amazon and Netflix, however, is that Amazon does allow their content to be released on physical media. Hulu doesn’t have a lot to offer in terms of original movies, but they do have their original series. But we have been seeing new digital platforms starting to show up like DC Universe with Disney+ on the way as well as CBS Access and other stuff like that. There was another platform called 365 Flix which was going to be a springboard for new indie action flicks, but there’s nothing on the website right now. The problem I have with all these platforms is that there are too many, which means certain films and shows are not going to get the attention that they deserve. Recently, Attrition found its way on to Blu-Ray and DVD after being an exclusive to 365 Flix for over a year. I think this film being an exclusive to a particular platform did more damage than it should have. My review today is for Steven Seagal’s Attrition.
Attrition stars Steven Seagal as Axe, a former special forces operative who left behind his violent past to help people in the Far East. While providing medical services to the local village, a man appears and asks Axe to help find his daughter, Tara, who was kidnapped by a local gangster, Qmom. The word on the streets is that Tara has special mystical powers to heal and that may be why she was taken. Convinced to return to a life of violence, Axe recruits his former team to track the young woman down and bring her home. Mystical mumbo-jumbo aside, Attrition has a fairly simple story that is really to follow. It’s nothing ground-breaking and it’s certainly nothing that we haven’t seen before, but I found myself enjoying it regardless. The writing and dialogue are pretty strange, though, but considering it’s Steven Seagal, I shouldn’t be surprised. Seagal has had a strange way of weaving in either environmental messages or message dealing with spirituality. In the case of Attrition, the message is about the importance of Kung-Fu. Truthfully, Steven Seagal is the last person on Earth to be preaching to us about Kung-Fu, considering that he’s a 7th dan black belt in Aikido….which is Japanese. That being said, these musing aren’t terribly intrusive and the film goes with the flow.
I was bound to start talking about Steven Seagal at some point on this site, so why not start with Attrition? Steven Seagal is a controversial public figure considering his political leanings and ideological inconsistencies over the years, none of which I will be going into here….ever. I have my opinions on Seagal as a person, but that’s as far as I’ll go. It’s no secret that most people don’t care for Steven Seagal as an actor, and to be honest with you, he really isn’t much of one. He’s had some performances that were decent enough over the years, but mostly it’s just Steven Seagal playing Steven Seagal. In that aspect, he’s pretty good. He’s not the worst actor I’ve ever seen. He gets the job done, and his performance as Axe really is no different than any of the other roles that he’s taken over the course of his career. While Seagal is the lead character, the guy you should be paying attention to is Louis Fan Siu Wong, who plays Axe’s Kung-Fu brother, Chen. I’ve been a fan of Louis Fan’s for quite some time now. He’s an accomplished martial arts actor in his own right and has worked with some of the biggest names in the genre: Donnie Yen, Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, and Jackie Chan. Kang Yu plays the main villain, and he does a pretty good job. The character of Qmom is definitely a scumbag, but he’s a scumbag that’s also a martial arts master. Ting Sue plays Tara, the young woman that was kidnapped. She’s not bad, even though, she’s only in the film for about a total of ten minutes, but I like the character as she is not impressed with Qmom or his men and she says as much. The rest of the acting is pretty much by-the-book. Not terrible, but nothing that really stands out, either.
Considering that Attrition is a Steven Seagal flick, I would’ve expected the action to be pretty incoherent as Seagal uses body doubles. He’s used doubles in a lot of action sequences in many of his movies over the years and it is painfully obvious, considering the man is very out of shape. That being said, the action in this film is surprisingly pretty decent. Nothing mind-blowing, but there isn’t anything that strikes me as awful, either. Steven Seagal does get to flex his martial arts abilities here a little bit, as he’s clearly studied some Kung-Fu for this film at least. His action sequences tend to be pretty one-sided, but that doesn’t mean they’re awful. You can actually see what’s going on, as the camera doesn’t shake nearly as much as it has in previous films. Louis Fan steals the show as his fight sequences are really freaking good. I didn’t realize that he was that fast. Now, some of the action sequences were sped up a little bit to compensate for Seagal’s lack of speed, but that wasn’t necessary for Louis Fan. He’s that damn good. The final action sequence at the club is pretty good. There’s some pretty good fight sequences and gun fights to satisfy fans for a little bit. It only lasts about 10 minutes or so, but it’s still pretty impressive for a Steven Seagal flick.
There are a number of issues with the film that bring it down a bit, but it’s mostly due to the fact that the film is a low-budget flick, so some of it I can give a pass to, but some of it I can’t. First of all, despite the film’s run-time of 85 minutes, it takes a while for it to get going. The pacing isn’t as good as it needs to be. The film’s violence is also kind of bizarre. The fight choreography is pretty good, but when it comes to actual blood-shed, there’s a lot of CGI blood. POOR CGI blood. It’s painfully obvious at times, which is really strange, because there are other shots where they actually use squibs and actual corn syrup for blood. So, the inconsistency can be very distracting at times. Also, Axe is one of the most cliched characters in the book, but Steven Seagal is mostly played characters like this for decades. He’s rarely changed things up, except when he played the villain in Machete. However, some of the cinematography is really stunning to look at. Some of the shots during the final club battle and slow motion shots are surprising beautiful. There was a lot more effort put into this film than I was expecting from a new Steven Seagal movie. Yeah, the movie’s not perfect and at times it feels like your typical Steven Seagal film, but the action, cinematography and relatively decent performances elevate what could’ve been another disaster for Seagal to something that’s actually worth taking a look at. Steven Seagal and surprises……now there’s two words that you would never expect to hear me say in the same sentence. Yeah, I liked Attrition. I like it a lot and I wasn’t expecting to. So kudos to Steven Seagal and company for making a film that I’m glad I bought blindly.
My Final Recommendation: 8/10. What can I say? This one surprised the hell out of me in a good way. Check it out.