The Killing Machine (2009)

Review: written Nov 2010

Return of the clichéd and in-your-face 80’s action flick

The noise, the shaky cameras in the middle of action beats, the splattered blood with squishy sound effects at every punch - we're firmly in B movie territory here. The plot is.. well, who are we kidding, it's a Dolph Lundgren movie - he plays an ex Russian spy turned assassin, who becomes target when one of his hits has a complication. There's a romantic subplot (if I could call it that), where he gets back together with his ex-wife, because.. and get this.. his mid-life-crisis-gorgeous- girlfriend gets blown up and his ex wife's boyfriend has his head blown off in front in front of her. What better way to ease out of post traumatic stress than some pelvic grinding with Dolph, eh? Yes, it's that class of movie...

Lundgren actually looks more believable with some lines etching his face.. though how he managed to get those lines with the lack of facial movements that characterise his acting, heaven only knows. His voice is less heavily accented than I remembered - in fact, he seemed to me to be almost doing some sort of Sean Connery impression with his clumsy narration - every line of which sounded like Mr Voice-over -man cueing up the trailer soundbites.

Cheesy plot, hackneyed direction, paucity of acting skills.. and yet, if you did enjoy those 80's action vehicles that were churned out with the home movie market increasingly in mind, once upon a time.. there's nothing to separate this from them, so you may well enjoy. If you're wondering if Dolph directing might be a revelation and resurgence of a fading actor..? Keep waiting, no revelations here.

(p.s. Also called ‘Icarus’ in some regions)