John Allman

If you’ve ever wandered the aisles at the video store or surfed the DVR pay-per-view options and seen a bunch of movies that you’ve never heard of, chances are John has watched them. Why? He loves movies. All kinds of movies. Good, bad, so-bad-they’re good, even the truly unwatchable ones. He mostly loves horror and science-fiction and drive-in exploitation movies that most upstanding model citizens wouldn’t dare watch. Then he writes up his thoughts so you can decide - watch, don’t watch or avoid at all costs. Sometimes he even gets to talk to the cool folks who make some of your favorite films.

 Blood, Violence and Babes
 John Allman

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Smokin’ Aces 2: Assassins’ Ball

Posted Feb 7, 2010 by John Allman

Updated Feb 7, 2010 at 05:32 PM

Smokin’ Aces 2: Assassins’ Ball
Genre: Sequel/Action
Directed by: P.J. Pesce
Run time: 88 minutes
Rating: R
Format: Blu-Ray

The Lowdown: This direct-to-DVD sequel of director Joe Carnahan’s “True Romance”/”Pulp Fiction” wannabe, which I didn’t like in the least, boasts a generic story, OK acting and enough familiar faces to make its slight running time tolerable.

There’s little here that you haven’t seen before, and the big whodunit is so telegraphed that you won’t be surprised in the least.

Like most genre films of its kind, “Smokin’ Aces 2” gathers together a rogue’s gallery of super-killers the likes of which make you wonder what world screenwriters live in. It must be a world populated by entire colonies of highly-trained assassins, devious serial killers and techno-geeks who exist only to play with cool gadgets, design impossibly intricate hidden lairs and employ all manner of death machines.

Some are interesting, most are blink-and-forget them stereotypes who are only positioned on-screen long enough to register as a character before getting blown away.

If the tagline on the box is to believed, “Murder, mayhem and madness” awaits all who pick up this puppy.

But sadly, you’ll get little excitement, much less a deviant thrill, from watching what is essentially a needless sequel to a forgettable shoot-em-up feature.

The Stuff You Care About:
Hot chicks – Yes, Martha Higareda and Autumn Reeser are smokin’ hot.
Nudity – Brief.
Gore – Gun violence.
Drug use – No.
Bad Guys/Killers – It’s an assassins’ ball, they’re all killers.
Buy/Rent – Rent it.
Blu-Ray Bonus Features – Exclusive: BD-Live and pocketBlu enabled; five featurettes, “Confessions of an Assassin,” “The Bunker Mentality: Designing the Set,” “Ready, Aim, Fire: The Weapons of Smokin’ Aces 2,” “Behind the scenes with Joe Carnahan” and “Cue the Clown.” Additional: Deleted scenes, gag reel, audio commentary.
On the Web – http://www.smokinacesdvd.com/
Release Date – Jan. 19, 2010