Sinners and Saints (2010) - ActionFest Buffet 3.0: Plate #3

On the Menu: SINNERS AND SAINTS (2010)

Ingredients: Johnny Strong, Sean Patrick Flanery, Tom Berenger, Method Man, Costas Mandylor, Luis Mandylor, Jürgen Prochnow, Kevin Phillips, Bas Rutten, Kim Coates and Sonny Puzikas. Directed by William Kaufman. Run time: 104 minutes. Rated: R.

At First Bite: Honestly, the only reason I marked this movie down on my ActionFest schedule was because Tom Berenger was scheduled to appear. I didn't know the plot. I didn't know who else was in it. I didn't know it was already on DVD. I just wanted to get my VHS copy of THE SUBSTITUTE signed by Shale himself.

Detective Sean Riley (Strong) has had it rough as of late. His son has died. His wife has left him.

After a raid goes bad, he's assigned to investigate a recent string of murders, where the victims are being burned repeatedly. One of the vics is the brother of a gang lord. Oops.

Hello, gang war.

Tough to Swallow: The mercenaries don't seem very well-trained or bright.

The majority of the "big" names in the cast only have a handful of scenes.

There is a credit for post-production assistant, but two people are listed.

In the credits, special contributors is misspelled as contributers.

Something to Chew On: Strong did the music for the film. He also did his own stunts. The dude is a black belt in Jiu Jitsu, an accomplished Mixed Martial Artist and makes knives.

The name of the bar in the movie is Boondock Saint. Flanery, of course, is one of the stars of BOONDOCK SAINTS and its sequel.

Flanery has now been in four films with the word 'saints' in the title. The first was PALE SAINTS in 1997.

Puzikas was also the film's tactical advisor. He is a former Russian Special Forces operative.

The movie was released on DVD on January 10, 2012 (three months before I saw it at ActionFest).

The film's showing at ActionFest was its domestic premiere.

SINNERS AND SAINTS 2 will go into production in the fall of 2012.

Aftertaste: Not a bad cop thriller considering it's a low-budget independent flick. It was actually filmed in New Orleans, and you'd never know it since we don't really see any landmarks or Mardi Gras parades. Instead, we get post-Katrina neighborhoods posing as cesspools full of drugs and gang violence.

The story is all over the place. The dialogue is lackluster. The acting, aside from Strong, is pretty sad.

But, but, but... there's lots of gunfire and people being burned. To me, violence is really the key ingredient for an action film. Schwarzenegger is as wooden an actor as there is, but his movies are fun because there are explosions, shootouts and people die in horrific ways. And, SINNERS AND SAINTS is full of intense, sometimes graphic, violence.

Kudos to Kaufman for using mostly practical special effects. Old school > CGI.

Kaufman says the sequel will have more exciting action, so I'll look forward to that.

Hopefully, the script will be better, too.

By the way, I got the VHS signed.

Rating: