12 Rounds
2009
Action
A low budget Die Hard With A Vengeance meets Speed meets the original Taken, but has little of their integrity, smarts and cool explosive action sequences to go with it, 12 Rounds is brought down for being derivative, bland and so pedestrian. A cop's girlfriend is kidnapped by the villain out of vengeance after his lover got run over by a car, several years ago. The action itself generic and isn't all that great and had it gone down the Crank route, it might have worked like a charm. No standout performances with a B/Z-list cast, & WWE's John Cena tries but arguably he is vanilla; the actress who plays the love interest looks stilted with her one-note turn, whilst Brian White's role is suspect. I enjoyed this far less than 12 Rounds 3, which is saying something as I kept my expectations low for that instalment. Reny Harlin's best work is when he isn't confined to the PG-13 vein (Die Hard 2, The Long Kiss Goodnight), and here, whilst this should be approached as a 'leave your brain at the door' type of movie, 12 Rounds has so little good action, most of it riffs on Speed & Die Hard, with a story that becomes more and more schlocky and tiresome. The film opened in March 2009 but it wasn't screened for the press. Watching this I can see why: shaky cam and choppy editing at times & the sheer boredom of it pretty much killed my interest in this, it's too dull for words.
Is It Worth Watching?:
Watch Speed, Die Hard 1 and 2 instead
Overall:
2009
Action
A low budget Die Hard With A Vengeance meets Speed meets the original Taken, but has little of their integrity, smarts and cool explosive action sequences to go with it, 12 Rounds is brought down for being derivative, bland and so pedestrian. A cop's girlfriend is kidnapped by the villain out of vengeance after his lover got run over by a car, several years ago. The action itself generic and isn't all that great and had it gone down the Crank route, it might have worked like a charm. No standout performances with a B/Z-list cast, & WWE's John Cena tries but arguably he is vanilla; the actress who plays the love interest looks stilted with her one-note turn, whilst Brian White's role is suspect. I enjoyed this far less than 12 Rounds 3, which is saying something as I kept my expectations low for that instalment. Reny Harlin's best work is when he isn't confined to the PG-13 vein (Die Hard 2, The Long Kiss Goodnight), and here, whilst this should be approached as a 'leave your brain at the door' type of movie, 12 Rounds has so little good action, most of it riffs on Speed & Die Hard, with a story that becomes more and more schlocky and tiresome. The film opened in March 2009 but it wasn't screened for the press. Watching this I can see why: shaky cam and choppy editing at times & the sheer boredom of it pretty much killed my interest in this, it's too dull for words.
Is It Worth Watching?:
Watch Speed, Die Hard 1 and 2 instead
Overall:
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