In the early '90s, Wesley Snipes (right) was a popular actor.
Powerful performances in Jungle Fever, New Jack City plus an attempt to be young pretender to the crowns of
Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone with kick-ass action roles like Passenger 57, Drop Zone and co-starring
with the latter in Demolition Man. Then his star waned and his Hollywood bankability diminished somewhat
with some mediocre choices, apart from the
Blade Trilogy which showed he could still pull one out
of the bag when it counted. However, a movie like U.S. Marshals felt more like a farce than an action
flick and offerings like One Night Stand were just terminal pieces of dullness. His conviction and 3-year-term
of imprisonment for tax fraud, currently being served, have not helped his case either.
And so to Game of Death where he plays Marcus, a man with a past who strolls into Father Clarence's (Ernie
Hudson) church and says he wants to donate a bag containing $1m, leading the sceptical priest to ask him
if he wants to confess. As they talk, the majority of the film is told in flashback.
Once an undercover agent for the CIA, his mission depicted is to infiltrate the Redvale Corporation who have many
millions invested in oil exploration in Africa but are getting resistance from the government so need arms dealer
Frank Smith (Robert Davi), to tool up the rebels to ensure the deal goes through. Marcus' task is to go
over there, get himself a reputation as a hard-ass mercenary, get employment as a bodyguard for Smith, then
eventually take both Smith and the Redvale Corportation out.
Promising start, then, with Licence to Kill Bond villain Davi back as a baddie and action also provided
by Marcus' team members, Zander (martial arts expert Gary Daniels, below-right) and Floria (stuntwoman Zoe Bell).
Alas, that's when it all falls apart. Neither Daniels nor Bell can act to save their lives and Davi looks so old that
these days he looks like he's made of leather, even more so than Michael Portillo! I'm surprised he's only turning
60 this year. Also, Davi gets very little to do as he spends most of his time in a hospital bed or a wheelchair
recouperating from a heart attack, making almost zero use of his talents.
Add to this lots of pointless shootouts of Marcus shooting at someone who's ducked behind a wall, then he hides
while the baddie takes a shot... rinse and repeat. Things get even worse when a bad guy chases him in a hospital
ward that's oh so conveniently part of a new wing so no-one can see him waving a gun about(!) Throw in some
double crossing, making you wonder who's on which side? ...For about five seconds, and anyway, after a while
you stop caring; and also one of my pet hates which is bad guys utilising good guys for one or two scenes and then
offing them for the hell of it, even though there was no necessity for it, making them look like extraneous cannon
fodder.
Game of Death is a movie that's predictable to the last, and fails early on by not even showing Marcus
trying to ingratiate himself with Smith as he's immediately shown alongside the man on his private plane. In fact,
it's such an appalling film that THIS is should've been the reason he went to jail!
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Presented in 2.35:1 and in 1080p high definition, there are no flaws with the print but the direction is appalling.
Mid-action sequence, the image doubles or triples over itself, as if you've just had half a bottle of vodka.
God knows how that's meant to heighten the effect of what you're watching as it just has a very jarring effect.
To make matters worse, sometimes he throws in other random effects that spoil it as if he's a kid with a new
toy who can't wait to press every button.
