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Feb
11

Movie Review: Death Race 2

Death Race 2 2010 BluRay 720p
If it’s any point of interest, prequels and sequels are either a miss or a hit. There are numerous times when “What the hell?” seems like a ringing tone and rarely does “I love that shit!” find its way out of our mouths. Did I say rarely? Oh yes, and Death Race 2 can slap me in the face, for it is a rare find! Death Race 2 is a Direct-to-Video prequel to 2008’s smash hit movie Death Race created by Paul W.S Anderson and is technically also a prequel, although described as a remake, to Roger Corman’s Death Race 2000 of 1975. It goes on depicting the origins of Frankenstein, the most watched racer in the film. Firing straight away, Death Race 2 is a blast!
2012 seems to be a diabolical year in movies, not that I had any clue from the “End of the World” movie 2012, duh?! All the same, in this year, prisons and correctional institutions are non-governmental and privatized. That’s another way of saying justice is out and business is around. Luke Goss (Hellboy 2, Blade 2) stars as Carl “Luke” Lucas who is arrested after a botched bank robbery for his boss Marcus Kane (Sean Bean) for killing a cop. He is then thrown into Terminal Island Penitentiary, the one sadistic place on Earth close to hell owned by Weyland Corporation. It holds the most diabolical race ever spawned for market value, the Death Race, a deadly televised pay-per-view race of heavily armed cars hosted by the sexually controversial former Miss Universe winner September Jones (Lauren Cohan). The film finds Lucas racing for his life along with his crew and Katrina Banks (Tanit Phoenix) and eventually, it finds Frankenstein.

Death Race 2 brings out a loud rumble straight from the screen. It is a bloody and violent heck of a movie that exudes excitement and awe. When game-like features are the central point of a movie, it is likely that a lot of people can dig it, and if you’re one of them then I guess you still haven’t reached puberty, but what the hell, right? The infernal cars featured in this movie are also the same cars used in Death Race, only they are driven by different people who apparently belonged to the same crew of the drivers in this movie. An example of this is the Dodge Ram wrecking machine driven by Big Joe in this movie was the same car driven by Tyrese Gibson in Death Race, both drivers are black.

Death Race 2 boasts consistency (of course it should, considering it’s a prequel) as it presented the same mechanics for the race, the same cars, the same “women beside the drivers” catch, and hallelujah, the same announcer’s voice! Acting-wise, Carl Lucas did a good job of stepping in the shoes of Jason Statham for this movie; he delivered a convincing action hero performance which definitely adds to his action movie resume. Also, 14k (Robin Shou), the Triad member, was the only racer to appear in both films.

I was surprised to see Danny Trejo as a protagonist here considering he always appeared as this grim-faced vicious criminal in most of his films. I was even more surprised that he wasn’t holding a gun in this movie. His role as Goldberg could have been given to anyone else in the film and he could have made one hell of a death race driver instead of a crew man. That goes for Ving Rhames too considering he could have made a more convincing Big Joe. Just the look on his face and you can tell he’s a killer – not to be judgmental.

Hey how about the women in this movie? Well, hands down, Tanit Phoenix is hot (Can’t take that away from her) but honestly, she didn’t sell this tough girl role very well, her voice was too pitchy for her role, and her tandem with Luke Goss wasn’t really the best. Lauren Cohan, also a hot human being, wasn’t really the best Death Race host there ever was because her antagonistic presence didn’t fill up the glass, she fell short on that. Joan Allen did a better antagonistic job in the first movie.

I have to say though that the title is confusing. Death Race 2 sounds more like a sequel than a prequel. There were a few dull moments where action tends to lay low, mostly the out of prison scenes, but let’s face it, when you see classic cars with machine guns, napalm blasters, rocket launchers and flamethrowers paired with violent men and hot women, mixed with an action-packed game-like central theme, the result is a good B-movie worth your while. And that folks is synonymous with Death Race 2.

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  • aryl016

    a Nurse needs a lot of brains.. and have to be knowledgeable.. we’re HANDLING LIVE’s.

    it’s not about the money.. it’s not only about ourselves.. but we are always thinking for every sick person we encountered in the hospital..and it’s to save their life.

    i understand you have limited time to answer the question, i just cant believe you came up with that answer..

    goodluck to this coming election Mrs.Villar