Death Ring

source: Death Ring

How's this for ya. Norris, McQueen, Swayze and Drago. But it's not who you would think... or even dream of. So If you cannot get the headlining stars. Do the next best thing. Get their lesser talented family. And sell the film that way. You're not lying plastering their surnames across the poster. At least you got Billy Drago. Disappointedly though, looks like Frank Stallone and Joe Estevez weren't available. An ex-solider (Mike Norris) along with his girl, are kidnapped after the attention he receives of winning a survival of the fittest contest. Soon he finds out he has been chosen as the next target for a life and death manhunt on a millionaires (Billy Drago) island. While his best mate (Chad McQueen) is doing everything possible to find out who kidnapped him. 'Death Ring' is a straight-to-video, b-action staple of little imagination and probably looked much wilder on paper than what entirely transpired. Still there's a clunkiness to its story progression, and along with certain performances sorta carry it through. The premise treads a familiar path of the most dangerous game formula. And it's not particularly a thrilling exercise, as it's very slow to get going, especially when it came to the island manhunt. Everything picks up in the last half-hour, where it comes into its own. Even though it's low-rent action. Throw in some dodgy booby traps, sloppy one-one-one combat, daring helicopter rescue and a head decapitation. It gets better as it goes along. Luckily Drago effortlessly chews it up whenever on screen and runs rings around everyone else. His interaction with Branscombe Richmond (who's sorely underused) is a vicious exchange. Was probably the best moment within the stodgy first hour. While Don Swayze is credited, he comes on late and doesn't get up to much. As he sorta tags along, while Norris goes to town. Norris gets a couple decent encounters especially with Donegan Smith (the most memorable of the hunters). Another cameo was Dennis Lipscomb, as a satanist leader. Quick, but devilishly amusing walk-on scene mainly involving the sub-plot of McQueen's character. An okay watch, but I wish it didn't hold back. In the end I'll rather re-watch Avenging Force, or Hard Target, and Surviving the Game. Even Deadly Prey did it better.

As others here before me have pointed out, what we have here is yet another take of the old "Most Dangerous Game" formula. I have seen a number of other examples of this formula, and while "Death Ring" isn't the worst example I have seen, it's all the same well below average. No one in the cast is particularly noteworthy - Mike Norris is only adequate at his best, and Billy Drago seems to be phoning in his performance. The biggest problem with the movie, however, is how slow and unexciting it is. It takes almost half of the movie before the "game" starts, and once the halfway mark is reached, none of the action is really all that exciting. The movie as a whole really feels sluggish and without energy or enthusiasm from anyone in front of or behind the camera. Except for the director of photography - he managed to give the cinematography for this cheapie a very professional look. If you want a GOOD take on this old formula, seek out the movies "Raw Courage" (a.k.a. "Courage"), "Avenging Force", and "Surviving the Game" instead.

When I looked at the credits, I noticed several popular names like Mcqueen, Norris, and Swayze. Unfortunately, they were all siblings of the more recognizable and much more talented actors. Death Ring is about a sport where people hunt humans for pleasure and entertainment. It takes place on an island and Billy Drago is the promoter of the event. Mike Norris plays Matt Collins, who was an ex military- special forces unit, and also the winner of the survival of the fittest competition. Collins is the human prey in the manhunt. There's a reason this movie went straight to video "It sucked" - Plain and Simple. The only positive thing I could say about this movie was the performance of Billy Drago playing public enemy #1 Danton Vachs. Drago was excellent in his role as the lead villain, as he kills a disrespectful guest with a fork, at the kitchen table as they were preparing for dinner. There were so many incidents that were so ridiculous that you couldn't help but laugh. When Norris is preparing to counter attack the hunters, he puts mud over his eyebrows and on his chin in an attempt to camouflage himself. Moments later, he gets confronted by a villain and he has no camouflage on him. The Asian Hunter has three ninja stars as weapons. He gets a visual on Norris, and he throws the stars at him during three sequences. Each one of them barely misses Norris's head, but they each hit the dead center of a tree. Drago has some sort of militia group guarding his house. Well, as far as their shooting abilities, the phrase "He couldn't hit the broad side of a barn", would be giving them too much credit. The safest place to be when they were firing their assault rifles was to stand right in front of them. Chad Mcqueen is flying a helicopter in an attempt to rescue Norris and his fiancé. Mcqueen is approximately fifty feet in the air, in a stationary position above the mansion. The Military Personnel are opening fire at the plane. That group couldn't put a hole in a stationary target thats practically right above them. The funniest part was when one of the hunters is looking at a map in an attempt to locate Collins. It looked like he was reading a traffic map. O'k, he really has no idea as to where Collins is, he doesn't pick up any clues or prints, and its an island with no streets. What's the point in looking at a map? It certainly wasn't a map of the island. I'm amazed that someone can actually write a script like this, proof read it, and actually go through with it.

Mike Norris stars as an Ex-Green Beret who is possibly the deadliest man alive, however when Billy Drago kidnaps Norris and his girlfriend, Norris is forced to partake in a hunt, in which he is the prey. His only hope comes from police officer Chad McQueen who uses a chopper to locate his best friends as well as a survivalist expert Don Swayze. It's hard to believe that everybody headlined in this movie is a relative of a far more famous actor. (Exceping Billy Drago) That being said Death Ring is a competent Most Dangerous Game rip off, with some decent action sequences, some moderate suspense and far better acting then what you would expect. However the most entertaining thing about this feature is Billy Drago who gives a performance so cheesy, that he overall steals the show. However where as Death Ring is better than average for a B.movie, it however pales in comparison to Hard Target and Avenging Force, however it does remain far more enjoyable than Aaron Norris' Overkill. Then again though, what isn't? Also from the director of Hell Comes To Frogtown, who sadly doesn't put in a chainsaw wielding frog. * * out of 4-(Fair)

*Spoilers ahead.* The guy who plays Voss is ABSOLUTELY PERFECT for the comic-strip-style role of sadistic criminal mastermind! Tying for a close second would be Temple, the thrill-seeking criminal lawyer (can you say "redundant?"); and Ms. Ling, the sultry-but-sinister "administrative assistant." I just wish they hadn't killed off Branscombe Richmond's character, so early. Mr. Cross would probably have confessed to being a Miami Beach druglord, who started out as the dope-smuggling son of an alligator poacher (or something)! Final analysis? 2.9 stars

I consider this to be one of my favorite movies, for the mere fact that it's so incredibly bad. It's not enough that the action is lame, or the plot so ridiculous. It's the fact that Don Swayze wouldn't need guns to kill an army of highly trained assassins, duh, he'd use his powerful acting abilities! Like in 'Trapper County War', he sniffed girls hair and threatened to kill them, that to me portrays a dangerous individual..so cerebral... Anyways, speaking of 'The Don', when I first watched this I was waiting for Don to come into the movie, and when the hero falls into the cave I said "Wouldn't it be cool if Don Swayze lived in the cave?". You know, just one of those stupid comments you make when you watch stupid movies. Low and behold however he did!! He'd been living there for something like 3 months off of rats and berries...ugh. Not even Billy Drago could save this movie, that says a lot. Buy it only if you love watching crap...like me.

I have always enjoyed the films of the Norris family (Chuck, Mike, and Aaron). When I rented Death Ring, I expected it to be an above average film. However, I was surprised. It is, in my opinion, one of the best B-films ever made. It is loaded with action, has a plot which is very easy to follow, and had good acting. Mike Norris did well in Delta Force 3, and continued with this talent throughout Death Ring. He is a very underrated actor who deserves to be in first-run movies. Given a chance, he is very likely to succeed at the box office. Billy Drago portrays this film's villain, and he did well too. He has the talent that makes his characters very antagonistic, and in the case of Death Ring, very engrossing. He has you siding with the protagonist even more. The locales used in this film were interesting as well.

From the director of "Hell Comes To Frogtown" comes "Death Ring", a movie, despite the impressive B-movie cast, could have used the talents of "Rowdy" Roddy Piper. In this complete and total knockoff of "The Most Dangerous Game" (1932), Mike Norris portrays local lunkhead Matt Collins, an ex-Special Forces soldier who can't find his place in the world. So he spends his time competing in events such as "The Survival Of The Fittest" competition. In this unexplainably televised event, which is a cross between rock-climbing and Army basic training, bored (really bored) evil rich dude Danton Vachs (great name) (Drago) (another great name)first sees Collins and kidnaps him and his girlfriend Lauren (Isabel Glasser) who were trying to spend a lovely day at the batting cages. Luckily, "Skylord" Harris (McQueen) witnesses the whole thing before being knocked unconscious by Vachs' goons. Did we mention his name was SKYLORD HARRIS? Because his name is Skylord Harris. Skylord is now on the case trying to track down his best friend Matt. Little does Skylord know, they have been spirited away to a creepy island and Collins is forced to play "The Most Dangerous Game" with a multi-racial group of hunters: a Mexican, an American Indian, an Asian, and an Italian, all go about hunting Collins in their own ethic-stereotyped ways. When Collins dispatches Mr. Chin, in a flash of brilliance, he posthumously re-dubs him "Mr. Dead". Vachs has a control panel set-up so he can communicate with his minions while they hunt Collins. (and so Collins can spit snappy one-liners to Vachs deep in the woods.) Vachs minions also drink snake blood and the titular "Death Ring" is a real piece of jewelry worn by Vachs. Exactly one hour into the film, we finally get our first "Swayze Sighting". Don plays John Blackwell, a leftover from Vachs' previous hunting party. He and Collins team up to get revenge. After searching one tattoo parlor named "Tattoo", Skylord sees the design of two overlapping triangles (like they are fast-forwarding their wrists) he remembers at the time of the kidnapping. We won't give away the ending, but let's just say it involves a "fan favorite death" and heads are gonna roll! Basically playing the same role as he did in the execrable "Money To Burn" (see review) with fellow castmate Don Swayze, we can only surmise that McQueen himself is a man dead-set against sleeves of any kind. Including his car, which is a jeep. Doors are too close to sleeves for this guy! It is "death before sleeves!" as Skylord sleevelessly saves the day in his rockin' helicopter. This "New generation of action stars" (as the box only lists their last names, as if that would fool potential renters) is really close to "Lone Tiger" syndrome: where a movie that is chock full of B-movie favorites does not guarantee a good movie. That being said, "Death Ring" is basic stupid action fun. It predates the very similar but more popular "Surviving The Game" (1994) by two years. Death Ring was first! The end credits admonish you to not just "read the novel", but in what has to be a movie first, to "eat the popcorn". If anyone out there has read the official Death Ring novel or eaten the official Death Ring popcorn, please write in today. Comeuppance Review by: Ty & Brett For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

Death Ring must be watched to check out the quality of Don Swayze's facial hair. Rubber shares must have went through the roof looking at that jaw. It may be just dirt on there but if its real then why have we not seen more of this kind. He appears to have made his home in the jungle where surely he is the king. With a cast that most Hollywood execs would be creaming for this movie is a must have in any self respecting DVD collection. SPOILER (In my opinion this film cannot be spoiled) An all time classic scene is when the helicopter takes off at the end and all the dead bodies below are perfectly laid out in a circle. Only Don could cause mass destruction with such style.