Popular reviews

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  Review by Tao A ★ 13

  Getting real tired of these Raidsploitation movies tbh. It’s like these Asian countries that aren’t called Indonesia all saw The Raid and be like hey we can do that. Spoiler alert they can’t. Without Gareth Evans’ godlike editing or Timo Tjahjanto’s commitment to carnage all you’re left with is 3 poorly (barely) choreographed fights where a couple dudes just kind of flail around a little bit and it’s about as exciting to watch as the least exciting thing in the world. 

  Also South Korea this is just a word of advice, but maybe chill with the digital blood a bit. It basically made The Villainess unwatchable (aside from everything else that made The Villainess unwatchable) and it’s no less distracting…

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  Review by matt lynch ★★★

  Not the RAID knockoff set on the NO ESCAPE island you were hoping for but it'll do.

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  Review by Sven Roth ★½

  I'm sick in bed, and have looked for an easy to watch movie.

  Good decision, I was able to sleep for an hour thanks to the boredom of the movie.

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  Review by Andy Fell ★★★½

  DuBFaL-Asia-Weeks - 2nd Round - Film-Nr. 8 - Revenger / Er kennt keine Gnade

  Der südkoreanische Actionfilm aus dem Jahr 2018 ist ein Film, der zwei Gesichter hat.

  Das eine Gesicht 😀 zeigt einen Material-Arts-Film, der geil inszenierte Kampfeinlagen bietet und das quasi Nonstop. Das sah richtig bockstark aus und erinnerte ehrlich gesagt an die The-Raid-Reihe. Der Hauptprotagonist - ein sehr sehr wortkarger Modellathlet (dachte schon ich steh vorm Spiegel 😜) geht in bester Norris/Bronson/Stallone-Manier auf Rachefeldzug nach dem Frau und Kind brutal ermordet wurden. Das hat mich begeistert, da konnte ich nicht genug davon kriegen.

  Das andere Gesicht 😕 beinhaltete eine nebensächliche Story, die eigentlich keiner gebraucht hätte und auch was die Haupthandlung betrifft überflüssig war und keinen nachvollziehbaren…

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  Review by Speeg ★★½ 24

  Just add an R to the end of the word, and you’ve got yourself an original title for a revenge action flick.
  Story is told with a lot of flashbacks early on although it’s not always clear what’s being flashbacked to because timelines are sort of all over the place, not to mention multiple bandaged faces. 
  Superficial characters for the most part, but the action is pretty solid, not overly reliant on ‘quick cut’ fight scenes. 
  Features quite a bit of bow and arrow usage which I didn’t expect and thought was pretty well done. 
  The main protagonist has an unconventional look but with fighting skill to spare so as not to seem unrealistic. And based on the premise, I…

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  Review by Geoffrey Broomer ★★★½

  When his family are murdered, a former police officer gets sent up the river to a free range prison island where the killer has set himself up as the local warlord. With more Bruce Lee hand gestures than spoken words, writer and star Bruce Khan strikes down convicts with the confident "might makes right" swagger of an early 90s Steven Seagal. Wearing its influences on its bicep, The Revenger is a live action version of an 80s anime - Fist of the Northstar or Violence Jack - with minimal plotting to set-up larger than life grotesques to be brutally put down. Without gunplay, martial arts take centre stage - slick editing and overly elaborate stunts making this South Korean production…

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  Review by Austin Burke ★★½ 1

  ⚠️51%
  YouTube review - Click HERE
  Updated 2019 list - Click HERE

  I went into this movie with no knowledge of what anyone thought and was hoping for another “The Night Comes for Us.” That film released last year and knocked my socks off with some incredible action and a story that made you care. Revenger holds some action scenes that are truly awesome but never gives you the character development to make you care. Why do I even want to root for these characters when the film gives you such poorly constructed characters? Now, our lead (and the semi-focus of the film) has the screen presence that truly doesn’t require fleshing out. Our woman and her daughter get a backstory but…

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  Review by Martin Kostenzer 🎞️ ★★

  Asia-Weeks 2021
  Land: Südkorea

  Heute habe ich tatsächlich zum ersten Mal die Shuffle-Funktion bzw. die Zufallswiedergabe von Netflix ausprobiert und nach ein paar Versuchen, bei denen es mir entweder irgendwelche Serienepisoden oder Filme, die ich schon gesehen habe, vorgeschlagen hat, war dies dann der erste Film, der daherkam und den ich noch nicht kannte.

  Zwar hat mich Er kennt keine Gnade (der deutsche Titel ist irgendwie merkwürdig) schon länger interessiert, aber irgendwie kam ich noch nicht dazu, ihn mir anzuschauen.
  Dabei klingt die Prämisse ganz interessant, wenn auch irgendwie bekannt und nach schon unzählige Male gesehen.
  Und ja, der Film hält was man sich von einem Martial-Arts-Film verspricht, solide Kampfeinlagen und eine nebensächliche Story, die eigentlich nur dazu dient, die…

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  Review by nick atkinson ★

  What a fucking abomination.

  I suppose it tried to be like The Raid but is it even worthy of that comparison? It failed so remarkably. In part this was due to the simple fact that nobody in Revenger could act. Combine this with an unlikeable protagonist and you have yourselves a bunch of characters you don’t care about. The villains are lazily introduced and made to seem menacing in the most cliché ways. And somehow even that gets butchered by the production team.

  The one thing that the film should have going for it, the combat, also happened to be awful. The choreography essentially just consisted of a couple of kicks and then a head butt every once in a while. The shitty editing did not help. 

  This was a mess, through and through.

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  Review by Sin ✊🏿 ★★½ 4

  I appreciate a straightforward and simple story - a former detective purposely gets himself banished to a remote "prison island" seeking vengeance against the man who murdered his family. But when it comes to revenge stories (and overall narrative), The Revenger is middling at best.

  👍 There's some pretty good action sequences and a couple of nifty directing choices that come along with said action spots.

  👍 The group of guys who essentially function as comic relief actually worked more often than not for me. (However, while there were some laugh out loud moments, a few times it was admittedly too goofy for my personal taste.)

  👎 I've long grown tired of movies that rehash the prototypical silent, lone wolf,…

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  Review by Nachtwaechter ★★½ 4

  "Der Zorn des Khan..."

  ... und zwar Bruce Khan, der als durch fremde, böse Kräfte seiner Familie entledigter Ex-Cop den Weg auf eine Gefängnisinsel sucht, um dort den Mörder seiner Familie durch hervorragend eingefangene, blutige Kampfkunst seines Leibes zu entledigen.
  Auf dem Weg dorthin müssen aberdutzende Statisten ihr Rollenleben lassen oder (asiatypisch?) etwas überkandidelten Humor zum Besten geben, da auch der fleißigste Kämpfer irgendwann mal eine Pause braucht und man zum Schreiben einer abendfüllenden Handlung weder Zeit noch Muse hatte.

  Das schöne Setting liefert attraktiven Rahmen, die Choreographen haben wie der schweigsame Hauptdarsteller offenbar eine gesunde Selbstwahrnehmung, was ihr können angeht. Und so pflügt der Khan, der Bruce gnadenlos und fast schon unbesiegbar durch die Horden an Gegnern und lässt sich beim Sprechen erwischen.
  Mehr ist hier nicht zu holen und das ist je nach Tagesform ausreichend oder schwer erträglich. "Aua" macht es auf jeden Fall!

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  Review by 👹 Lee, or El Duderino, if, you're not into the whole brevity thing ★★ 2

  The fight choreography was cool, and that's about it. Also this Netflix movie has the guts to place a mid credit scene setting up a sequel. To be honest the sequel it hints at is so outrageous that I'll probably bite.