No matter what you think of The Asylum and their never-ending line of low budget “mockbusters”, you’ve got to hand it to them for creating one of the best titles of all time with Snow White and the 7 Samurai. Surprisingly enough, the movie almost lives up to its awesome title. Almost.
Not even a minute into the movie we learn why Anya (Fiona Dorn) is nicknamed Snow White as she’s “heir to her daddy’s cocaine empire!” And get this: Her drug-dealing daddy is played by none other than Eric Roberts. Naturally, Roberts gets killed off in record time and leaves his fortune to Snow White. Her wicked stepmother (Gina Vitori) despises the fact she wants to make the family business legitimate and hires “The Hooded Man” (Quinton “Rampage” Jackson) to snuff her out. Snow White survives and is nursed back to health by seven sexy samurai women who fight corruption and injustice. It doesn’t take long for the feisty Anya to join their ranks and together, they set out to stop her wicked stepmother once and for all.
I don’t know about you, but I’ll take seven sexy samurai women over seven dwarf miners any day.
Yes, this movie could’ve skated by on the ingenious title alone, but credit goes to the filmmakers for actually sneaking a decent female-driven action flick in there too. The real surprise is that the action is well-choreographed, and the fight scenes are a lot of fun. (I think my favorite scene was the fun training sequence where Snow White learns various fighting techniques from each of the samurai women.) Vitori is especially intimidating as the wicked stepmother who can throw down with the best of them. Sunny Tellone who plays Luna, the leader of the samurai, is equally impressive as she can spin a mean Bo staff and kick lots of ass. Dorn is a credible action lead in her own right and carries the film gamely enough. She certainly doesn’t need any Prince Charming to help her out of danger.
It’s always entertaining seeing Roberts in something like this, even if his role is limited. His appearance may lead you to believe it’s going to be another grade Z effort, but it’s better than you’d expect, all things considered (even if it starts to run out of steam by the final reel). Jackson also brings an air of menace to what’s essentially a thankless henchmen role (he’s basically the Huntsman character). It was also nice to see Skinamax stalwart, Robert Donavan popping up as the family’s lawyer.
No comments:
Post a Comment