S.W.A.T.: Firefight (2011)

Pretty Good

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Although the original SWAT may have embellished the realms of reality a little, it was a movie I was still able to watch and enjoy to the most. This sequel however is really in the league of TV drama over any type of well researched and feasible movie plot execution. No doubt the money is there in the props and gear, but the execution is not beyond what I would expect to see on commercial TV in the middle of the day.I'm not adverse to stretching the realms of reality a bit, I enjoy the old Bond films as well as things like Die Hard 4, but the stretches of the reality in those films are within an expected context and add to the experience more in their own out there and comedic fashion. In this movie however everything is pitched as though it is supposed to be dead serious, so if you're a person who has even half a clue, or an ounce of respect for that matter, of what these guys do in real life, then this movie will most likely eat at you the entire way through. If it was made in the 80's, then maybe it would have been right at home.There was either little real world advice sought on the production of this, or it was totally ignored, since there is very little at all aside from the uniforms and the odd technical reference which made any correlation between them and their real world counterparts, especially so in their discipline and conduct. You could see this coming as soon as the opening credits rolled and we see a clip being filled with spent ammunition.So unfortunately I think we've just set the public impression and fear of what real SWAT teams are back about 20 years thanks to this movie, and I can now see a great many children being spanked and sent to their room for even suggesting any aspiration of being a SWAT officer when they grow up.Alas movies are not supposed to be documentaries. So the one main comparison for me that comes to mind between the quality of SWAT: Firefight vs the original SWAT movie is the difference between Behind Enemy Lines with Owen Wilson and Gene Hackman and the later WWE produced sequel Behind Enemy Lines: Columbia. If you're the type of person who enjoyed Behind Enemy Lines: Columbia without grinding your teeth the entire way, then SWAT: Firefight will probably ride well with you. Otherwise if you're the type of person who more enjoyed the first Behind Enemy Lines and enjoys a bit more believability in your story and some well researched details to what they are representing on screen, then this will probably just have you infuriating and wishing for that 90 minutes of your life back again.

Don't know where jonmcann got his review from....but he was way off. Not the very best of movies...but it definitely was a watchable move and there was no suffering sitting thru it. The action was pretty much non-stop and the plot well put together. If the acting had been more up to par it would for sure get a much higher review.Well worth watching. I imagine that a few better actors would have made the movie better. And the role of Hatch could have been better laid out more clearly to the viewers. And also bringing in Lori to the squad was a bit curious, as it was sort of she was not previously in the movie anywhere else that I recall. All in all a decent movie....just that the acting could have been better.

This movie was available ON DEMAND, so I thought I'd give it a chance, mostly because it starred Gabriel Macht, an actor I've enjoyed in supporting roles in major films. The movie starts off well: Sgt. Cutler, an LAPD SWAT leader with a military background (Macht) is sent to Detroit to train-up their SWAT team for some special Federal hostage/rescue certification. The film takes the time to develop the team members to some degree and includes the requisite tension between the new officer and the locals that leads to one of the more senior Detroit SWAT members, Kellogg, being "re-assigned," despite the fact that he's by far the team's best sniper. I can't speak to the veracity of any of the training techniques that are presented in the movie as being updated, post-Iraq and Afganistan procedures, but it made sense to this lay person and was interesting to watch.When Cutler brings in a female, former soldier sight unseen (no police training or certifications; no knowledge of Detroit and Michigan state law), it's not very plausible, but it was easy to overlook since it was fun to watch the team interact. The movie falls apart when, instead of being a movie about a SWAT leader and his team going up against the bad guy, it becomes a one man against the bad guy movie with the team fading into the background. Why take the time to build chemistry between and among the team leader and his squad only to have them relegated to the background? I would have bet the mortgage that Kellogg, the best shot in the Department, would show up to help Sgt. Cutler take down the bad guy. He shows up, but only to be told to stay behind (which he does!).But the worst part is the dismal ending. The Detroit police chief in charge of the SWAT teams asks Sgt. Cutler to stay on after the team's been decimated. But Cutler says he wants to go home. End of movie. Someone forgot to tell the screenwriter that the hero's supposed to have finally found his home and wouldn't dream of leaving his new buddies. Overall, not totally bad, but nearly so.

I'm convinced this movie is aimed at kids in the early teens. I mean this movie is stuffed with things that makes you go "What the f...!?".Just take the start of the movie for instance. It begins with two baddies crashing a random rich kid's party. They're demanding their money and threaten to kill everybody if they don't get it right now. In comes the SWAT. But behold suddenly that rich kid is on his own having a machine gun and shoots out a surveillance cam. WTF!? Later on the best shooter in the team gets pulled from being a sniper. For what? Not being able to hit a target with a pistol in the wrong hand? WTF!? A hostage is so scared of a villain she takes her own life. WTF!? And it continues like that for 90 minutes. So if you like action movies with tons of shootouts, loud bangs and don't mind plot holes or people behaving strangely you'll love this film. But if you expect anything more from a movie then this clearly ain't for you.