Riot (2015)

Very disappointing...

Absolutely Fantastic

In truth, any opportunity to see the film on the big screen is welcome.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Copper Jack Stone purposefully orchestrates a bank robbery in order to be thrown into prison with the notorious Russian kingpin Balam. Balam is more than just a mob criminal; he's a very cunning and dangerous lord who controls the police force from behind bars. I was expecting Riot to be some kind of 'Escape Plan' but it managed to be even worse than 'Escape Plan 2: Hades'. It's a total borefest of a film, the acting isn't impressive and Lundgren is totally wasted plus studios need to stop with this fake advertisement their doing cause it's awful!!

Policeman Jack Stone (Matthew Reese) purposely gets himself thrown into prison following a bank robbery and killing a police officer. He doesn't have good odds, but he is Jack Stone, movie cop with choreographed moves. His goal is to take down Russian mafia boss Balam (Chuck Liddell) who deals drugs from his private quarters inside the prison surrounded by crooked guards. He also runs a protection racket.Jack befriends mop man William (Dolph Lundgren) and there is also an attached woman's prison where Alena (Danielle Chuchran) causes trouble. Not too hard to figure out.The plot was highly improbable as was the prison. There were no real twists as the writing exhibited little imagination and dialogue. What the movie features is plenty of prison fighting. How many times can Jack get hit with a club and not go down?Guide: No sex or nudity. No swearing. Serious no swearing in a prison film. Filmed in Utah.Danielle Chuchran aka "Thing One" wanted the role of Katniss. She ended up playing Kate Mitra in "Survivor" and assumed the Katniss pose on several occasions. She has become the leading lady in Utah films.

The last few Dolph Lundgren flicks have been rough going (specifically the Serafini ones like BLOOD OF REDEMPTION), so I entered RIOT with expectations lower than usual. So it was nice to see it actually putting forth some effort. It is essentially a vanity project (lead Matthew Reese's name appears 3 times in the first 30 seconds) and you have to suffer through UFC fighter Chuck Liddell - sporting a huge HGH belly - doing one of the worst Russian accents in the history of cinema (not an easy feat!), but the filmmakers came up with a twisty plot, some cool guard costumes and did some interesting fight choreography (which was obviously influenced by JOHN WICK and THE RAID films). Not a Dolph- classic by any means, but a decent 85 minutes.

I liked this movie from start to end. There is no special depth to the plot but for an action movie it was quite good. There were no unrealistic scenarios, not much exaggeration (some but not in the way where you would just stop watching) in fight scenes and no unrealistic "taking over the prison" stuff, it was plain and simple and what's better, it was believable. I really like the part Dolph Lundgren played in this movie and he played his character really well from the beginning. Although Matthew Reese is a leading actor and main protagonist in this movie (and he played the part quite well), Dolph Lundgren's performance and character left more impression on me while i was watching it. Give this movie a chance, and I think you'll like it.