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Road to Hell (2008)
Deeply Flawed
While I can appreciate Cody's "journey" and the tragedy it entails, the whole thing swerves too far away from the original Streets of Fire, as far as Cody's character. Suspending disbelief, there are several changes I'd have made to it, were I doing this movie and still working with this material. First, I would cut out the whole introduction with its explanation. The movie would have been much better if the audience was just left guessing. I suppose since the movie was "unauthorized" the characters' names being changed some was to be expected, but in other ways, there were incursions onto the original material. It seems like it would've been better for instance, if Cody was just "Cody" as opposed to Cody Wilson. More nudity would've been better. The ending with Cody being let off the hook seemed bogus. My sense of justice was that even Kat was "better" than Cody because she hadn't been at it as long. Ashe seemed to be mostly a victim and not deserving of her fate. I don't question God on any of this, just to be straightforward, but do question the writers or director. The music in the movie was great whether the old or the new. There was a little too much included. If you did only what I said, you're really left with a short rather than a full movie. There was too much detail in the movie in some ways also. With the changes and some fleshing out, this could be an 8 or even 9 star movie. I still rate it a little above average. I watched the Direct Streaming version from 2015 off Albert Pyun's own site also. Just FYI.
In the Electric Mist (2009)
Disappointing
This is a disappointing adaptation of the James Lee Burke novel "In the Electric Mist of the Confederate Dead". It is rather poorly acted mainly due to the miscasting of the principal players. Tommy Lee Jones, a normally fine actor, just doesn't capture Burke's "Dave Robicheaux". As Robicheaux's main nemesis, John Goodman does a sloppy job as the "heavy". The guy who plays Robicheaux's actor-buddy doesn't look like a former "A" lister leading man. The rest of the movie is mainly cast with no-name locals who just don't do justice to a big-time novel.
The movie and Jones' performance is way too hurried for one thing. Robicheaux in Burke's series of novels, gives one the feeling that he fits well into his environment most of the time, being laid back and slow-moving. This is just like the deep south and southern Louisiana. Then at times Robicheaux is nearly manic in his exertions. Jones just moves at a fast pace through the whole movie. He doesn't vary. Ned Beatty is wasted. Mary Steenburgen is out of place. About the only good thing about this is the setting. On the whole the movie gives one the impression of a TV movie.
EZ Streets: Pilot (1996)
This is one of the best TV series' ever
along with "Profit". It's ironic that they both came out in 1996, at about the same time. Neither lasted very long, which is possibly a commentary on popular taste.
The premise was that a semi-disgraced cop would go undercover in his old neighborhood to bring down a low-level but rising gang of hoodlums. Joe Pantoliano as the crime boss was wonderful. The whole cast was uniformly excellent and included the old master-Rod Steiger. The setting was great. Everything about the show reeked of quality. It only lasted a few episodes and then was gone forever. Could the quality have been maintained in the long haul? I doubt it, but taken on its own with no consideration of what might have been, this is one of the best series' ever.