Review of Sudden Death (1995) by Bill C — 13 Oct 2008

Sudden Death is one of those poorly contrived action movies, which I know I should hate, but really I liked.

Muscles from Brussels himself, Jean-Claude Van Damme, who was quite popular from the late 80's to the mid 90's. Scores what was his last big hit.

Van Damme plays Darren McCord, an ex fireman who of course quits after he failed to save someone. Insert roll of the eyes here...

He's now the fire marshall at the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh. And he happens to be working the night of the final game of the Stanley Cup.

But of course there's a terrorist plan to hijack money, because the Vice President of the United States, is at the game. Makes enough sense I suppose.

Powers Boothe is quite chilling as the head terrorst, and I actually enjoy watching him in the good chunk of movies he does. Sadly, most of them suck.

This one doesen't suck, it's merely mediocore.

So of course, Darren's kids are at the game, he and his wife are divorced, and he gives his son and daughter two tickets, despite his wifes objections.

Of course the wife objects for no other reason, other than the fact that the script says she has to. Am I the only one who thinks this is stupid? And for some reason, later in the movies, when the son says "Dad's probably checking more light bulbs", in a very mokcing tone and says, "Dad's not a fireman Emily" very harshly. Why does he resent his Dad? We never got an indication of that before, during or AFTER that scene. That one relaly bugged me, again, it's as if he resented his dad, just to have the set up for the daughter to run away, and get abducted herself.

So of course, Darren gets caught up in it all, with his daugther involved, even motivates him more.

The action scenes and the idea of the plot itself, were actually quite good. The reason I'm reccomending it, is because, I wasn't bored.

Some people tried to compare this to "Under Siege". Mind you that movie has some amazing bad guys, a good script, and some good dialogue. Sure, Steven Segal isn't much of a better actor than Van Damme, but Under Siege was very well thought out, of how it came together.

Anyway, Sudden Death is a good movie to watch if you're bored, or just in the mood for a semi-decent action flick.