Amy Smart Movie:

		List Price: $14.95		Label: Simitar Ent. Salesrank: 173211 Released: May 18, 1999
		Our Price: $20.00
		Used Price: $1.35
		MPAA Rating: R (Restricted) Media: DVD

High Voltage Reviews:
Florentine's Low-Watt Bulb
2009-10-13 - Director Isaac Florentine is a gift to action fans where direct-to-video cinema is concerned: the man makes sure that there's reason to buy films like this, despite their obvious budgetary, dramatic, and technical limitations, by guaranteeing an amount of action unparalleled by movies concerned with whether the leading man's hair is perfect. With that being said, "High Voltage" is probably the least significant of his films made within his established formula (i.e. post-Desert Kickboxer [VHS]) for the simple fact that it fails to pioneer its action content and almost blatantly steals from others.

The story: when a group of bank robbers play out their latest "job", they unwittingly upset a laundering market run by a ruthless agent of the Korean mafia (George Cheung, Rambo: First Blood Part II). Targeted by the mob, they must wake their way through city and desert whilst devising a plan to unbecome marked men.

These marked men include TV/action hero Antonio Sabato, Jr. (The Base 2, Deadly Skies), co-star extraordinaire Locklyn Munro (Dead Man on Campus), blonde-turned-buttkicker Amy Smart (Crank), and Shannon Lee, daughter of the legendary Bruce. Turncoat William Zabka (Shootfighter: Fight to the Death) rounds off the major cast. Needless to say, you're not going to find any kind of acting that rates higher than "high school drama class". This wouldn't be so bad on its own, but the film is marked by the single most stand-out scene of ridiculousness I've ever seen, Florentine film or not (SPOILER): two-thirds through the film, Smart's boyfriend (played by writer Mike Mains) is shot and killed, and the group fulfills Smart's desire to marry him by holding a priest at gunpoint and making him wed the partially-deceased couple. Then they bury him in the desert. Up until that point, none of the characters have displayed any kind of mental unstableness, but this event blows a giant hole into my ability to take this film seriously on any level. The scene is so ridiculous and out-of-the-blue that it stays in your mind throughout the movie, and I guarantee it's going to be the first thing you think of before watching it again. It's...just a little too weird.

But what of the action? Well, remember me mentioning something about ripping off another movie?
See, there's only one hand-to-hand fight (a decidedly cool affair involving most of the main characters), and the rest of adrenaline is supplied by a handful of gunfights. I think that it was Florentine's intention to make a solid "gun-fu" movie along the lines of John Woo's Hard Boiled...but before long, he realized that he wasn't nearly as inventive at filming shootouts as he was at martial arts brawls, and he decided to simply copy Woo's style blatantly. While this is cinematically sinful enough, he doesn't even do a good job at it: all three of the gunfights are hindered by unnecessary a complete lack of ebb & flow and much unnecessary slow motion. Yes, two years before The Matrix was released, Florentine pioneered the use post production slow-down and made it as annoying then as it is today. Quite possibly his worst work ever.

Whether the in-between portions of the film are entertaining enough to save the film is entirely up to the individual viewer. Personally, I thought the characters were bland and the story forgettable...and that's coming from a Florentine fan whose favorite film is US Seals 2. With that said, the production is solid, bright, and fun to look at. The director even cut back on the "whooshing" sound effect whenever anybody raises a gun. Nevertheless, I fail to consider this movie to be among our benefactor's best, or even his middle ground. Fans ought to give it a look just for the sake of it, but don't use this film to make any first impressions.

Enjoyable for Antonio Sabato Fans
2006-08-08 - I enjoyed the movie, but I am a big Antonio Sabato fan. Although Antonio plays the part of a "bad guy," he is one of the "good" bad guys.

To thine own taste, be true!
2005-11-23 - To say that High Voltage is either a good or a bad movie would be too much of a generalization. In fact, one must understand the lengths that American production companies have gone through to imitate Asian action cinema. Many have failed, to say the least, but only so few have managed to succeed since the heydays of the No Retreat No Surrender trilogy-namely Steve Wang (Drive), and the director of High Voltage, Isaac Florentine.

Florentine's filmmaking style sets itself apart from the rest with the use of fantasy-based conceptual storytelling, with the help of some of the best action choreography and coordination ever seen on screen. But as usual, his films do not stand without some level of mediocrity of its own, since a lot of what brings a good action film to life depends not only on the know-how, but also a good budget that helps bring more to the table for a filmmaker to make a movie look good on screen. Such is the case of High Voltage.

Despite its low budget, the movie has a lot of really nice production qualities, as well as some good acting done by Antonio Sabato Jr., Antonio Sabato Sr., George Kee Cheung, James Lew, Amy Smart, Shannon Lee, and William Zabka. The gun battles are spectacular as well as the fight sequences, thanks to Koichi Sakamoto and the Alpha Stunt team, who have brought a much needed upgrade to the American standard of martial arts entertainment.

Personally, I give this film a lot of credit because I like it, and we need more films like this in the American circuit. Isaac Florentine brings as much style and substance to his films as he can with a limited budget, and succeeds for the most part.

Being an action film junkie all my life, I have come to the conclusion that the only reason why I "liked" the shtick featuring Billy Blanks, Gary Daniels, Olivier Gruner, Cynthia Rothrock and Richard Norton (Post HK film career), Jalal Merhi, and Don "The Dragon" Wilson, was because it was all I ever had thrown in my face for almost 10 years. American cinema has a chance to redeem itself, and nonetheless continues to waste its efforts on films like Pit Fighter (don't cast Scott Adkins if you're not going to use him) and Lessons For An Assassin (Koichi and Shannon should be ashamed for that one).

All I have to say is this: Undisputed 2 will be out in '06. In the meantime, take a look at High Voltage and pacify yourself for awhile. It'll be worth it!

High Voltage for DVD
2000-02-21 - Now this movie had bad acting, and bad music, but did it deliver on action ! The shootouts in this movie seem straight out of Hong Kong. If you want to see a "B" movie with "A" Quality shootouts then this is for you. ( When did Bruce Lee's daughter look so good)?

OKAY
2000-01-14 - I am a fan of Antonio's but I will speak frankly - this movie was cheesy. It was okay. It is always a thrill to see that hunk -- and an extra thrill to see his father (Good Lord! He is more built than his son! WOW!)-- but the movie was not very good. Sorry-- it's really only for hard core Antonio fans. What's with the marriage scene! That was lame! But overall it is okay.