Shakedown is B-movieland personified. Lots of shoot-em-up silliness, shouting, yelling, the occasional burst of humour, and a nonsensical script. Oh, and a number of filler shots in the way of stock footage and grotty CGI work. But never mind.
The cast try very hard to make up for it, with a personable leading man in Wolf Larsen, who turns out to have a nice line in wry humour. It's a real shame he doesn't make better films than this. Erika Eleniak looks pretty, makes an attempt at acting and portrays the tough-nut heroine quite well. But the real star of this one is Ron Perlman as the deadly intense religious nut St Joy, all blonde hair and black leather, in a role that could so easily have been ruined by over-acting. But not in the hands of the tremendously talented Perlman. St Joy is genuinely creepy, and - oddly enough - at times, even sympathetic. Then he turns the whole 'sympathy' thing on its head with his unerring brutality.
If you like mindless violence, a convoluted, badly thought-out plot and loads of mayhem, then you'll like this one. Great for an evening in with a pizza, but not much else.
The cast try very hard to make up for it, with a personable leading man in Wolf Larsen, who turns out to have a nice line in wry humour. It's a real shame he doesn't make better films than this. Erika Eleniak looks pretty, makes an attempt at acting and portrays the tough-nut heroine quite well. But the real star of this one is Ron Perlman as the deadly intense religious nut St Joy, all blonde hair and black leather, in a role that could so easily have been ruined by over-acting. But not in the hands of the tremendously talented Perlman. St Joy is genuinely creepy, and - oddly enough - at times, even sympathetic. Then he turns the whole 'sympathy' thing on its head with his unerring brutality.
If you like mindless violence, a convoluted, badly thought-out plot and loads of mayhem, then you'll like this one. Great for an evening in with a pizza, but not much else.