The Detonator (2006)

Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

Absolutely brilliant

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

This is a gorgeous movie made by a gorgeous spirit.

Such has been Wesley Snipes' career despite his obvious talent that he has had to take up many shoddy projects just to keep his coffee warm. Nevertheless, it's always good to see Wesley Snipes kick and punch and shoot the bad guys. When it comes to action flicks, he's a reliable hero and a natural. But if that's why you wanna watch this movie, don't. Chances are solid that you won't even last the full length of this movie in your seat.This is a low-budget, straight-to-video affair that does barely enough to be considered a movie. 'Could've been good' can be said about lots of movies but let's not go there with this one because nearly everything would need to be redone from the scratch to make something good out of the plot. Acting is meh while everything else is just plain trash. CGI used in simulating action scenes is low-class and pathetic. Tim Dutton impresses with his persona; I wouldn't mind seeing him as a villain in other serious projects. Pretty Italian actress, Silvia Colloca, is mostly irritating trying to pass off her flat chest as a well-endowed bosom with the help of a push-up bra. Eeek! William Hope is one of those actors who can't perform badly even if he wanted to.VERDICT: Avoid, unless you have nothing to do in your life like I do.SIMILAR & BETTER movies: Matt Damon's BOURNE series, Spy Game, Ronin, Casino Royale

Snipes has joined Seagal and van Damme in the direct-to-video market after doing some really good films like U.S. Marshalls, Passenger 57, The Art of War, and Murder at 1600. I wasn't expecting much, but I had a good reason to check it out.Lesbian Vampire Killers is not out yet, so I had to watch to get a Silvia Colloca stimulus. I'm glad she wore the same outfit the whole movie, because it and she was hot! The movie was not a complete disappointment as there were loud explosions, great car chases, and lots of bullets.There was also lots of Silvia, and that's worth seeing.

The CIA secret agent Sonni Griffith(Wesley Snipes) travels to Romania for investigating a gunrunners and avoid the selling a nuclear weapon.Meanwhile he's killing Romanian gangster at a national soccer event,he's interrogating,gunning down people and burning suspects.Griffith is arrested at the Romanian semifinal cup match.Then is jailed but is freed by his friend ,the CIA agent Michael Shepard(William Hope).He's assigned a new mission ,scorting the Romanian named Nadia(Silvia Colocca).But he aware that Nadia is pursued by Josef Bostanescu(Tim Duttom),a megalomaniac nasty,he owns the stadium and soccer team and is preparing the biggest deal he've ever made.He tries to get from Nadia the information he needs: the location where are the thirty millions of dollars that she hid of her murdered ex-husband and accountant of Bostenescu and he wishes for buying the atomic bomb.When an information into CIA is leaked,allegedly from his chief(Michael Brandon)and reveals where are placed ,they must fight to survive against the gunrunners and save themselves.The movie displays suspense,thriller, unstopped action and lots of violence when the killing happen.It's an average actioner movie with some entertaining moments but also with no sense scenes.Wesley is nice as action hero ,his early performances were as serious actor in dramas ,later turning as tough action man in films with big budget like¨Money train,Murder at 1600,US Marshall and Blade trilogy¨,although nowadays he solely movies with middling and low budget like as ¨Unstoppable,7 seconds,Chaos,The marksman¨.The movie is produced by Andrew Stevens Entertainment Inc.Andrew Stevens(son of Stella Stevens) was a famous actor of the 80s,today turned in successful producer,besides is produced by the starring Snipes and by Pierre Spengler,he's a veteran producer of known movies like the saga Superman-Reeve and the classic Three Musqueteers. The motion picture is shot in Castel studios of Romania where have been film the last vehicles of Steven Seagal and Van Damme.

There was a time when Wesley Snipes WAS action. Blade, Passenger 57, Boiling Point, Demolition Man...now he seems to be the king of straight to DVD and I hadn't seen him in action in awhile so I decided to go with The Detonator. In all fairness Snipes is not the problem. He stills kicks some serious ass and he can actually act which is a plus for an action star but the story was just bogged down with non-sensical and confusing plot and characters. The film falls victim to a common error committed by writer Martin Wheeler who is probably just an action film fan boy who thinks he can write his own. He's slapped together a film completely neglected plot holes, sense of style or even fitting together and just let it fly. Action films don't have to be realistic but they have to have a basis in reality so that the audience will ignore the lack of realism (ie: Transporter 2) Wesley Snipes plays scorned Government agent Sonni Griffith who is wanted back in the U.S. for murdered a mobster and yet apparently is allowed to roam Europe on assignment...yeeeah. He is after a big gun runner until his cover is blown by a mysterious phone caller. Now he has to escort a protected witness back to the U.S. Snipes is good, there is nothing wrong with his performance. His martial arts is wicked, and his gun play is superb, the man could still be an action superstar but the plot and story stinks. Italian actress Silvia Colloca plays the protected witness, Nadia Cominski who despite a rather poorly slapped together Russian accent does a decent job. She's tough, and her and Snipes have great chemistry although the I hate you, I love you routine is a little forced at times. Matthew Leitch gives a stand out performance as head bad guy Dimitru (misspelled Dimitri on IMDb.) For some reason I wanted his name to be Dimitri because that's the common name but no it was "u." Anyways Leitch gives a really great performance as a blood thirsty angry vicious killer/hit-man for a much larger mobster. Although Leitch and Snipes don't actually go head to head that often they are great adversaries and in a weak story such as this it would have easy for the bad guy to be a real pansy but instead he gives a terrific performance. William Hope plays brutally vicious mobster Michael Shepard. Seeing him in the same shot playing with children and then threatening and murdering other people is disturbing and he is a great mobster. He's mostly a straight to video kind of guy but he is a great actor and does a good job playing the bad guy. Warren Derosa plays fellow cop Mitchel who never quite fits in with the cast especially Snipes. He doesn't have the acting chops to fit in and he really just always looks like a schmuck. Deciding whether he is the one working against them never enters the mind because his character is boring and mostly useless.With a much, MUCH stronger screenwriter The Detonator might have been able to fly but because of the completely lost script the film is pretty much ruined. There are a few neat action sequences, and the story is watchable but there is just far too many plot holes, things that are completely not necessary and characters that don't fit in. Maybe there are fans of Wesley Snipes that still hold it out for a triumphant return to theater but I can tell you this won't help. Wait for this one to show where it belongs...on cable...5/10