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Malevolent
Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment // R // March 11, 2003
List Price: $29.99 [Buy now and save at Amazon]
Having sat through both The Big Hit and Bats theatrically, I've been conditioned to recoil in horror whenever I see the name 'Lou Diamond Phillips' emblazoned on poster art in big, bold letters. I went into Malevolent, the new direct-to-DVD cop thriller from Dimension Home Video, expecting something similarly campy and horrendously over-the-top. Admittedly, a nuanced character piece it's not, but Malevolent is executed well-enough to be appreciated without feeling forced to resort to a clichéd expression like "...so bad, it's good."
Phillips stars as Detective Jack Lucas, a cop still reeling from a scandal that sent the press into a feeding frenzy. Jack's partner was affiliated with a gang called the Red Dragons, and a related gun battle left the city in tatters and six people dead. Despite his claims that he was unaware of these shady dealings, Jack is being raked over the coals and isn't entirely optimistic about the possible outcome of an internal investigation. On his way to drown his sorrows at a local watering hole, Jack finds himself nearly run over by the devil-masked Ollie (Edoardo Ballerini). Ollie apologetically offers Jack a drink and, upon seeing a newspaper article about the messy incident that occurred a few months back, toasts him on his heroism. Jack's glass shatters, and the resulting shards leave a hand with a nasty gash. As he stumbles into the bathroom to wash up, the last words Jack hears before passing out onto the dingy floor are Ollie asking if he's alright.
When Jack awakes, he finds himself mostly intact, minus a shirt pocket, a bloodied rag, and his issued Baretta. There's little doubt in his mind that his new pal Ollie is to blame. He shrugs off reporting the incident, but Jack's intrigued enough to do some investigating on his own. His memories of their brief conversation lead him to Jessica Tarrant (Kari Wuhrer), a dancer whose Broadway dreams were dashed, but she's thankfully able-bodied enough to find more exotic work. Ollie was a regular at the club whose hundred-dollar tips progressed into unwelcomed backstage groping. Jessica, fearing for her life, turns to Jack for help. As Ollie uses his ill-gotten souvenirs to pin a series of murders on Jack, the embattled detective tries to clear his name and piece together why he's being maniacally pursued.
Malevolent is somewhat of a paint-by-numbers thriller, though that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It accomplishes what it sets out to accomplish, and though I'm not a particularly ardent follower of the genre, I'll freely admit to enjoying Malevolent. It does faithfully follow most of the clichés, including (1) a car that won't start at a crucial moment, (2) a scene where our hero lurks about in the villain's lair, and just as he's about to be discovered, the bad guy's distracted by some harmless third-party, (3) a wrongly accused hero (well, not exactly, but delving into further detail would involve an unwelcomed trip into spoiler territory), (4) a cop handing in his badge and gun, and (5) a busty female lead who's stalked by the villain and winds up spending at least one night at the hero's apartment. At least Jessica and Jack don't fall madly in love. For extra credit, there are a couple of scenes at a strip club, though Kari Wuhrer fans will be disappointed to learn that there's no nudity at all in the movie. Director John Terlesky lingers plenty on the female cast members' butts, and a body double's chest is glimpsed briefly through a translucent shower curtain, leaving the requisite T&A leaning heavily on the "A".
"Damn, Jack. Sometimes I wonder if you want to go down." These sorts of thrillers are mostly dependent on characters doing things that don't make much sense, and Malevolent isn't any different. There might not have even been a feature-length movie if Jack hadn't refused to file a report over his missing gun. He was fully aware of Ollie's murderous rampage, but the only person in whom he confided wasn't one of his many law-enforcing co-workers, but an entirely powerless stripper. Jessica isn't any brighter. When hiding out in a supposedly secret location, she picks up the phone and indirectly leads Ollie right to her doorstep. I'm familiar with suspension of disbelief and all, but it's too bad that characters have to be so dim for dramatic purposes. There aren't direct payoffs to the majority of Ollie's nasty doings, but it seems to fit with the movie's internal logic that his attacks towards Jack would be more psychological, unnerving rather than outright imprisoning him.
Okay, so I guess I've established that Malevolent isn't the most stunningly original movie ever. For what it is -- and that's not meant as backhanded praise -- Malevolent really is pretty good. The bombastic introduction instantly grabbed my attention, and my interest didn't wane during the entire runtime. There is somewhat of a lack of blatant on-screen action outside of the car chases and gunplay in the movie's bookends, but the pace never drags. Malevolent does a better job than most at building tension and suspense, and I found myself genuinely curious about Ollie's motivations for torturing Rick. Production values are kept respectably high, and the talent involved manage to elevate such standard material into an above-average movie. No, Malevolent isn't one for the ages, but as a late-night popcorn rental, it's pretty tough to beat.
Video: Malevolent is presented in anamorphic widescreen at an aspect ratio of 1.85:1, and the movie has some of the hallmarks of a low-budget production. Film grain, for instance, is all over the map. There are a number of shots in which it's barely noticeable. In others, such as a shower a little over three minutes in, the buzzing is almost overwhelming. Most of the movie falls somewhere in between. The level of detail is similarly varied. Much of the time, it's nothing striking, but there are close-ups where each individual pore or bead of sweat is distinctly visible. Colors appear to be spot-on for the most part, though a handful of shots are a bit off, most noticeably in the abnormally pale footage of Ollie storming off around 1:26:21 in. The source material is almost entirely free of any speckling or print flaws, as is to be expected from a movie filmed so recently. The presentation as a whole is unremarkable, but much of that, I'd imagine, can be attributed to its low-budget origins.
Audio: Whenever the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio has the opportunity, it's loud, precisely the way this sort of movie should be. Malevolent takes full advantage of the six channels at its disposal, and the more action-oriented scenes, not surprisingly, are the aural highlight. The explosions and gunfire that kick off the movie are accompanied by a substantial amount of bass, and these effects sound solid for the most part. A couple of scattered instances -- such as the initial explosion and the lackluster sound of a car flipping over (seconds before, of course, another explosion) -- don't sound as if quite as much love was lavished upon them in post-production. Surrounds get quite a workout, building a surprisingly immersive environment. The shootout at the beginning makes effective use of the rear channels, tossing the viewer squarely in the middle of the action. Aside from bullets whizzing across the soundstage, there are plenty of more subtle ambient effects present for almost every minute of the movie's runtime. For example, when Jack strolls into the bar, an off-screen chirping television is heard only in the surrounds, and entirely different banter and crowd noise can be heard up front. Dialogue, however, is not consistently rendered cleanly. There are several scenes, such as when Jessica and Jack first meet in a parking lot and the late night encounter between Ollie and Sgt. Dexter, that just don't sound as if they were recorded properly. The characters remain intelligible, but the dialogue is noticeably muddied. There are portions of Malevolent that sound significantly better than I'd expect for a direct-to-video release, but the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio is not without its shortcomings.
The other audio options on this DVD release of Malevolent are English subtitles and closed captions.
Supplements: Extras are limited to a trailer gallery for other Dimension Home Video releases. Along with the expected "Dimension Cutting Edge" promo clip are trailers for Below (1:44), Undisputed (1:42), Asunder (1:22), and Wes Craven Presents Dracula II: Ascension (1:01). All four full-frame trailers sport Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtracks.
Malevolent features a set of static 16x9-enhanced menus, and the movie has been divided into eighteen chapters.
Possible Errors: My set-top DVD player, a Toshiba SD-3109, froze at the 59:36 mark, during the transition from the disc's eleventh to twelfth chapters. Whatever caused my player to lock up didn't occur when I tried giving the disc a second spin, nor did I run into similar issues when I tried playing that portion on my DVD-ROM. Hopefully it's just a one-off fluke, but I thought it might be worth a note anyway. This has not been a frequent occurrence with my player to date.
Random Bitching: I'm not sure if John Terlesky was trying to be artful with his direction in the scene where Jessica reports a break-in to Jack at the station. Maybe the chopping editing was to generate a sort of tense, nervous energy. It's disconcerting alright, but not in the way Terlesky presumably intended. The obtrusive quick-cutting of different angles just looks dumb, and unless I'm completely nuts, Jack and Jessica don't even look as if they're positioned in the same place as the camera hops around.
Conclusion: Malevolent's $29.99 list price is offputting for a sight-unseen purchase, and this is the sort of movie that I'm not too terribly likely to revisit again anytime soon. A solid, consistently entertaining stab at well-trodden material, Malevolent is recommended as a rental. Rent It.
Phillips stars as Detective Jack Lucas, a cop still reeling from a scandal that sent the press into a feeding frenzy. Jack's partner was affiliated with a gang called the Red Dragons, and a related gun battle left the city in tatters and six people dead. Despite his claims that he was unaware of these shady dealings, Jack is being raked over the coals and isn't entirely optimistic about the possible outcome of an internal investigation. On his way to drown his sorrows at a local watering hole, Jack finds himself nearly run over by the devil-masked Ollie (Edoardo Ballerini). Ollie apologetically offers Jack a drink and, upon seeing a newspaper article about the messy incident that occurred a few months back, toasts him on his heroism. Jack's glass shatters, and the resulting shards leave a hand with a nasty gash. As he stumbles into the bathroom to wash up, the last words Jack hears before passing out onto the dingy floor are Ollie asking if he's alright.
When Jack awakes, he finds himself mostly intact, minus a shirt pocket, a bloodied rag, and his issued Baretta. There's little doubt in his mind that his new pal Ollie is to blame. He shrugs off reporting the incident, but Jack's intrigued enough to do some investigating on his own. His memories of their brief conversation lead him to Jessica Tarrant (Kari Wuhrer), a dancer whose Broadway dreams were dashed, but she's thankfully able-bodied enough to find more exotic work. Ollie was a regular at the club whose hundred-dollar tips progressed into unwelcomed backstage groping. Jessica, fearing for her life, turns to Jack for help. As Ollie uses his ill-gotten souvenirs to pin a series of murders on Jack, the embattled detective tries to clear his name and piece together why he's being maniacally pursued.
Malevolent is somewhat of a paint-by-numbers thriller, though that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It accomplishes what it sets out to accomplish, and though I'm not a particularly ardent follower of the genre, I'll freely admit to enjoying Malevolent. It does faithfully follow most of the clichés, including (1) a car that won't start at a crucial moment, (2) a scene where our hero lurks about in the villain's lair, and just as he's about to be discovered, the bad guy's distracted by some harmless third-party, (3) a wrongly accused hero (well, not exactly, but delving into further detail would involve an unwelcomed trip into spoiler territory), (4) a cop handing in his badge and gun, and (5) a busty female lead who's stalked by the villain and winds up spending at least one night at the hero's apartment. At least Jessica and Jack don't fall madly in love. For extra credit, there are a couple of scenes at a strip club, though Kari Wuhrer fans will be disappointed to learn that there's no nudity at all in the movie. Director John Terlesky lingers plenty on the female cast members' butts, and a body double's chest is glimpsed briefly through a translucent shower curtain, leaving the requisite T&A leaning heavily on the "A".
"Damn, Jack. Sometimes I wonder if you want to go down." These sorts of thrillers are mostly dependent on characters doing things that don't make much sense, and Malevolent isn't any different. There might not have even been a feature-length movie if Jack hadn't refused to file a report over his missing gun. He was fully aware of Ollie's murderous rampage, but the only person in whom he confided wasn't one of his many law-enforcing co-workers, but an entirely powerless stripper. Jessica isn't any brighter. When hiding out in a supposedly secret location, she picks up the phone and indirectly leads Ollie right to her doorstep. I'm familiar with suspension of disbelief and all, but it's too bad that characters have to be so dim for dramatic purposes. There aren't direct payoffs to the majority of Ollie's nasty doings, but it seems to fit with the movie's internal logic that his attacks towards Jack would be more psychological, unnerving rather than outright imprisoning him.
Okay, so I guess I've established that Malevolent isn't the most stunningly original movie ever. For what it is -- and that's not meant as backhanded praise -- Malevolent really is pretty good. The bombastic introduction instantly grabbed my attention, and my interest didn't wane during the entire runtime. There is somewhat of a lack of blatant on-screen action outside of the car chases and gunplay in the movie's bookends, but the pace never drags. Malevolent does a better job than most at building tension and suspense, and I found myself genuinely curious about Ollie's motivations for torturing Rick. Production values are kept respectably high, and the talent involved manage to elevate such standard material into an above-average movie. No, Malevolent isn't one for the ages, but as a late-night popcorn rental, it's pretty tough to beat.
Video: Malevolent is presented in anamorphic widescreen at an aspect ratio of 1.85:1, and the movie has some of the hallmarks of a low-budget production. Film grain, for instance, is all over the map. There are a number of shots in which it's barely noticeable. In others, such as a shower a little over three minutes in, the buzzing is almost overwhelming. Most of the movie falls somewhere in between. The level of detail is similarly varied. Much of the time, it's nothing striking, but there are close-ups where each individual pore or bead of sweat is distinctly visible. Colors appear to be spot-on for the most part, though a handful of shots are a bit off, most noticeably in the abnormally pale footage of Ollie storming off around 1:26:21 in. The source material is almost entirely free of any speckling or print flaws, as is to be expected from a movie filmed so recently. The presentation as a whole is unremarkable, but much of that, I'd imagine, can be attributed to its low-budget origins.
Audio: Whenever the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio has the opportunity, it's loud, precisely the way this sort of movie should be. Malevolent takes full advantage of the six channels at its disposal, and the more action-oriented scenes, not surprisingly, are the aural highlight. The explosions and gunfire that kick off the movie are accompanied by a substantial amount of bass, and these effects sound solid for the most part. A couple of scattered instances -- such as the initial explosion and the lackluster sound of a car flipping over (seconds before, of course, another explosion) -- don't sound as if quite as much love was lavished upon them in post-production. Surrounds get quite a workout, building a surprisingly immersive environment. The shootout at the beginning makes effective use of the rear channels, tossing the viewer squarely in the middle of the action. Aside from bullets whizzing across the soundstage, there are plenty of more subtle ambient effects present for almost every minute of the movie's runtime. For example, when Jack strolls into the bar, an off-screen chirping television is heard only in the surrounds, and entirely different banter and crowd noise can be heard up front. Dialogue, however, is not consistently rendered cleanly. There are several scenes, such as when Jessica and Jack first meet in a parking lot and the late night encounter between Ollie and Sgt. Dexter, that just don't sound as if they were recorded properly. The characters remain intelligible, but the dialogue is noticeably muddied. There are portions of Malevolent that sound significantly better than I'd expect for a direct-to-video release, but the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio is not without its shortcomings.
The other audio options on this DVD release of Malevolent are English subtitles and closed captions.
Supplements: Extras are limited to a trailer gallery for other Dimension Home Video releases. Along with the expected "Dimension Cutting Edge" promo clip are trailers for Below (1:44), Undisputed (1:42), Asunder (1:22), and Wes Craven Presents Dracula II: Ascension (1:01). All four full-frame trailers sport Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtracks.
Malevolent features a set of static 16x9-enhanced menus, and the movie has been divided into eighteen chapters.
Possible Errors: My set-top DVD player, a Toshiba SD-3109, froze at the 59:36 mark, during the transition from the disc's eleventh to twelfth chapters. Whatever caused my player to lock up didn't occur when I tried giving the disc a second spin, nor did I run into similar issues when I tried playing that portion on my DVD-ROM. Hopefully it's just a one-off fluke, but I thought it might be worth a note anyway. This has not been a frequent occurrence with my player to date.
Random Bitching: I'm not sure if John Terlesky was trying to be artful with his direction in the scene where Jessica reports a break-in to Jack at the station. Maybe the chopping editing was to generate a sort of tense, nervous energy. It's disconcerting alright, but not in the way Terlesky presumably intended. The obtrusive quick-cutting of different angles just looks dumb, and unless I'm completely nuts, Jack and Jessica don't even look as if they're positioned in the same place as the camera hops around.
Conclusion: Malevolent's $29.99 list price is offputting for a sight-unseen purchase, and this is the sort of movie that I'm not too terribly likely to revisit again anytime soon. A solid, consistently entertaining stab at well-trodden material, Malevolent is recommended as a rental. Rent It.
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