Reprisal Blu-ray Review

THE MOVIE — 1.25/5

Reprisal is the latest direct-to-video fare from the illustrious Grindstone Entertainment Group, a company that turns and burns these kind of productions, quite of a few sadly co-star Bruce Willis and even now have roped in the underrated and often underutilized Frank Grillo as well.

The plot for Reprisal focuses on Jacob (FRANK GRILLO), a bank manager and all around family man whose bank is the latest target from a violent robber. After being traumatized by the event and being placed on administrative relief, the household finances were already in dire straits. And as a way to cope with the experience, he teams up with his neighbor and retired ex-cop James (BRUCE WILLIS) to investigate and track down this murderous criminal, and in the process collect the large 6-figure reward.

So, Jacob does what apparently an FBI task force cannot and begins thinking like the robber, as we discover his name is Gabriel (JOHNATHON SCHAECH), and eventually manages to even find Gabriel’s headquarters. Not only that, is also able to follow him and discover his next target. The robbery is nearly thwarted but Gabriel does get away, but stashes the money in an underground parking lot, to which Jacob finds the loot and decides to take it for himself. Big mistake, especially when Gabriel finds out Jacob’s identity and begins targeting his asthmatic daughter and beautiful wife.

Now it is up to Jacob to save his family as we witness a “thrilling” and “incompetently” edited final sequence that attempts and so fails as trying to be as suspense-filled as the shootout featured in Heat.

Reprisal is the typical, middle-of-the-road, poorly made direct-to-video movie from Grindstone. Forgettable mess at its finest, trotting out Bruce Willis in the hopes his name and face will get people to dish out the $15-20 price to buy on DVD or Blu-ray only to realize he is a supporting player in a minimal role with a badly written script that doesn’t make a lick of sense despite what is a simple plot. Even if one were to buy that a bank manager could suddenly become a fairly masterful investigator, seeing trends that even the FBI hasn’t found, it’s hard to ignore some of the logic, including a shootout ending that, perhaps justified in some way, would land our lead character in jail.

I also would be remiss if I didn’t mention the editing in the aforementioned finale. I’m getting into SPOILER territory, so might want to skip, but bad guy Gabriel kidnaps Jacob’s wife and daughter and we cut back and forth as Jacob and Gabriel exchange gunfire set against James’s ex-cop friends searching for Jacob’s family, and are actually found in the back of a pick-up, thus eliminating any sort of suspense, which relatively speaking was limited anyway, from a scene as Jacob is crushed when James arrives on the scene, checks in on the family no less, and shoots and kills Gabriel, leaving Jacob utterly angry and in dismay… This, I guess, could’ve made for a (moderately) better sequence if we didn’t know they were rescued, but instead it made the entire sequence feel empty.

But I digress. While Reprisal is indeed bad, there wasn’t a point where I was angry (those kind of movies sit on my all-time bottom 15 movies or so), this is an all around forgettable thriller where even the actors didn’t seem like they gave two-s’s, especially Willis who seemed to have the delivery of a man who is slowly dying inside, wondering how it went so wrong. Skip.

SPECIAL FEATURES – 2.25/5

This release comes with a glossy, title-embossed, slip cover. Inside is a redemption code for the Digital HD copy. The only features is a Making Reprisal (9:29; HD) featurette; some Cast/Crew Interviews (26:27; HD) including Director Brian A. Miller, Frank Grillo, Olivia Culpo, Johnathon Schaech and Colin Egglesfield; and the Trailer (2:18; HD).

Trailers – Bleeding Steel, Escape Plan 2: Hades, Acts of Violence, Extraction, First Kill, Marauders

VIDEO – 4.25/5

AUDIO – 4.0/5

OVERALL – 1.5/5

Overall, Reprisal is just another forgettable direct-to-video thriller from the illustrious Grindstone Entertainment production company and it’s also another film featuring a lackluster performance from Bruce Willis, marking this his tenth that I’ve seen, a far cry from his superstar days. In any case, the Blu-ray release offers good video/audio transfers and a lackluster bonus features selection.