Disc Reviews
The Prince Review
The Prince marks another Direct to Disc release for what seems to be emerging as a group of film-makers who have access to some prime Hollywood talent.
Emmett/Furlas films and the Grindstone Entertainment Group for a while now has been working in and out with other companies and with A-list talent names like Bruce Willis (Set Up, Fire With Fire, Catch.44), Dwayne Johnson (Empire State) and John Cusack (The Frozen Ground) for a few years now and have been churning out very mid-range action thrillers.
Once was a time when direct to video names were the likes of Van Damme, Segal and even Wesley Snipes – but now a new market seems to have opened up lead here – and oddly enough more often than not feature in some way a small extended cameo from Curtis “50 cent” Jackson. Not that we mean to make fun of Jackson: he tends to be pretty good, and more often than not is happy to play unsavoury characters (See The Frozen Ground).
We also have no issues with a group of directors and actors and producers working with each other again in a machine that is affordable to them that we dare say gives actors a fat pay check for little to no work (Willis all too often gets a high billing for what is really glorified cameo work).
But we do take issue with the fact that a pattern is emerging. The same names crop up (and even in the future you can still expect Vice (with Willis and Thomas Jane) and The Outsider (with Jason Patric again) and the results remain unremarkable. This is clearly not the best work we are being delivered by the actors in question. It is perhaps suspicious that their motives for the parts are perhaps tainted by dollar and time valued against dramatic integrity, and the directorial and writing talent is presumed missing.
The Prince then as the latest venture finds a man of war (Jason Patric) now retired and living as a humble mechanic – called back into action when his teenage daughter goes missing. With his activities to find her spreading word, it isn’t long until a mob boss (Bruce Willis) gets wind of his movements and sets out to find and destroy the man who is responsible for the death of his own family. Throw in a lazy appearance from a haggard looking John Cusack, the 50 cent cameo and you have yourself a middle of the road dramatic thriller that runs out of fuel long before the end.
We’ll give points to Patric for holding things together as best that he can. But we’ll deduct those points right away again for Willis’ lazy bad guy routine.
The Prince isn’t the most offensive DTDVD release out there, but it doesn’t improve the game any, and will make those in the know more slyly aware of what is to come.
Steven Hurst