“The Weapon” Movie Review

 

“The Weapon”

Movie Review

 

 

The Weapon, directed by Tony Schiena and written by Michael Caissie, stars Tony Schiena as Dallas, Donald Cerrone, James Chalke, and several supporting actors. It tells the story of a mysterious and unusual shooter who battles the Las Vegas mob to free his kidnapped lover.

By torching their drug labs, releasing their trafficked women, and killing everyone who gets in the middle of this procedure, unstoppable aristocrat Dallas, played by Schiena, has been causing havoc for the crooks of Las Vegas. Although the movie opens with footage of marshal Antano, who is obviously undercover, being confused by the waking mayhem, The Weapon aims to make the reason for this action the central theme of its story. The issue is that the nonlinear structure and premise of the movie reveal that, making the outcome predictable rather than mysterious.

The script's attempt to stay unreadable is hampered by many dialogue exchanges that demonstrate Antano and Tanner's familiarity with Dallas, as well as that of the ringleader Lars, enforcers Vinny, and Tanner. There are too many sequences that spend too much time doing nothing, too many attempts to keep the audience in the dark, and a structure that is too loose for something that ought to be mind-numbingly simple, so it is difficult to determine what the overall narrative is.

 

 The bad men kidnapped Dallas' girl, Iris; the cops and the bad guys both wanted to kill him for various reasons; the main character got assistance from wild cards like Blue and Voner, and the day was saved.

The purest of all white knights is Dallas. He grumbles during his entire discourse, saves every girl he can find, kills every ne'er do well, never takes money, waxes poetic about what he genuinely deserves. There is no character development or growth, no compelling narrative as to why he is carrying out this assignment, and no reason to appreciate him. He seems like the type of person who will always try to outdo you in conversation just to make you feel inferior. Dallas may employ trade-specific instruments, but he is no more effective than the tools with which he deals in injuries.

No evil guy stands out as anything more than a hasty attempt to form a syndicate. Lars is a comically idiotic bad guy with hazy ties. The guy looks like a rejected vocalist for an emo band, which isn't helped by his excessively slimy mannerisms, and The Weapon only allusively implies that his drug trafficking operation is connected to a biker gang without actually providing any clarification. Although Vinny appears to be under Lars's protection, he only speaks lines about wanting to kill and beat up people.

Both parties are amusingly dull and listless, but the author's insistence on including a ton of side characters—including Doris, a man who speaks very briefly and dies at random—gets in the way of the inadvertent humor.

To be fair to the movie, it has a respectable start. Starting with a fight is a surefire way to get people's interest. Dallas searches a building filled with trafficked women. He slips into their rooms and emerges to surprise the first assailant. He beats the assailant to death with a motorcycle helmet, which he then uses as a weapon to knock out a few other assailants with some spin kicks and fisticuffs before returning to the road. It has a strong choreography.

 

Following this action, there is a startling decline in quality when Tanner sends what can only be described as "ninja cops" to target Dallas, but they merely stand still while he beats the brakes out of them. Only one of them resists, which gives the man the opportunity to stab the others with a shattered bottle. Some random melee scenarios oddly mimic the opening scene, with weird outcomes like slapping a gunman wearing a protective vest. A sequence in which Antano is shot from anywhere by a guy for no apparent cause is one example of how poorly shot and confusingly telegraphed gunfights are.

The average and above-average filmmakers can cope with the level of strain needed to produce a feature picture, but occasionally there are individuals who falter. These include Schiena. Schiena is one of those individuals who is simply not suited to be a director. The Weapon, on the other hand, seems to be a vanity effort for the filmmaker, as one of the more illustrious cast members could have taken the lead role to make the film more transparent. Contrary to popular belief, Schiena provides himself with all of the supposedly smart dialogue, exciting action, and attractive women. As a result, the movie contains sloppy scenes where the cameraman is visible, extraneous single frames from the editing process, and badly timed sound effects. That is a mess. The Weapon is a complete mess except from the few great actors and a few effective fights, and there are few things more pleasant than a lousy movie.

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