Professional wrestling is as much a performance art as it is a sport, with combatants required to inhabit a persona as well as master a series of intricate wrestling moves. As a result, there have been a series of wrestlers over the past few decades that have tried to make the leap into acting. For a long time Hulk Hogan was the only one who could claim, limited, mainstream success with Suburban Commando and Mr Nanny hitting the heights in the early nineties. Since then, sporadic attempts to cross over have been stillborn, until The Rock left the WWE to pursue a full-time acting career nearly ten years ago. He has put in the time, and become the first wrestler to make it as a bona fide movie star.
This success has, inevitably, opened the floodgates. On paper, ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin had a pretty good shot at following in The Rock’s footsteps. In a WWE ring, he has shown himself to be physically imposing, whilst also being charismatic and entertaining. He certainly had the popularity amongst wrestling fans to suggest he could draw an audience. He has already appeared in several movies, most notably a bit part in Stallone’s Expendables, and his latest effort has arrived on Blu-ray and DVD.
Austin plays Ryan Varrett, an ex-cop out for revenge. What? I said he plays an ex-cop out for revenge. We discover over the course of the film that he has lost his family, and has hunted down the people responsible. This hunt leads him to the small town of Hope, and a murderous biker gang led by a crime lord named Drayke. Drayke runs the town, and even has the local sheriff in his pocket. What? I said he as the local sheriff in his pocket. With help from a sympathetic police deputy, and whilst avoiding the attention of the Feds, Varrett takes it upon himself to bring justice to the town. What? I said he takes it upon himself to bring justice to the town.
If that paragraph confused you somewhat, you clearly are not a Steve Austin fan. If that’s the case, you have no business reading this review, as the only people with the remotest of interest in this film should be die-hard ‘Stone Cold’ fans. Unfortunately, even they will be disappointed. Billed as an action movie, Recoil is curiously lacking in action. The formula for this type of movie was set in stone a long time ago. Badass comes to town, takes the bad guys down one man at a time, working his way up to the baddest, leading to the grand finale. For some reason, director Terry Miles has decided to ignore the rules. The paper-thin plot is laboured throughout, and with only a handful of short fights scattered around, the ninety minute running time feels like a lifetime.
When you have a low-budget, a simplified storyline and a wrestler as the lead, you need to string a series of fights together with the minimum amount of dialogue between, wham bam credits. What’s worse is that the few fight scenes are soft and slow. Austin is no martial artist; he is a brawler, which makes snappy action difficult anyway. When you consider that Austin made his career in an environment where throwing a straight punch is outlawed, and his biggest adversary is a seventy year old Danny Trejo, you can see why this move was doomed to failure. Poorly written, poorly acted, Recoil is less fun than a Stone Cold Stunner.
[Rating:1/5]
