Reviewed by Andres De La Hoz

I could try and write a real, cohesive review here. Or I could simply go with the flow. And the flow is telling me a simple thing: this movie is a fucking atrocity. It is. Retaliation is a short film about a guy who wants to retaliate. That's it.

That's the only thing you're going to get from this piece of shit. There is NO depth whatsoever. NO emotion whatsoever. NO thought put into it whatsoever. This is one of the most empty, senseless pieces of crap I've seen in a long time. The fact that it's well animated makes it all the more offensive.

There's no denying that the animation in this movie is terrific. The expansion pack is put to great use, with scenes looking detailed (even if they aren't, because it's just textures). Anders has an eye for great angles. There's some particularly good "police light" effects, too.

Unfortunately, all of this is put in the service of what has to be one of the most moronic plots in the history of this program. I'm not being hyperbolic here, in case you're wondering. I believe a good argument can be made for this being one of the worst plots ever. See, other movies have awful plots. But generally, they're not too pretentious about it. Most early action movies... hell, most recent action movies have completely implausible and often senseless plots. But no one's expecting them to be taken seriously or anything. They're silly little action movies. Jeff Ching's movies have some absurd
developments in them. But no one's going to take that seriously. We know Jeff Ching movies take place in a fantasy land, where people have wrestling bouts or fight robots. We all know Action Joe 2 takes place in a fantasy land with giant dogs.

But this... as far as I can tell, this movie takes place in the real world. Now, since it takes place in the real world, I would like an explanation as to why this is the stupidest piece of shit in recent memory. The plot simply makes no sense whatsoever. There isn't a single person in this world who can honestly tell me that this movie isn't completely retarded. I'm going to get into spoilers, but who cares? Do you really not want to miss this "experience"? Pffft.

So the basic plot is this: There's this guy whose wife is killed. He gets sent to jail for it, and wants to retaliate. He wants to do mean things. We know this because he has the same effect in his eye that the killer had. This is delivered with the subtlety of a kick in the prostate.

The problem is, none of this makes any sense whatsoever. None of it. NONE. I'm not talking about "the big picture". I'm talking about every single thing that happens. OK, first of all, is there ANY reason why these killers kill the woman? ANY? No. They just enter the house, and kill her. They don't seem to steal anything. They just break into a house in the middle of the fucking day, shoot a woman, and run. You have got to be kidding me here. Of course, I can try and fill in the blanks and say that maybe they were targeting her, or that they stole something that wasn't shown, or that this movie was written by some random project of Widney High. This DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. It's hard to get involved in a movie that is fucking nonsense. So the husband comes in, sees the wife shot, and falls down on the floor and cries. Huh? Hello? Not even character reactions make any sense. Do you mean to tell me that this guy, upon seeing his dead wife (or girlfriend, I really don't care), wouldn't grab her fucking body and at least try to see if she's really dead? Try to do some CPR? Call 911? Try to assist her. C'mon. He just, upon seeing her, assumes she is dead and gives up? THIS DOESN'T MAKE SENSE.

What takes the cake, however, is what happens next. The guy is sent to jail, presumably for killing his wife. Huh? HUH? There was a witness of sorts, you see. But because of sloppy directing, we don't know what she saw. What I have to ask myself is this: Did the husband have a motive? Did the husband have his fingerprints all over the gun used to shoot her? Did the witness see the husband kill the wife? WHAT'S THE DEAL HERE? There is no humanly way possible that this guy could get convicted for his wife's murder. How is that supposed to happen? Where's the missing gun? Where's the motive? He "shot her". Wouldn't he have some blood sprinkled or something?

None of that matters to this piece of shit movie. The plot is merely a set of absurd contrivances meant to get somewhere. And you're supposed to believe it, even though it's had about as much thought put in as Tony Teulan's mother has clothes on after baked bean breakfast at the household. There is no reason for the audience to have to buy any of this fucking crap on a leap of faith. This is the worst plotline of the year, at least. Everything is a completely idiotic contrivance. The last one's just too irritating. The guy getting sent to jail makes no sense whatsoever. It is just a ridiculous excuse to get the character to want to take vengeance.

Now generally these movies have all sorts of idiotic plot contrivances in order to get us to a point. If the point's good, you might be able to accept what came before it. So what's the point here? What's the actual "retaliation"?

None.

I'm not kidding. The movie is a huge set of absurd plot contrivances that you *might* buy if they lead to someplace good. But at some point, the way to that place suddenly stops. I'm sure this sounded "edgy", "creative", and "indie" when the director thought of it, but it's quite simply the most insulting of the year, next to LEGOZ. You mean that there's no POINT to this idiocy? That you didn't get lazy just to get to a point, but that you simply lazy-ed your way through this movie?

For the love of god. I was thinking of giving it a 1/5 for the flashing police lights, but no. This movie doesn't deserve anything. The fact that it's polished and well-animated makes its astoundingly awful plot be even more insulting.

0/5