Vendetta (2015/WWE/Lionsgate Blu-ray w/DVD)

Picture: A-/B- Sound: A/B Extras: C Film: C+

Vendetta (2015) is the first experience I have had with a WWE Studios production and I was not sure what to expect. However, I will admit I was surprised that this movie was not absolutely terrible.

The acting was subpar, but not to anyone's surprise. Detective Danvers (Dean Cain) was not bad, but considering what he has been in during the early stages of his career you can tell he has stumbled. Victor Abbott (The Big Show) played a decent criminal, but it was kind of on the nose and one note. We did not get to see many layers to this character. After seeing Vendetta, I could not see Paul "The Big Show" Wight's acting career taking off unless he plays a prisoner in everything. The Warden Snyder (Michael Eklund) was probably the actor that gave the performance that stood out, but not in a good way. It seemed like he was trying too hard and, after seeing him in other things, sounded like Daniel Day-Lewis from There Will Be Blood, which was extremely weird.

If we were to talk just about the story of Vendetta we would see it features a somewhat absurd plot about a guy who blows away his freedom just to kill the detective's (Cain) wife and how the entire prison is run by criminals. It is a ton of bloody fistfight scenes after the next, and we follow Detective Danvers as he commits murder after murder to get vengeance on his deceased wife, keep in mind the only one that had anything to do with his wife's death is Victor Abbott (Wight). Vendetta loses me, because we see this great detective that has Abbott subdued and can kill him, but lets him go to prison, then he turns around and kills a ton of people that had nothing to do with his wife's murder just to get to Abbott. The plot is kind of ridiculous in the sense that I am not sure what Abott's motivation is to throwaway his freedom to kill Danvers' wife, just as I am not sure what Danvers' motivation is to go to prison and kill a group of people to get to Abbott after letting him go.

The technical aspects of the movie were 1080p/AVC and a 1.78:1, which looked pretty decent. As I stated earlier, I did not know what to expect with a WWE studio production, but the camerawork was not that bad. They did add some shaky-camera effect in some spots and the deeply de-saturated lows in the time-lapse for their outside establishing shots were a bit much at times, but it still was an entertaining film to watch. The audio is a DTS-HD MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless mix and you can hear each squishy punch, because there are a lot of them, pretty well.

Extras include The Making of Vendetta (where some of the cast and crew discuss the making of the movie and the effects), A Haunted Location (Shooting at an abandoned mental hospital), and A Big Transformation (this, of course, referring to The Big Show going from a wrestler to an actor).

- Jordan Whiteko