Cheaters Justice!
Added 7/23/2009
When the term b action is brought up the first thing Sid pictures is something like the finale of Commando, the ultimate explosions in Delta Force 2, or Matt Collins breathtaking battle with Apache in Death Ring. Kevin Sorbo? Not so much. When his name was brought up all we could picture was him parading around in his styrofoam armor during his mid 90's show Hercules, until now. After catching Walking Tall this afternoon it became evident the old boy Sorbo may have what it takes for some serious b action hits. Who knows, he may have a listmania made in his honor one day. Especially if he keeps working with the one and only Donald Swayze. Maybe Kevin can even take Chad's role as the sidekick to Don's facial contortions. Either way he did a killer job here and provided us with possibly "surprise of the year" in 09's Woody Awards.
The story is a typical type revenge deal except Sorbo is taking on some Mexican drug pushing bandidos. Yeah Awesome! Nick Prescott (Sorbo) returns to his hometown to take on the Mexican street toughs after them attempt to kill his FBI woman friend. The only way this can be handled is with a little vigilante justice, Sorbo style. It moves a bit slow at times but overall is filled with hilariously awesome action and ultra tough one liners. Not to mention this is the sequel to Walking Tall featuring the Rock. That's an extra star right there. Our only suggestion would be to change the name to Walking Tall: Cheaters Justice or Revenge of Hercules.
All in all this film is a quality piece of b action cinematic delight. In no way were we expecting much from Walking Tall: The Payback but were completely caught with the front, restoring our faith that Prairie Fever starring Don Swayze will be just what we were looking for. It really had all the factors Sid looks for in an action except for some fantastic explosions. If they threw in a few nice explosions this one had potential to be a 5 star treat, but we'll keep it at four which it earned very easily. It even inspires us to give it the drive in totals:
2 loped off thumbs
Screwdriver to the back of the head
16 dead Bandidos
8 country bumpkins
electroshock on Sorbo
873 rounds fired
and a four star action event
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Kevin Sorbo keeps his clothes on the entire time!
Added 12/29/2008
Although the Sony Studios designated it as a sequel to director Kevin Bray's 2004 theatrical feature "Walking Tall" with Dwayne 'the Rock' Johnson, "The Confidence Man" director Tripp Reed's "Walking Tall: The Payback" (2007) with Kevin Sorbo qualifies as only an 'in name' sequel.
Sorbo plays a former U.S. Marine, Nick Prescott, who trains horses for living, while the Rock played Chris Vaughn. Furthermore, "Walking Tall" took place in Kitsap County, Washington, whereas "Walking Tall: The Payback" occurs in Boone County, Texas, not far from Dallas. Sorbo's Nick totes around a big stick once for a couple of the minutes in the middle of the movie. Instead, he prefers a riot shotgun with a lever action grip to a big stick. Indeed, he uses a pool cue in the bar fight, but he never wields a club either like the Rock or much earlier as Joe Don Baker and Bo Svenson did in the previous theatrical releases.
On the other hand, "Walking Tall: The Payback" explores corrupt in a small town. The screenplay by Steven Seagal collaborator Joe Halpin and newcomer Brian Strasmann borrows from Sergio Leone's "Once Upon a Time in the West," because the primary villain, Harvey Morris (A.J. Buckley) is trying to buy up land before a new highway is built through the town, and he isn't particular about how he acquires the real estate. He walks into a hardware store with his henchmen and they smash up the owner's arm and promise him more rough stuff if he doesn't bow to their wishes. The opening scene shows one of Harvey's thugs pumping gas out of the storage tank when the owner appears with gun in hand and threatens to kill the henchmen. They tangle, the henchman shoots him and the gas station owner lives long enough to touch off an explosion that wipes out everything. Later, the villains assault a city councilman on his tractor in his crop field and torch the tractor. When a waitress warns our heroes that the villains intend to force the city council to appoint an interim sheriff, the villains close in on her trailer and gang rape her. "This will put a smile on your face," they chuckle as they bend her own her sofa and sodomize her. Despite its' R-rating, the filmmakers shy away from nudity of any kind. The same is true for the violence. You see little blood and nobody is squibbed so that bloody explosions erupt when they are shot or wounded.
Despite Kevin Sorbo's brawny presence, A.J. Buckley's slimy villain, and its solid production values, "Walking Tall: The Payback" is a derivative, far-fetched, superficial thriller with no surprises except its narrative lack of closure. The heroes take the primary villains to task, but they ignore the larger villains that lurk in Dallas and churn up most of the conflict between the hero and the villains. One might think that the producers would have taken up where "Walking Tall: The Payback" left off in the sequel "Walking Tall: Lone Justice," but Andrew Stevens and director Tripp Reed explore other areas. "Walking Tall: Lone Justice" updates the main characters from the first one without probing into the treacherous sidewinders that provided support to the villains. There is one good bar fight early on in "Walking Tall: The Payback" that passes muster, and Kevin Sorbo's hero uses a horse to good advantage in the final showdown, but this movie lacks clout. Tripp doesn't do anything revolutionary, and the best that can be said about "Walking Tall: The Payback" is that it clocks in at 88 minutes. Some of the dialogue is catchy. For example, the villain confronts the hero: "There can only be one big dog, everybody else, they just sniff" while the hero challenges the villain: "Are you all bark and no bite?"
Our hero, Nick Prescott, has a low opinion of the law and the justice system. We learn that his wife died when an inebriated driver ran into her and killed her. Says Nick, "Justice is about two things: power and money. With them you can just about get away with anything." Nick and his father Sheriff Charlie Prescott haven't seen each other since his wife's death because Nick felt that his father didn't press the case hard enough. The drunk driver got off with a fine and community service. According to Nick, "the system is broken." He shrugs when his father tells him that he going to see the FBI in Dallas to find a way to bring down Harvey Morris and his Dixie mafia. "You really think that you can make a difference?"
Later, Harvey and his henchmen catch Charlie on the highway, wreck his car, flip it and kill him. At the funeral, Harvey drinks a beer from afar and watches the ceremony. This aggravates Nick so much so that his father's deputy Hap catches Nick taking a shotgun from the rifle rack. Hap tosses him a badge and assures him that as a deputy he has more leeway. Nick starts his own campaign against Harvey. A few days later, the FBI agent, who told Charlie that the felons had not broken any Federal laws, arrives and looks into matters. It seems that Charlie took a revolver that he recovered from the gas station after it blew up and gave it to Detective Pete Michaels of the Dallas PD to run a ballistics test on it. The higher powers behind Harvey in Dallas bribe Pete to send the report to Harvey and this is what prompts Harvey to kill Charlie.
"Walking Tall: The Payback" is a synthetic, redneck thriller with enough action to keep you watching while you shake your head at the things that the citizens let the villains get away with in this 94 minute melodrama. Women should be forewarned that Kevin Sorbo keeps his clothes on the entire time.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
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Kevin Sorbo is the man!!
Added 10/23/2007
I'm pleased to see Kevin Sorbo is doing well after his show Hercules and Andromeda ended. I really enjoyed this movie. The bad guys wanted to run a small town, but Sorbo has something quite different in mind. There is a torture scene. Further, there is a rape scene. Be warned, this action flick is extreme. It's not a gore film, nonetheless, it is violent. Sorbo plays his role well. In his future movies, I look foward to him changing his appearance, maybe cutting his hair very short or growing a beard to show some Versatility to his acting skills.
The ability to change the types of roles one plays and the image one has are 2 hallmarks of a great actor. Kevin Sorbo has changed his looks from the Hercules days with a shorter hair cut and a leaner physique.
Now, he can look for roles that will challenge him to show pain and emotional vulnerabilities. Otherwise, he may end up making movies that all seem similar.
This version of Walking Tall is original because it doesn't attempt to copy The Rock's version of Walking Tall.
I give Kevin Sorbo's acting combined with the overall new version of the Walking Tall series a 5 star rating-
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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Much better than expected, Kevin Sorbo did well, good story.
Added 4/19/2007
I enjoyed the first Walking tall, Starting the rock in a story of one man's quest to turn around his small hometown that had been overun with crime and drugs. This movie is based in Boone texas, and Kevin sorbo plays the son of the long time county sherrif, who county is having a bunch of trouble with recent crimes and "bad accidents" after his 30 years of relative peace on the job. Finally, after an explosion at one of the local gas sations, the sherrif uncovers something that leads him to suspect something big is going on. Unfortunatly for him, he became invovled in something bigger than him, and payed the ultimate price with his life. Well, His son (Kevin Sorbo) comes back to town to help his mom, and Do something about fixing his town. The movie takes off from there. Good action, Sorbo was a great fit for the role. Decent script, although some of the lines and acting can get cheesy, it decent for most action movies. And this does not let anybody down for action. Check it out, good follow up movie in the series, thankfully not billed as a sequel.
5 out of 5 people found this helpful.
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could've been so much better
Added 4/6/2007
I don't understand why they keep making these silly walking tall movies with little or no regard to Sheriff Buford Pusser, the real and only walking tall (HELLO)!!!!! Why can't someone just remake the REAL TRUE STORY of Sheriff Buford Pusser??????
1 out of 2 people found this helpful.
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Cheaters Justice!
Added 7/23/2009
When the term b action is brought up the first thing Sid pictures is something like the finale of Commando, the ultimate explosions in Delta Force 2, or Matt Collins breathtaking battle with Apache in Death Ring. Kevin Sorbo? Not so much. When his name was brought up all we could picture was him parading around in his styrofoam armor during his mid 90's show Hercules, until now. After catching Walking Tall this afternoon it became evident the old boy Sorbo may have what it takes for some serious b action hits. Who knows, he may have a listmania made in his honor one day. Especially if he keeps working with the one and only Donald Swayze. Maybe Kevin can even take Chad's role as the sidekick to Don's facial contortions. Either way he did a killer job here and provided us with possibly "surprise of the year" in 09's Woody Awards.
The story is a typical type revenge deal except Sorbo is taking on some Mexican drug pushing bandidos. Yeah Awesome! Nick Prescott (Sorbo) returns to his hometown to take on the Mexican street toughs after them attempt to kill his FBI woman friend. The only way this can be handled is with a little vigilante justice, Sorbo style. It moves a bit slow at times but overall is filled with hilariously awesome action and ultra tough one liners. Not to mention this is the sequel to Walking Tall featuring the Rock. That's an extra star right there. Our only suggestion would be to change the name to Walking Tall: Cheaters Justice or Revenge of Hercules.
All in all this film is a quality piece of b action cinematic delight. In no way were we expecting much from Walking Tall: The Payback but were completely caught with the front, restoring our faith that Prairie Fever starring Don Swayze will be just what we were looking for. It really had all the factors Sid looks for in an action except for some fantastic explosions. If they threw in a few nice explosions this one had potential to be a 5 star treat, but we'll keep it at four which it earned very easily. It even inspires us to give it the drive in totals:
2 loped off thumbs
Screwdriver to the back of the head
16 dead Bandidos
8 country bumpkins
electroshock on Sorbo
873 rounds fired
and a four star action event
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Kevin Sorbo keeps his clothes on the entire time!
Added 12/29/2008
Although the Sony Studios designated it as a sequel to director Kevin Bray's 2004 theatrical feature "Walking Tall" with Dwayne 'the Rock' Johnson, "The Confidence Man" director Tripp Reed's "Walking Tall: The Payback" (2007) with Kevin Sorbo qualifies as only an 'in name' sequel.
Sorbo plays a former U.S. Marine, Nick Prescott, who trains horses for living, while the Rock played Chris Vaughn. Furthermore, "Walking Tall" took place in Kitsap County, Washington, whereas "Walking Tall: The Payback" occurs in Boone County, Texas, not far from Dallas. Sorbo's Nick totes around a big stick once for a couple of the minutes in the middle of the movie. Instead, he prefers a riot shotgun with a lever action grip to a big stick. Indeed, he uses a pool cue in the bar fight, but he never wields a club either like the Rock or much earlier as Joe Don Baker and Bo Svenson did in the previous theatrical releases.
On the other hand, "Walking Tall: The Payback" explores corrupt in a small town. The screenplay by Steven Seagal collaborator Joe Halpin and newcomer Brian Strasmann borrows from Sergio Leone's "Once Upon a Time in the West," because the primary villain, Harvey Morris (A.J. Buckley) is trying to buy up land before a new highway is built through the town, and he isn't particular about how he acquires the real estate. He walks into a hardware store with his henchmen and they smash up the owner's arm and promise him more rough stuff if he doesn't bow to their wishes. The opening scene shows one of Harvey's thugs pumping gas out of the storage tank when the owner appears with gun in hand and threatens to kill the henchmen. They tangle, the henchman shoots him and the gas station owner lives long enough to touch off an explosion that wipes out everything. Later, the villains assault a city councilman on his tractor in his crop field and torch the tractor. When a waitress warns our heroes that the villains intend to force the city council to appoint an interim sheriff, the villains close in on her trailer and gang rape her. "This will put a smile on your face," they chuckle as they bend her own her sofa and sodomize her. Despite its' R-rating, the filmmakers shy away from nudity of any kind. The same is true for the violence. You see little blood and nobody is squibbed so that bloody explosions erupt when they are shot or wounded.
Despite Kevin Sorbo's brawny presence, A.J. Buckley's slimy villain, and its solid production values, "Walking Tall: The Payback" is a derivative, far-fetched, superficial thriller with no surprises except its narrative lack of closure. The heroes take the primary villains to task, but they ignore the larger villains that lurk in Dallas and churn up most of the conflict between the hero and the villains. One might think that the producers would have taken up where "Walking Tall: The Payback" left off in the sequel "Walking Tall: Lone Justice," but Andrew Stevens and director Tripp Reed explore other areas. "Walking Tall: Lone Justice" updates the main characters from the first one without probing into the treacherous sidewinders that provided support to the villains. There is one good bar fight early on in "Walking Tall: The Payback" that passes muster, and Kevin Sorbo's hero uses a horse to good advantage in the final showdown, but this movie lacks clout. Tripp doesn't do anything revolutionary, and the best that can be said about "Walking Tall: The Payback" is that it clocks in at 88 minutes. Some of the dialogue is catchy. For example, the villain confronts the hero: "There can only be one big dog, everybody else, they just sniff" while the hero challenges the villain: "Are you all bark and no bite?"
Our hero, Nick Prescott, has a low opinion of the law and the justice system. We learn that his wife died when an inebriated driver ran into her and killed her. Says Nick, "Justice is about two things: power and money. With them you can just about get away with anything." Nick and his father Sheriff Charlie Prescott haven't seen each other since his wife's death because Nick felt that his father didn't press the case hard enough. The drunk driver got off with a fine and community service. According to Nick, "the system is broken." He shrugs when his father tells him that he going to see the FBI in Dallas to find a way to bring down Harvey Morris and his Dixie mafia. "You really think that you can make a difference?"
Later, Harvey and his henchmen catch Charlie on the highway, wreck his car, flip it and kill him. At the funeral, Harvey drinks a beer from afar and watches the ceremony. This aggravates Nick so much so that his father's deputy Hap catches Nick taking a shotgun from the rifle rack. Hap tosses him a badge and assures him that as a deputy he has more leeway. Nick starts his own campaign against Harvey. A few days later, the FBI agent, who told Charlie that the felons had not broken any Federal laws, arrives and looks into matters. It seems that Charlie took a revolver that he recovered from the gas station after it blew up and gave it to Detective Pete Michaels of the Dallas PD to run a ballistics test on it. The higher powers behind Harvey in Dallas bribe Pete to send the report to Harvey and this is what prompts Harvey to kill Charlie.
"Walking Tall: The Payback" is a synthetic, redneck thriller with enough action to keep you watching while you shake your head at the things that the citizens let the villains get away with in this 94 minute melodrama. Women should be forewarned that Kevin Sorbo keeps his clothes on the entire time.
0 out of 0 people found this helpful.
|
Kevin Sorbo is the man!!
Added 10/23/2007
I'm pleased to see Kevin Sorbo is doing well after his show Hercules and Andromeda ended. I really enjoyed this movie. The bad guys wanted to run a small town, but Sorbo has something quite different in mind. There is a torture scene. Further, there is a rape scene. Be warned, this action flick is extreme. It's not a gore film, nonetheless, it is violent. Sorbo plays his role well. In his future movies, I look foward to him changing his appearance, maybe cutting his hair very short or growing a beard to show some Versatility to his acting skills.
The ability to change the types of roles one plays and the image one has are 2 hallmarks of a great actor. Kevin Sorbo has changed his looks from the Hercules days with a shorter hair cut and a leaner physique.
Now, he can look for roles that will challenge him to show pain and emotional vulnerabilities. Otherwise, he may end up making movies that all seem similar.
This version of Walking Tall is original because it doesn't attempt to copy The Rock's version of Walking Tall.
I give Kevin Sorbo's acting combined with the overall new version of the Walking Tall series a 5 star rating-
1 out of 1 people found this helpful.
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