The Condemned (2007)

Director: Scott Wiper

Writers: Scott Wiper, Rob Hedden, Andy Hedden

Composer: Graeme Revell

Starring: Steve Austin, Vinnie Jones, Robert Mammone, Tory Mussett, Manu Bennett, Madeleine West, Rick Hoffman, Christopher James Baker, Sam Healy, Luke Pegler, Masa Yamaguchi, Emilia Burns

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The fight is on.

Plot:  Jack Conrad (Austin) is awaiting the death penalty in a corrupt Central American prison. He is "purchased" by a wealthy television producer and taken to a desolate island where he must fight to the death against nine other condemned killers from all corners of the world, with freedom going to the sole survivor.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  Nah.

I think this is Austin's first feature in a starring role.  You can tell he might've skipped a couple of acting classes but he's got potential.  He certainly looks the part of a supreme ass kicker.  I saw this months ago and then watched DAMAGE (2009) which, if my memory holds, he was a lot better and the movie was more fun than this one.  The story here isn't anything new, it's been told before and it's one that has lots of room for fun and great kills.  Fun and great kills is what most of us care about when settling down for a flick like this, at least that's my criteria.  Vinnie Jones isn't in this enough and he needs more screen time in everything he does.  I love that guy.  The dude that's running the show is a major dickhead from the start and you know he's going to get his comeuppance and it had better be good (it turns out to be an OK death).  The island scenery is nice and there are some fun kills and neat moments but not enough to sustain nearly two hours which is too long.  If there had been a lot more violent action two hours is awesome.  I could've done without so much hand-held shaky camera work but it's still a reasonably fun picture that doesn't really get slow and boring at any point.  The Lionsgate DVD presents the film with a nice anamorphic widescreen print and it has a bunch of extras.  You get a making of featurette (40 minutes), a look at a fighting event between Austin and Jones (4 minutes), a 2 minute piece at a Steve Austin signing event in Australia, storyboard sequences (6 minutes), the anamorphic widescreen theatrical trailer and trailers for other Lionsgate films (non-anamorphic widescreen).