HOUNDS OF WAR (2024)

Genre: Action/Crime
Director: Isaac Florentine
Cast: Frank Grillo, Robert Patrick, Rhona Mitra, Leeshon Alexander, Matthew Marsh, Urs Rechn, Steven Elder
Runtime: 1 hr 35 mins
Rating: NC16 (Some Coarse Language and Violence)
Released By: Shaw Organisation
Official Website: 

Opening Day: 12 September 2024

Synopsis: Their covert operations have been instrumental in toppling governments, eliminating key undesirables, and igniting wars for economic gain. But now, their own master wants them dead. This is a story written in blood.

Movie Review:

I suppose templates for movies liked Hounds of War can be purchased for cheap in the dark underbelly of Hollywood. Else how you explain this generic, DOA action thriller starring Frank Grillo and Robert Patrick. Note that Grillo who has been keeping himself with lots of DTV works also produced this.

In Hounds of War, Grillo plays Ryder, a mercenary sort of tough guy who joins his brother for a covert operation in Malta. Under the command of Colonel Hart (Patrick), Grillo and his bunch of middle-aged, overweight buddies are assigned to kill a warlord hiding in a bunker on the pretext of saving the world kind of nonsense.

In the end, Grillo and company is betrayed by Hart who has for no reason actually worked out a deal with the warlord. Everyone on the team is killed and Ryder hopes to “break the system” with the help of his equally tough-as-nails, ex- girlfriend, Selena (Rhona Mitra). In simpler terms, the man is out for revenge.

VOD expert Isaac Florentine (Undisputed II, Acts of Vengeance) definitely knows how to maximise the action without breaking the bank. In most cases, with the limited amount of money on hand. Florentine delivers a deafening sequence where Ryder and gang stormed the bunker. Thousands of shots are fired but none of the masculinity are displayed to their finest. Hilariously, Ryder managed to escape unscathed just because his brother sacrificed himself with a grenade.

Florentine continues to keep things busy with a fist fight in Selena’s bar, a police foot chase and a finale wild goose chase which took viewers on a scenic city tour of Malta. There’s honestly no lack of action scenes as Ryder embarked on his path of vengeance. But the choreography and editing deserves much more to keep viewers immersed. While there are still effort being put in, the general feeling is that it’s just a few points above an average JCVD and Seagal VOD work.

Hounds of War also lacks a strong, compelling story to company the action. It’s hard to really care for Ryder’s plan, Hart’s motive in this messy conspiracy and the President’s cause. Generally, the plotting is as straightforward as they come, it doesn’t mean much to the average audiences with all the above inconsequential fillers stuffed in-between the action.

The breath-taking shots of Malta’s architectural and landscapes perhaps is the only saving grace of this yawnfest. Grillo is serviceable as he always has been. Mitra makes a decent comeback and Patrick is chewing the scenery in the usual baddie role (similar to the one in Reacher season 2). Ultimately, we more or less confirmed Hounds of War will never break the system or mould to be the next action franchise. More importantly, Florentine and Grillo only wants to deliver a decent DTV actioner.

Movie Rating:

(A perfect tourism commercial for Malta. The movie not so much)

Review by Linus Tee