User reviews

I'm struggling to review this film as I didn't actually hate it, but it's littered with flaws.

My main complaint is that it never really settled on a tone. At times this film is dark as hell, with some properly gruesome and grotesque ideas and scenes.

At other times it strays into Evil Dead style comedy horror with some of its action scenes and sequences. This shift was quite jarring and had they picked one route and gone for it might have been more effective.

The acting was quite hit and miss, with no particularly solid performances to mention.

In terms of plot it actually had some interesting ideas, but took way too long to get stuck into the meat of the story.

The soundtrack is pretty great though I must say.

Overall a bit hit and miss. There's plenty for horror fans to enjoy and I did enjoy large parts of this film, but it felt a bit rough around the edges.

The Retaliators is dumb but fun entertainment - something that has strangely become a rarity in horror.

Nowadays where every movie is a slow burn "elevated" metaphor for trauma and abuse - so it's refreshing to see a film that just wants to entertain in a blood soaked way.

I felt like there was also an innovative movie here. The antihero was very interesting and should have been the focus of the movie. Instead it just became a run of the mill revenge flick and focused on the wrong character.

It's well acted and has good production value but, in the end, the redeeming qualities surrounded the cameos and the soundtrack. The rotating one-night only releases is also a marketing gimmick. I fell for both of them...

I feel like the names (i.e. Jacoby Shaddix, Five Finger Death Punch, Tommy Lee) was more of a marketing gimmick than of any real value.

Best leave this for when it becomes available on a streaming service.

Honestly. I do. The beginning started out fantastic for a lower budget horror movie. I was intrigued. It captured me like a good zombie film would have. Although it's not a zombie film. Then it plodded on forever. I lost interest. I made food. Took the dogs out. One dog decides to not potty and just lingers around the yard sniffing at everything it can sniff. Waited a little bit longer and then the last 1/4 of the movie comes back to the first 1/8 of the movie and I was interested again. Also, this cast is ridiculously stupid. So many "I know that guy" it's not even funny. FFDP and Tommy Lee??

Better than a movie featuring the singer of Papa Roach has any right to be, "The Retaliators" is a fun revenge thriller, that switches between genres, offering just enough twist and turns (and a bonkers ending) to stay engaging.

The acting is not bad, with a certain Z Nation actor being the highlight.

Following the death of his daughter, a grief-stricken priest sets out to seek revenge for the person responsible, eventually finding him in the form of an underground criminal kingpin being sought by a multitude of organizations for his work and must dig deeper into his own resolve to escape the situation.

There was quite a lot to like with this one. Among the better features found here is the incredibly enjoyable setup that provides quite a fun setup to the later insanity featured here. The initial setup with the easy-going lifestyle of the priest trying not to get into confrontation or violence and then wretched with grief when his daughter is killed and eventually learning to stand up for himself works rather nicely, while the secondary setup of the need to catch up with the drug-deal gone wrong featuring the criminals scouring their own underworld trying to discover who the psychopath is and what he's done with the money. This gives the film quite a unique setup that brings some rather interesting points along the way. As well, the film manages quite a lot to like with the brutal and over-the-top confrontations with the killers coming into play. With the strong opening about the girls being stranded in the van and then finding the attempted saviors getting dispatched gruesomely before the graphic final scene, this one manages quite a lot to like almost immediately in a fast, frenetic sequence. The car chase and resulting accident that sets this one in motion are quite thrilling, and the relentless attacks that come about in the finale where the freed prisoners are let loose bringing upon a ton of frantic, furious sequences together as they attack the group in the underground dungeon and eventually make their way out into the woods which features all sorts of impressive effects-work on the graphic kills throughout here, giving this some likable features. There are some flaws to be had with this one. The main problem is that so much of the film's first half is so generally unappealing as a horror film that it's easy to think this one doesn't even fall into the genre. The opening attack is very misleading to the later scenes as the main setup that gets focused on the search for the figures in the criminal underworld that revolve around the killer that kills his daughter than it is about the deaths being dished out. This plays far more like a crime thriller than a genre effort with the way the scenes play out as the drug deal gone wrong involving the brutal murder of the courier which is not that interesting or features anything remotely close to what's going on later on in the film so it just isn't that good to get started. That early setup highlights the films' other issue in that there's such a pronounced and obvious stylistic change between the first and second half that is awkward and clumsily put together. The sluggish pacing from the non-genre first half gives way to a furious, fast-paced second half that's quite different not just in style but also in presentation. There's so little about what's going on here that feels cohesive and connected to what's come before it as the turn from crime thriller to horror is not that well-defined and comes out of nowhere with how it's played off. The shift in tone is drastic much like the content of the action featured here which all combine together to knock this back a bit.

Rated Unrated/R: Extreme Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Nudity, and heavy drug use.

Michael Lombardi is the aptly named "Bishop" - he's a rural pastor - who traditionally shuns confrontation and generally encourages others to do the same. Until, that is, his daughter has a run in with a gangland hoodlum who has a car stashed with cocaine, loot - and a man who is not in great shape. She attempts to flee but while being chased chooses to ring her dad, rather than 911 (or maybe drive off in the general direction of the police station!?). Anyway, the remainder of this terribly lacklustre revenge thriller follows dad's attempts to avenge his daughter. For a previously gentle man, he adapts to the brutality of his new environment with an ease that made me think that if Sigourney Weaver had had him in the "Alien" films, those acid bleeding critters wouldn't have lasted twenty minutes. That's really the problem here. The scenario is just daft. Right from the get go when we have an altercation over a Christmas tree through to the very end, it's all just predictable and implausible tosh. The acting is college project standard, as is the writing and the direction. Indeed, quite how this got a cinema release at all is a far more worthy and ponderous question than anything raised by the script. Nope, I really wouldn't bother.

A fair surprise I got after I saw this movie in a theater near me, went with little to no expectations, looking for a common horror film, with jumpscares and metal singers' cameos (I went to this film just because i'm a huge Ice Nine Kills fan), but what I got was nothing I expected, instead of a horror/slasher film, what I saw was a film about crime/thriller with horror aspects in it, that touches the themes of religion, grief and revenge in an interesting way. My biggest problem was at the beginning of the film, the writing and the acting wasn't any good, but after that car scene, everything turned up a notch and I got gripped (and surprised) with everything that happened during the story.

Imagine if Papa Roach made a movie that had exactly as much originality and style as their music (so...absolutely none). This sorry attempt at a grindcore meets zombie flick meets "Hostel" makes Rob Zombie's fare seem like Citizen Kane in conparison.) Imagine a sombie film without a hint of the kitsch, set design and art direcrion and musical direction and you end up with "The Retaliators."

On the plus side, Tommy Lee has a cameo, but honestly, it's hardly worth the 2 hours you'll never get back.

This movie reeks of something that was created front to back by emoty, souless LA nu-metal hacks without an ounce of depth between them. Let's just hope they don't bother with a sequel.

The plot is a bit twisty and fast-paced. I loved most of the music and the overall atmosphere was fun, exciting action/gore. A lot of it was predictable but in a good way because I was excited to see it all play out. The acting was not amazing, but it was certainly watchable. Simply enjoyable entertainment that doesn't layer in deep, heavy themes and symbolism like most of the horror movies these days. The characters were very interesting, though not a whole lot of depth to them. The movie didn't take itself too seriously. Every scene had something fun going on, I watched the whole thing without getting distracted. I wish they had gone down a darker path with the story and dialed back on the comedy gore so I could really feel connected to the main character, but overall I thought it was great.

In the beginning, I thought this might be some kind of sappy religious movie. Ha ha ha!

First impressions sometimes suck! This is NOT that kind of movie. What it is, is a solid guy film packed with just about everything a human man needs to sock back a six pack and a pie in righteous style. Oh, yeah!

On the surface, this is a film about vengeance. Then it's a film about justice gone awry. Then it's a film about... well, it gets very guy-flick from there. Suffice it to say that the acting is solid, the dialogue moves, and the cinematography is gripping. You'll get this film's message quickly enough.

Without spoiling the story, I can only summarize "The Retaliators" this way: after all is watched and finished, you'll want to 1) pump some iron and 2) take a shower.

Enjoy!

Where we have Rob Zombie and his dreadful "Slipknot horror" as it's woefully named after his affliction for masks being the scariest element of his childhood...here we have the antithesis; Creed Horror.

This film pretends to be horror within a defined genre, when it really takes more than a couple of violent scenes to be considered something it really isn't. It comes across as something riding the line of a B-movie crime drama, a revenge flick, a drug deal gone wrong premise, a biker film and finishes with a "zombie" or cannibal element all to the tune of some mallcore nonsense and god awful repetitive tropes seen over and over.

This film is an absolute mess, and comes off more as a film school wanna be kickstarter campaign gone wrong than anything resembling a horror film.

When you see the "awards" tab on the imdb page----do yourself a favor and see if they are legitimate festivals before getting worked into believing there's something resembling a cult classic or a hidden gem. This is neither.

Wanted, "metal band" video directors to cram 5 movies into 90 minute snooze fest. This one will make a Rob Zombie film fan puke.

I am going to try and be as diplomatic as possible to see why I think this movie is a 1 and a slew of others say it's a 9 or 10. First case, the 9's or higher. Do you love one or all of the following? Popa Roach, FFDP, Ice Nine Kills or Rob Zombie movies? This is going to be your cup of tea. If you would have preferred to hear 12 minute black metal songs from bands no one has heard of before while being a pretentious prick after the first 5 minutes, you will give this one a 1.

This is simply bad and not worth watching based on the acting and poor directing. Definitely feels like someone had some resources meaning money to do a move but wasn't able to cast properly and hire directors capable of making something good and worthwhile.

This is a movie that I got sent over as screener thanks to Justin Cook. Just a peak behind the curtain, I got this a little over a month ago. There wasn't an embargo, but it was asked to hold off until closer to the date of release. I'm now giving it a watch. What is funny though is that I saw a trailer for it at the Gateway Film Center as well. Other than that, I did see the poster and read just a bit which piqued my interest.

Synopsis: an upstanding pastor uncovers a dark and twisted underworld as he searches for answers surrounding his daughter's brutal murder.

We start seeing someone drop a body down a well. It doesn't show us who was carrying it. From there, we shift over to a couple of young women in a van. We learn this is taking place in New Jersey. They decide to a take an unmarked road to avoid losing a day since it seems they've been traveling for some time. It becomes a nightmare for them when they get a flat tire. They're attacked by someone who looks crazed. He isn't alone though. The first person is killed and this bloody person opens the back of the van before they're attacked by others. We then shift to the beginning of all this.

Sarah (Katie Kelly) is in a grief counseling group. I think this does a good job here as she zones out listening to another member as they tell their story. This is effective. What we learn is that she lost her mother and struggling. Her father is the local pastor, John Bishop (Michael Lombardi). Since what has happened to his wife, he is a bit more protective over his daughters. The younger one is named Rebecca (Abbey Hafer).

Now the movie gives an interesting interaction at a Christmas tree farm. John and Rebecca leave Sarah in line to pay for the one they picked out and another guy takes it. She is yelling at him which brings her father over. The guy, who is played by Brian O'Halloran, shoves him and is confrontational. John lets him take it, which bothers Sarah.

Their world is turned upside down once again with tragedy. John allows Sarah to go to a party. When she is getting gas, she has an encounter with a guy named Ram Kady (Joseph Gatt). We saw that he was at a drug deal, attacked the other guy and stole the product while keeping the money. At the gas station, Sarah hears the guy in the trunk. This causes Ram to tie up this loose end. Since the synopsis gave away that she is killed, this breaks John.

The detective on the case is Jed (Marc Menchaca). He has a similar past of tragedy. He sees himself in John and decides to give him the revenge that he sought previously. Going back once again to the synopsis, this leads John on a dark path. He has a decision to make that will change him forever. It also leads to secrets that Jed is keeping as well.

Now that is where I'm going to leave my recap as I don't want to spoil things here. That gives you a good introduction to the basic plot and to the characters. Where I want to start is that we get an interesting character study here. I would say that most of that is focused on John, but I also think we get a look at Jed here as well. Since I'm going to avoid spoiling, I'll do what I can to relay points in that confine.

I don't recall if they say what happened to John's wife and the mother of his daughters. Rebecca seems to be handling it better which could be due to her age. John seems to be in a good place as well. I think part of that he is a pastor. He has his congregation and his faith. That gets rocked though when Sarah is killed. I can't blame him. Jed tells him to allow the police to do their work, but he can't sit idly by. He needs answers. He isn't expecting the offer that Jed makes. What I will say here is that he is faced with the choice that my friends and I have debated in the past. What would you do if someone hurt your loved ones and you get the chance to settle the score with them one on one. Most everyone says they'd hurt them. What this movie also brings up though are the repercussions of that. I'll leave here the adage, 'before you embark on a journey of revenge, dig two graves'.

Where I want to shift over to next starts with Jed. We see that he's a tortured soul almost immediately after taking the case. He is drinking while watching surveillance footage. The movie then gives us his back-story through a flashback. This involves a criminal named Quinn Brady (Jacoby Shaddix). What is interesting though, we know that this guy was put away and then freed. He does something horrible. This then leans that he could be behind things happening now. What I will say here is that Jed, Quinn and these zombie like people from the opening are connected. What is happening there is quite horrific. It does feel borrowed from a popular movie in the 1990s. I don't want to say to avoid spoiling. When you see it though, I think it clicks.

With all that explored, I do have a negative. I'm not sure if all the parts here mesh as well as the filmmakers wanted. This feels like we might have too many ideas that are interesting, but it is overly complicated. There is a biker gang that Ram has an association with. We have a drug deal gone wrong. There is this pastor that needs to tap into his darker side for revenge. There is a broken cop who might have snapped. We get a family tragedy and almost a monster movie in the end. Personally, I would have liked them to remove a subplot or two so this flows a bit better. It just feels disjointed with how it is put together. Don't take this as I hated this as that's not the case. They try to explain things that go on too long.

That should be enough for the story so I'll go over to the acting. I thought that Lombardi was good as our lead. He seems like a good guy that wants to raise his family despite the tragedy that they've dealt with. I like the growth for his character from the beginning to the end. Menchaca was solid as this broken detective. I thought he played it well. I wasn't expecting where he ends up. Gatt's acting doesn't add much, but he's here for his size. He fit as well. I thought that Kelly and Hafer were both cute as the daughters. The former does show good fear with what happens to her. There are also a lot of cameos. For actors we have like O'Halloran, Robert John Burke and Robert Knepper. They were all fine. I'd bet they were all on set for a day. If you can get them, might as well. It doesn't hurt anything except I know they're good at what they do and would have liked more. There are bunch of cameos from musicians as well. I recognized Shaddix and Tommy Lee. There are more here for sure. I'd say that the acting is a bit over the top, but not enough to ruin things for me.

Last things to go into are all under filmmaking. In general, they are solid. I'd say that the cinematography was fine. There were times that it felt like a music video. This partially goes to the fact that they had access to these types of bands. I'll say that it isn't necessarily my type of music, but I think that it fit for what the movie needed. There were other times that how this was shot was on point. I'd give credit to the editing there as well. Other than that, I think the effects were good. There were a couple moments of CGI that I wasn't a fan of. That dealt with mostly blood spray. One of which is a body part being chopped off and blood spurting. It wouldn't work that way since the part spraying isn't connected to the heart. That's a nitpick though since this went practical with what they could. I was glad to see that here for sure.

In conclusion, I think that this is a solid movie and I'm glad that Justin reached out so I could see this. I like mostly what they're doing here. We have an interesting revenge story that held my interest. This goes brutal with different things and doesn't pull its punches at times. The acting is solid and the filmmaking aspects were as well. If I do have an issue though, they put too much into this movie so it overcomplicated it. I think they scale that back and just focus more on what was needed and this works better. I do appreciate the ambition. Not everyone will enjoy this though. I'd say that this is for fans of lower budget cinema or more into these modern 'exploitation' type movies.

My Rating: 6.5 out of 10.

Sexy teenage-looking pastor and single-dad of 2 girls goes from upstanding citizen to violent a-hole. I'm not sure why we should cheer. I was too distracted by the AWFUL acting and even worse writing.

That said, it was goofy fun. The violence was very funny, though the effects were way too bad for all the time spent zooming in for closer shots. Truly though, nothing can compare to how terrible the acting and writing was. I'm not a Papa Roach fan, so I can't tell if all the band members were in it, or just a couple. The soundtrack was mostly their kind of alternative teenager rock. If someone told me a bunch of rockers wrote and directed this, I would not be surprised. It seems to have been shot using proper movie-making materials, so it gets more than one star.

I truly hated the experience of watching this, and I'll never watch it again, but I am a Mark Menchaca completist, so I'm glad I saw it once. Three stars.

You say I wrote Pray with me wrong? That could not be the case now could it? No pun intended as always. And we start with the "here and now", before we go back and the movie shows us how we got to this moment we just witnessed. Does it mean the movie that unfolds has lost its tension? I would highly disagree with that notion.

I also would urge anyone with a weak stomach not to watch this. This does not take any prisoners (not necessarily literally ... though also that ... sometimes)! There will be blood ... there will be insanity ... there will be a lot of violence! And a few bad guys to enjoy ... to hate! I know this is just a movie, but certain things did hurt watching ... the amount of evil that was unleashed at times ... mind blowing (well and other things of that human body nature ... you'll get it ... wood you not?)

First off horror is my favorite genre and I've watched just about everything out there worth watching. I consider myself to be a somewhat manly man who enjoys lots of action and bloody action at that! After watching the trailer I figured this was definitely the movie for that and I was really looking forward to it!

My first problem is that it took way too long to get to any of that action I previously spoke of and second it had more of a slapstick feel to it instead of a straight up "kick butt, take names" feel that I definitely would have preferred for this type of movie. It's like they couldn't figure out who they wanted to be so they figured they would try both which for me just didn't work. If they would have just went with the same stuff they gave in the trailer, and doled out a lot more of it, I think it would have really worked good.

I give it a 5 out of 10 because again it was okay but could have been something great!

This is an enjoyable movie, just don't expect it to be the next Saw. This is more of a soundtrack movie than a horror movie. That's probably why a lot of the lower level characters are played by members of the band by the same name who also wrote the theme song. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot that are big misses in the movie, but if you're bored and just want a good revenge movie to watch this will fill that pretty easily. It's not on the level of I Spit on your Grave, American Merry, or any of the other great revenge horror, but its watchable.

The acting is sub par, but that's on point for the genre.

This movie had all the elements of an 80's style Horror Thriller. Great gore and action based around a solid revenge story.

The plot of the film centers around loss and revenge, but more importantly it deals with what it takes for a peaceful person to cross a line they can't come back from.

What set's it apart from other basic revenge thrillers, is the 80's style gore. Once the action starts, much like the evil dead movies, it doesn't stop. You really feel like you are on a ride.

If you have the opportunity, try and see this movie in theaters. The awesome music that accompanies the action scenes was meant to be seen on the big screen with a great sound system.

We loved it from start to finish! Definitely worth checking out!

...it would be this bucket of tripe. Obviously Marc Menchaca must've owed someone a favour to appear in this joke. From square one, Retaliators is a boiler plate of cliché melodrama, canned dialogue, hokey exposition & wildly embarrassing over-acting. In spite of a few entertaining moments, the Presence of the 40 plus motorcycle crowd is too undeniably awkward to ignore. What's worse is the soundtrack: arguably the worst compilation of music I've ever heard, this obnoxious contribution of early aughts hillbilly rock-rap makes this movie the closest thing I've ever seen to viewing a headache. Thumbs down!

One, I can watch a good low-budget horror movie... this one does not quliafy for one simple reason....the writing.

I can talk about direction(bad), editing(horrible), charater development(non-existent)...but the sriting is downright atrocious. It is on the level of high school(junior hig) plays. There is very little actual convesation but rather stand-alone sentences and one word responses. As the other responses have mentioned, you could turn off the sound and enjoy the movie better...I really mean that.

Next it is all over the place, wants to be horror, wants to be revenge, wants to be a thriller, but the parts do not work in conjunction, they pull apart from each other, especially with the bad writing.

This is a skip.