Kill Speed

Directed By: Kim Bass

Starring: Andrew Keegan, Brandon Quinn, Natalia Cigliuti, Bill Goldberg, Greg Grunberg

Synopsis:

A group of young, speed-freak pilots make a fortune transporting crystal meth across the Mexican border into California in their sub-sonic planes. Chasing the lifestyle of girls, parties and stacks of cash, they take ever greater risks culminating in them drawing the attention of the FBI. They want to use the pilots skills in smashing a Mexican cartel.

This movie so reminds me of 80s DTV movies; that promise so much and deliver very little. Some of those 80s movies have now become cult classics, so perhaps Kill Speed will in 20 years time. Somehow, I’m doubtful.

This is a TV movie through and through. Despite the quality of some TV shows, this movie is clearly aiming for the less discerning teenage market. Sadly, I think that this potential target audience will tire before the movie is finished. At 1 hour and 51 minutes it is overlong and far too talky. The usually acceptable 90 minutes would have been enough. There are a number of scenes involving the planes but this is hardly “Top Gun 2”. Some effort is made, by the director, to make the action scenes as exciting as possible given the limited resources but it can’t rescue the mainly bad acting, tedious dialogue and overall poor filmmaking; some of the scene lighting is appalling. A screenplay that might have looked good on paper is badly executed.

The thing is it purports to have something in common with The Fast and the Furious but instead goes to show just how entertaining those movies were, without being great movies. The cast appear to have been chosen for this very reason, especially Natalia Cigliuti who looks very much like Jordana Brewster. The young cast aren’t bad individually as I have seen them in various TV shows before but collectively they were done a disservice by a screenplay peppered with unfunny quips and stilted dialogue. The story itself comes across as an adaptation of a teenage novel.The big surprise casting was Tom Arnold. How the mighty have fallen, from the dizzying heights of True Lies to the bargain basement action of Kill Speed. I also wondered what Greg Grunberg (Heroes, Alias) was doing in the movie. I wasn’t as surprised as Robert Patrick’s appearance. As much as I like the actor, he’s not proud when it comes to picking up the check and he does get to play the President this time.

Some effort was made in varying the plane chases by the change of location (for example, the LA tunnel) but sometimes makes the action look ridiculous.

Summary:

The concept of young pilots smuggling meth and having to work with the law isn’t a bad one but it’s just badly executed. You’ll be forgiven for picking Kill Speed up on the strength of the advertising campaign as the poster artwork that I’ve seen is very good (not so much the UK dvd cover!).

3 out of 10 (Wayfarer)

New! Comments