As with all of my reviews of films for The Creepercast, I fully recommend that you check each and every one of them out. I am one man and this is my opinion. I've seen plenty of movies that received reviews that were the complete opposite of how I saw the film. These writers, directors, producers and actors all put a lot of time and love into these projects. They deserve to be seen and appreciated for what they are. Everyone has a dream and I fully support the people that take the time to make theirs a reality. With that being said....
About two weeks ago, something happened to me that's never quite happened before. I saw a trailer for a film called, 'Death Kiss'. Now, that's not the strange part of the story. What was strange is that the main actor in it looked exactly like a personal favorite of mine, Charles Bronson.... who passed away in 2003. This was a new film though. I was confused at first and then remembered a post on Reddit about a face swap software that was allowing everyday people to take on the visages of celebrities. I assumed that this was the next phase of that technology. Full length films with long gone movie stars. I quickly learned how wrong I was. This was an actual man named Robert Kovacs Brunzi. Someone who bears almost an unnatural similarity to the late Mr. Bronson. So much so, that every time I see him, I have to do a double take. It's uncanny! After watching the trailer and sitting with this moment of shock for a while, I found out this wasn't his first film. He also starred in another piece from last year called, 'From Hell to the Wild West'. A curious title, that only makes sense once you put it in the context of the film's story line. Needless to say, I had to jump on this one and see if he could hold his own against his near legendary counterpart. I fired this one up last night and sat back to enjoy a simpler time in my life, when all that mattered what Charlie and me and losing ourselves in a couple of hours of escapism. This was the result.
The story takes place in the old west and during the opening credits, the last words you see before the film begins, is that this is based on a true story. Okay, so now I'm intrigued. We open on a long haired gentleman stomping through the woods, as he digs up a mask that's supposed to be a stitched together thing. In reality, it looks like it's a manufactured Halloween mask from Party City. (Sorry, Party City) He's stalking a woman who'd getting water down by the stream. He pulls out a large butcher knife and heads down to carry out some nefarious deeds. Meanwhile, a man by the name of Buchinski (Charles Bronson's birth name, by the way and played by Robert Kovacs Brunzi) who's doing some stalking of his own. He's out to kills this man and stop his reign of terror. But Buchinski is ALSO being stalked by a lawman, who stops him from killing the madman and causes Buchinski to become the hunted madman suspect. The madman kills the woman and gets away. Cut to two more woman showing up at the local saloon. The town is all but abandoned, except for the lawman, I guess. The two woman are soon victims of the madman too. This leads me to question why anyone even comes to this town anymore? Fast forward to a college student doing some research on an old slave woman's diary, which has led hear to believe that the madman is Francis Tumblety. A real life person, who was thought to have possibly been Jack the Ripper. She tells her professor the tale and he soon believes that she may be right. A bunch of other killing and chases happen and things end.
Let me just get this out of the way, this was not a good movie. Not by any stretch of the imagination. The best part of this film, is Brunzi. He channels the hell out of his inner Bronson and for the roughly hour and a half run time, I felt like it's the late 70's again. Other than that, this was pretty abysmal, even by low budget standards. I believe this was someone's “great” idea for a film that couldn't get funding and thew in Brunzi to sell the idea. It's a confusing premise, that's overwrought with too many ideas and not enough proper execution. It was basically a serial killer film, set in the old west, relying on a real life character that meets a former action star. The title gives all of that away, but you wouldn't know it, until you saw the film. If you are familiar with the Jack the Ripper case, he signed a letter 'From Hell'. This was also the title of the Johnny Depp film, made by The Hughes Brothers. It's lazy, I'm sorry. It also kind of turns Jack the Ripper into a slasher villain. I don't think ol' Jacky boy would ever utilize a meat cleaver in his handiwork. I also don't think Jack just ran around an old west town wearing a mask and killing anyone and everyone that wandered into it. That's not his style. They also elude to how smart Francis Tumblety was. This character in the film, literally just runs after women and kills them Ala Jason Voorhees. While that works for Mr. Voorhees, it doesn't work here. There's also some major anachronisms here. The two women who show up to the town to take a job at the local saloon, look and sound like they just stepped out of a CW spin off show. (Sorry to the CW) Not too mention that the action sequences look like they were staged by my nephew, who's 4 years old. Right down to two shots, that the film makers probably thought were clever, but weren't. One with a POV shot from the front of a rifle of the hero of the story and then one from the other end of the rifle like a first person shooter. It's lazy and didn't work for 'Doom' and doesn't work here. Oh yes and probably the worst use of a Wilhelm Scream ever put to film. Finally, poor Mr. Brunzi is overdubbed by a Charles Bronson impersonator. I've heard him speak and he may not sound like Charles, but that's because he isn't Charles. They could have skipped that part and probably saved some money.
I wanted to like this, I really did. It was just too much, too little and too awful. While I loved seeing my beloved Charles Bronson back on the screen in a new film, it could have been in a much better film. I mean, Robert is almost an exact duplicate of Charles. From his posture, to the way he holds a gun and right down to his build. It's creepy. That was the selling point. That's where I think 'Death Kiss' may succeed. Granted, I don't expect it to be a good film, but at least it knows what it wants to be. For this film, it's a 2 out of 4 star film. The extra star is for Bronzi. Maybe 'From Hell to the Wild West' would've been served better if it had just stuck to the Francis Tumblety story alone? I don't know. I mean, that story is kind of intriguing. But when you throw in all the other elements, it just kind of implodes on itself. I sincerely hope that we get more films from Robert in the future and for what it's worth, every one has to start somewhere. In his case, I guess starting at the bottom of the barrel means he has no where to go but up.
If you want to see Charles Bronson in his prime, check out: 'Death Wish' (1974), 'Hard Times' (1975) or 'The Mechanic' (1972)
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