Explosive
Summary
Lights Out is director Christian Sesma’s best film yet with a fantastic cast who deliver plenty of kick-ass action while also keeping a quick runtime and all while maintaining its heart.
Plot: In LIGHTS OUT, a homeless veteran, Michael “Duffy” Duffield (Grillo), meets a talkative Ex-Con, Max Bomer (Phifer) who notices Duffy’s skills after he gets into a bar fight and offers him a well-paying “job” competing in underground fight clubs. The pair form an unlikely partnership after their first fight and decide to travel to LA so Duffy can atone for his past and Max can pay back a crime boss, Sage Parker (Mulroney). Duffy enters Sage’s fight club and eventually wins, but it also gets him tied up in the crime world and offered jobs he can’t refuse, including one with Sage’s partner and Police officer, Ellen Ridgway (King). The deeper Duffy goes in this world, the more deadly it gets.
Review: 2024 really is off to a great start with The Beekeeper, One More Shot, Ruthless and now Lights Out proving that old-school action is alive and well. Lights Out has one of the year’s best casts with Frank Grillo playing a drifting ex-soldier named Michael ‘Duffy’ Duffield who becomes an underground fighter with the help of a just released ex-con (Mekhi Phifer), pitting them both against a crime boss, corrupt cops and hired killers.
Scott Adkins is also along for the ride as well as Dermot Mulroney whose been making a name for himself in the action genre lately. He’s on villain duties here, but he’s more interesting than your one note antagonist as he isn’t the real threat. Jamie King gives one of her best performances to date as the corrupt Detective Ellen Ridgeway with the always awesome Paul Sloan as her partner Detective Kincaid. These are truly nasty villains, so we need some true badasses to take them down. Thankfully, Frank, Scott and Mekhi are up for the task giving us all the fight scenes and shoot-outs we could want.
Frank Grillo has that old-school, Charles Bronson-esque toughness to him and is perfectly cast as Duffy; I would have no problems with a sequel either as you could do a Kung Fu like series with Duffy wandering the Earth and helping people out.
Lights Out is just under 90 minutes long making it an easy watch with no screentime wasted; we care about the characters and there is plentiful amounts of action making this easily Christian Sesma’s best film to date.
If you’re looking for Scott Adkins doing Undisputed-style fight scenes you may be disappointed; this isn’t that kind of movie, but is very much its own beast taking place in the real world.
Overall, Lights Out is up there with The Beekeeper as one of the year’s best action pictures with great characters, a winning cast and plenty of breakneck action to be well worth checking out.
