What Not To Watch: Misfire
Misfire is defined as a failure of a gun or missile to fire correctly. With that in mind it was the perfect name for the movie I am covering today…
After my last experience with a Gary Daniels movie was less than satisfactory, when I saw the 2014 movie Misfire pop up in my Netflix suggestions I decided to give it a try. I have seen Gary Daniels movies in the past that I enjoyed, so I know it is possible and I really wanted to enjoy Misfire, but my desire to enjoy the movie and my actual enjoyment of the movie were not syncing up.
If this movie was cut down to about 46 minutes and made into a pilot of a show where Gary Daniels plays a suspended DEA agent stuck in Mexico and still waging wars with the drug cartels, this would be a pretty awesome episode of that unnamed show.
But this was not the pilot for a TV show, this was a full length motion picture, which made this movie feel excruciatingly long. It literally felt like they were just adding scenes to get this thing to hit the 90 minute minimum.
- Bizarre Love Triangle: One part of the story not only felt needless for the plot, but in my opinion actually hurt the characters that the audience should be supporting. Cole’s (Gary Daniels) ex-wife Sarah was covering an upcoming election in Mexico, and when she discovers that one of the candidates is also the head of a drug cartel, she ends up missing. As a viewer you think… you have Cole the determined DEA agent waging a personal war on drugs. Then you have Sarah, a determined reporter looking to get the story at all costs. It is no wonder these two are divorced. Both were too driven by their professions, but now we have a chance for them to see the err of their ways and if they make it through this horrible situation they can live happily ever after… that might be the case if Sarah hadn’t left Cole for his brother. How am I supposed to care about this woman now? And the fact that Cole does doesn’t really strengthen his character in my eyes… maybe if that was the mother of his children, but there was no mention of kids.
- Let Me Tell You Something Brother: One of my big problems with, Forced to Fight, the last Gary Daniels movie I gave the What Not To Watch treatment to, was the fact that his brother in that film did not have an English accent. Well in Misfire, they managed to get him a brother played by a fellow actor from the UK (although Michael Greco who plays Cole’s brother Johnny is from Scotland not England like Gary Daniels), but there is ZERO family resemblance. Even The Circuit managed to get somebody who could pass for Olivier Gruner’s brother in both looks and sound.
- One Bright Spot: Even bad movies have their positives and one of those is the vivacious Vannessa Vasquez, who plays a photo journalist friend of Cole’s ex wife and becomes Cole’s partner in more ways than one as the movie rolls on. I guess it was important to throw a love interest in the movie for Daniels so he didn’t come off as a complete door mat.
Misfire proved to be another miss in the career of Gary Daniels. I am beginning to wonder if Daniels is trying to challenge himself as an actor instead of sticking with the action movie basics when he’s choosing his projects. Or maybe he’s getting bad advice from his management team. Either way, I’m hoping my next Gary Daniels movie experience is a good one.
