There were some great lower budget Action flicks of the 90s that did have some studio backing, the majority of Steven Segal's early work was backed and released by Warner Bros, I think Van Damme made a fair few films with Universal and Chuck, Well chuck kinda sucked in the 90s. Stallone was still smashing it out the park with Demolition Man, Judge Dredd and Assassins before his career kind of fizzled out in the late 90s. Arnie was still making bank all the way up to The 6th Day, not a great film but serviceable. Arnold made his name in the OTT films of the 80s with Commando, Raw Deal, The Running Man, Red Heat and Predator (the official 2nd greatest action movie of all time) but when he entered the 90s, we got GOAT level Schwarzenegger flicks with T2, Kindergarten Cop, Total Recall, True Lies, Eraser and Junior before again, like Stallone fizzling out towards the latter part of the decade and the beginning of the new millennium with forgettable fare such as End Of Days, The 6th Day and Collateral Damage. But for people who needed a continuous fix of explosions and gunfire, these movies were like the main course of a banquet of varying quality.
At the top end of table you have the 3 star Michelin starred action films, in the middle we had the quality affordable action movies like Stone Cold, Beverly Hills Cop 3 and Air-force One but right a the lower end of the table is the Greasy spoon, fly-in-your-tea, Beans On Toast (not Heinz) action flicks, the working mans bang bang splody movies with actors like Chad McQueen, Gary Daniels, Thomas Ian Griffiths and Richard Norton, the wank end of Burt Reynolds career with a minor break in the middle with Boogie Nights. Films with titles like Tough & Deadly, Riot, Mercenary Of Death, Blood Warriors, Bloodfist, Blood Fight, Blood Hands, lots of titles with the word blood in them. Made for peanuts and seemingly churned out on a conveyor belt of shit. But and here's the point where I change my focus, but, while these movies did indeed suck the goose' honker, they had one thing the big budget films didn't... No name actors giving terrible performances against a backdrop of some of the BEST stunt choreography and action sequences you will ever see.
Singling out the unofficial three R's trilogy from the king of 90s DTV action, PM Entertainment and all starring Gary Daniels, those films are titled Rage, Riot and Recoil, these films highlight the absolute insanity of mid 90s, low budget direct to video action. Rage and Recoil probably being the most bonkers of the 3 in terms of action but Riot being one more on the better narrative side. Rage is quite possibly the most breakneck, breathless action movie ever made, it's Crank but made ten years earlier and featuring way way way more gratuitous violence and glass shattering but also highlighting what can be achieved on such a small amount of money. The stunt work, the car chases, shoot outs all add up to what could essentially be a live action looney tunes cartoon. It's very cartoonish. A teacher played by world renowned legit martial artist Gary Daniels, gets injected with a substance that cause him to move like the flash a beat the living shit out of anyone who gets in his way, be it human being, dominatrix (just go with it) or glass panel. The plot is absolute nonsense but you ain't watching Rage for it's narrative structure and deep character development, you're watching Rage for an 11 minute car chase and Gary hanging off the side of a massive glass skyscraper. It's all systems go, or Charlie Sheen gear, infact the case could be made that everyone was on some sort of gear while making Rage, its fucking mental. Below is the trailer for Rage, watch it and tell me you don't instantly want to watch it.
But lets not just focus on Gary Daniels, there were some other great 90s DTV action flicks that are sorely looked past by the average movie watcher. Below is a list of movies with the trailers linked...
This is just to name a few of the better DTV Action flicks of the 90s but there's a whole rabbit hole of movies out there worth taking a deep dive into. Everything from Cyborg Cop, Steel Justice to a whole slate of PM Entertainment and Nu-Image movies. Some are good, some are laughably bad to the point of throwing them in the bin. But if you like action and are hungry for something outside of the mega budget Hollywood action of the 90s, there really is a smorgasbord of cheapo 90 minute action fests for you.
The world of DTV Action took a more substantial turn in the 21st century. Stars of the 90s such as Wesley Snipes and Steven Seagal headed to eastern Europe to make some scratch by starring in a string of ok to down right crap movies, Snipes fared a hell of a lot better that old slow hand who to this day is still churning out crap fest after crap fest action movies on a budget of about £15. Snipes obviously has made a decent comeback since his IRS troubles, however, we got two film makers in the 00s who's directorial output kind of put DTV back on the map by putting effort in. Issac Florentine, who made his bones on episodes of Power Rangers and some lesser known DTV flicks in the latter half of the 90s, made sequel to Walter Hill's prison boxing drama, Undisputed with the obviously titled Undisputed 2 which cast Michael Jai White as the Ving Rhames character who finds himself in a Russian prison and in the cross hairs of champion prison fighter Yuri Boyka. Boyka would become a sort of pop cultural icon in the world of DTV, appearing in two more sequels and bringing more attention to british martial artist Scott Adkins. Adkins would go on to form a brilliant working relationship with stunt co-ordinator and independent director Jesse V. Johnson. Adkins and Johnson would go on to give us great movies like Savage Dog, The Debt Collector and its sequel, Accident Man, Triple Threat and his modern action masterpiece and critically acclaimed British gangster/action movie Avengement. Adkins would work with Florentine again in Ninja, its acclaimed follow-up Ninja: Shadow Of A Tear and Close Range. Adkins' skill as a martial artist has lead him to more studio roles in bigger budget movies, appearing in Doctor Strange, American Assassin, Expendables 2, Day Shift and the upcoming John Wick Chapter 4 but I think everyone who watches Adkins' movies will tell you that Universal Soldier: Day Of Reckoning, directed by John Hyams, son of Hollywood action director and cinematographer Peter Hyams, is his best work. He's still made a fair amount of trash but the good definitely out-do the bad.
Action cinema has taken a horrendous turn for major studios in the last few years with all the money going to comic book adaptations and cinematic universes with only the Mission:Impossible series and the Fast & Furious series being the non comic book adaptions still making money. Sure there's a few select sleeper hits now and then, John Wick not withstanding, like Nobody or Bullet Train but again, Bullet Train, while being a lot of great fun, is incredibly artificial. Almost nothing feels real but then you look back at a film like 1995's The Hunted starring Christopher Lambert and that films insane samurai sword fight on a bullet train, it makes you think what happened to stunt teams and production design, everything is done on a green screen these days. DTV action, fortunately seems to be the long standing hold-out in an age of men with capes and half assed, rushed Star Wars sequels.
I love low budget action and you should too. Don't watch for the plots or the acting, watch the insane stunt work and action. Play a drinking game every time Gary Daniels breaks a pane of glass. Embrace the cheese and love the explosions.
But what is the definition of DTV "Direct To Video"? Wikipedia defines it as "the release of a film, Television series, Short or special to the public immediately on Home video formats than the initial theatrical release or television premiere" or according to Macmillandictionary.com as "not good enough to be shown in cinemas but sold as a video or DVD". I think its a mixture of both really. A lot of DTV movies are filmed specifically for the home video market where as some films may test badly and might forgo a theatrical release in favour of a home release premiere. I recall Paul W.S Anderson's 1998 sci-fi action film Soldier, starring Kurt Russell, at one time being the most expensive straight to DVD movie, I know the film didn't receive a theatrical release somewhere, I can't remember if it was the UK or U.S.A. Another example of this could be Seth Rogan's The Interview, which released to DVD under much different circumstances. Sometimes studios will test a movie in front of an audience and if the audience doesn't like the film, why would they spend millions of dollars on promoting a film that could very likely lose them a lot of money. I would like to see Warner Bros and DC release the completed Batwoman movie in this capacity, I mean, it might very well be an irredeemable pile of trash but at least allow people to make their own minds up.
We also have to look at streaming services. Netflix and Disney have all released "original" movies to their own platforms. These films eclipse the budgets of the 90s and 00's DTV action films by a considerable amount. Are we supposed to look at these as direct to video-like films or not. A film like Netflix's Extraction, one of the best straight up action films of recent memory, cost $65million to nake, The Russo brother's post Avengers Endgame title, The Grey Man cost a reported $200mil, Michael Bay's 6 Underground cost $150mil, David Ayer's Bright cost between $90 - $110mil to produce and Red Notice also cost $200mil. Are these movies classed as direct to video? or are they produced to such a high budget to save on the cost of promotion. What sets Red Notice apart from say, Jean Claude Van Damme's 1996 adventure film The Quest, both are globe trotting action adventure movies that follow a group of thieves? one was made for an astronomical amount of money and The Order was made for $35million. Now I know its unfair to compare a film made in 1996 to a film made in 2021 but where in did that $200mil go in Red Notice? Red Notice is also a pretty bad film btw. I personally don't see any difference between the lower budget PM Entertainment movies and the newer mega budget Netflix original movies. Neither are shown on cinema screens and if I'm being brutally honest, with the exception of maybe 6 Underground and Extraction, the action sequences and stunts in those earlier 90s movies are far better executed and staged. Sure the acting is below par for a majority of the films but are these newer films any different? Gal Gadot can't act for shit, Dwayne Johnson does the exact same performance in every single fucking movie he's in from Jumanji, Rampage, Skyscraper and Red Notice, even in the fast and furious movies and Hobbs & Shaw, the dude just plays the same character. At least when you look back at his earlier work like Walking Tall or The Rundown, there's at least a bit more character and more of a performance in them, these days he just phones it in, and personally, I can't dig an actor who phones it it. I love Ryan Reynolds but since Deadpool, he appear to play Wade in every film, or if you'd like to be more specific, he plays Van Wilder in every film. What happened to the Reynolds of Smokin' Aces?
I just don't understand the stigma that DTV action gets when studios are literally doing the exact same thing with their movies.
But like I said previously, direct to video action can be a trash can of garbage and suck the gooses honker but, out of the thousands and thousands of mediocre movies, there are a lot of films that truly stand out and could beat the living bejesus out of any studio released action movie.
This was originally going to be a piece about recommending some good action movies you might have missed but ended up being a more in-depth look at the current state of the genre. There is a lot more I could go into like WWE's series of The Marine movies and 12 Rounds sequels or William Kaufman's realistic cop action with films like Sinners & Saints. I could have looked at the work of Sheldon Lettich or the work of newer directors such as Steven C. Miller or James Nunn, but that would need a full on deep dive into the world of DTV not just an overview of the "genre" it's self and don't get me started on Bruce Willis' output in the last 10 or so years. Now I'm not going to bash Willis for those movies considering what has come out about his health struggles which makes his poor choices valid but even oustide of those absolute trashola crapfests, he still had the audacity to make A Good Day To Die Hard.
So there we are, its long and its probably a bit rambly and it's taken me two days to write but I hope this inspires you to seek out some of the bastard stepchildren of the action genre.
Cheers
Pete
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