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91It may very well be the best action movie of the year.
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91Hyams delivers a remarkably satisfying action-thriller hybrid that constantly pushes ahead. It's one of the best action movies of the year simply because it keeps hitting the right beats.
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75An intensity of purpose and a patient, suspenseful directing style make the B-movie Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning superior to most of the big-budget action films I've seen lately.
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Dec 3, 201270Hyams's film, which may at first seem like a glorified VOD entry in a forgotten franchise starring has-been action stars, is an admirably tense sci-fi/horror adventure that somehow turns its considerable limitations into virtues.
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Nov 27, 201270Against the prevailing cheerlessness, these intensively choreographed fights, many shot in audacious, roving single takes, are like glimpses into a dream world.
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Nov 27, 201270Playing like a mash-up between "Enter the Void" and "The Raid," Day of Reckoning is an uncommonly assured slice of bargain bin cinema, as arresting to watch as it is impossible to comprehend.
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70There's something perversely fascinating about helmer John Hyams' freewheeling yet deliberately paced mashup of noirish mystery, splatter-movie intensity, first-person-shooter vidgame and "Apocalypse Now"-style surrealism.
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Nov 29, 201260The movie creates something of the sensation of huffing industrial solvents - in a good way! - a waking-sleep zombification that can't exactly be described as pleasurable but definitely has an odd, distinct power.
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Nov 29, 201260This bloody wallow in sweat, guns and fisticuffs - for those who swing that way - delivers.
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60Say what you will about the confused narrative, blatant borrowings and wildly over-the-top gory violence of Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning -- at least you can see what the hell is going on.
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60It's almost worth wading through the wearisome setup to get to the fun stuff. But there is a reason fast-forward buttons were invented.
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58Consider this a public service announcement: Folks who have a problem with onscreen flesh-hacking - or the fact that franchise stars Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren aren't in the movie all that much - should stay home.
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Nov 28, 201250As with all the films in the Universal Soldier series, this is mostly a catalog of increasingly brutal fights, which are the main attraction in and of themselves.
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Nov 20, 201250Like a stiff Schwarzeneggerian conqueror making good on an "I'll be back," John Hyams returns to one-up the franchise again.
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Sep 26, 201245In the least, and most significantly, Day of Reckoning should propel British martial artist/stunt veteran Adkins out of the niche genre world - action cinema's Adkins diet?
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40It's up to you to decide if his oddly artsy vision, which pulls in first-person perspectives, surreal memories and highbrow cinematic references, suggests interesting ambition or misplaced pretension.
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25The latest undead-soldier story carries on the franchise tradition of graphic violence and bad acting.
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20The fight sequences are briskly choreographed at least, gruesome though they are -- and, to be honest, that goes a long way in a film such as this. In fact they may be the only reason to see it, other than the chance to see Van Damme in full Col. Kurtz mode, all face-painted and droopy-eyed and bat-poop crazy.