SummaryOn and beneath the meanest streets of Glasgow, fiery gangster Bart (Hoskins) is merciless with debtors, would-be rivals, and anyone else to whom he even takes a passing dislike. How does Bart maintain his chokehold? Through his unwitting enforcer Danny (Li), who he has "raised" since boyhood. (Rogue Pictures)
SummaryOn and beneath the meanest streets of Glasgow, fiery gangster Bart (Hoskins) is merciless with debtors, would-be rivals, and anyone else to whom he even takes a passing dislike. How does Bart maintain his chokehold? Through his unwitting enforcer Danny (Li), who he has "raised" since boyhood. (Rogue Pictures)
A preposterous mix of sentiment and brutality that casts martial-arts star Jet Li as a music-loving killing machine, turns out to be his most entertaining movie in quite some time.
Freeman and Hoskins lend the film a level of artistry it doesn't really deserve. Unleashed has a vivid concept, but savagery and sentimentality make strange costars.
Bringing together a full on fight fest coreographed by Yuen woo ping and a heartfelt story of love and loss, this is truly marked as one of the high lights of jet li's career. At nearly ten years old, it still feels fresh and dynamic, evoking feelings of the old guy richie-esque style of cinemagrophy. The gritty realistic style of fighting combined with the warmth of innocence of welcoming family life, this truly is a movie that exceeds it's own frames and boundaries and manages to stake out a path of it's own. A definitive must watch.
Unleashed (a.k.a. Danny The Dog) is a gangster-fairytale-martial arts-drama about a man who not only was never given the chance to grow up, but was raised as a dog. I've seen hundreds of martial arts action films and I have no problem saying that Unleashed is easily one of the best English language martial arts action films of all-time! Not only was the action on point but the acting was actually good. Morgan Freeman does a decent enough job (not his best work) but Bob Hoskins blew me away as the wicked uncle! The biggest surprise though was the dramatic chops of Jet Li! He displays a childlike innocence in this role that makes you actually care what happens to him so you end up truly feeling for his character. He gives a stellar emotional and physical performance as an actor, everything from his posture to his emotionally expressive, soulful eyes. He takes you on a journey from animalistic pit-bull-like ferocity to docile puppy-like innocence, curiosity, and vulnerability. You experience moments of humor, drama, & edge of your seat-brutal action sequences! I know some people were put off by the quieter sections of the film when the studio marketed it as some sort of non-stop action flick, but the truth is this movie has heart... Which I find refreshing for this type of film. Simply put, Unleashed was off-the-chain! P.S. Just a WARNING: I own the dvd and when you first put it in it gives you a choice between the Unrated & Extended versions of the film... DO NOT WATCH the extended version for the first viewing! The extended sections ruin the fight scenes with poor video and audio quality, I don't even think they added sound effects.
Attention : production Besson Ãtonnante! Et pour cause, Danny the Dog n'est pas un film entièrement tournà vers l'action. En effet, le long-mÃtrage se veut touchant et naïf question sentiment. Et quand on voit le personnage que je joue Jet Li (un orphelin transformà en chien d'attaque pour les comptes d'un mafieux), on se prette au jeu. On va même jusqu'à dire qu'il y a quelque chose dans ce Danny the Dog, qui provoque un certain intÃrêt. Mais bon, production Besson oblige, il y a donc des sÃquences d'action façon jeu vidÃo, des invraisemblances scÃnaristiques et un casting inÃgal. NÃanmoins, cela reste l'un des "Besson" les plus abordables (Louis Leterrier a quelque chose à montrer!).
Hands-down the best action scenes in any Jet Li movie ever. Hands-down the goofiest and least believable plot ever (and yes I'm counting Kiss of the Dragon and Once Upon a Time in China and America... they come in 2nd and 3rd :P). The result is quaint and reasonably watchable action-trash.
Production Company
Rogue Pictures,
EuropaCorp,
Danny the Dog Prods Ltd.,
TF1 Films Production,
Qian Yian International,
Current Entertainment,
Canal+,
Clubdeal