Sommerleigh Pollonais – Senior Writer
Poachers suck ass and I hope they all die horrible deaths. That said, it’s all supply and demand right? So the a—holes who want something to mount on their walls or keep thinking ivory is gonna give them bigger boners or whatever, are just as bad and I hope they get super herpes and die.
Now that I have that out of the way, let’s talk about ROGUE. Megan Fox (Transformers) stars as a mercenary who leads a team of highly trained soldiers into Africa to rescue hostages. When things go FUBAR (that’s military speak for really really bad) they get stranded and have to make their way out of the country, while going up against poachers and a very pissed off lion.
Let’s talk firstly about the endangered elephant in the room. Megan Fox gets a bad rep in my humble opinion. She’s no Meryl Streep (who the hell is) but she’s nowhere near as bad as people say she is. Here’s some homework for you. Go rewatch Transformers 1 and 2 and try focusing on Megan as an actress and not just a piece of eye candy (because Mr. Bay only knows one way to shoot beautiful women in his movies) and you’ll see she has a much better story arc than Shia does. And she doesn’t spend two films running around screaming and acting like an obnoxious man child.
I do think she needs to make better choices in choosing roles that don’t just focus on her hotness, but that also give her a chance to actually, you know, act. She was good in Jennifer’s Body, funny in Friends with Kids and This is 40 and even though she doesn’t have that much screen time, I liked her in Above the Shadows as well.
Which brings us to Rogue. For what this movie is, I think she handles herself well and unlike her role as April in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, you can tell she’s actually invested in what she’s doing. Good on her. Now let’s be real here. This is NOT the kind of movie you watch expecting Oscar worthy performances, but there are strong performances here nonetheless, especially when the topics of human trafficking and poaching come up. That stuff is not treated like an entertaining side note and I appreciated that.
I enjoyed the fun twist on the whole mercenaries-in-the-jungle motif (No.1 being Predator of course). The cast, which includes Philip Winchester (British action series Strike Back/Law and Order: SVU) handle their roles well. The movie also had some funny moments that made the group feel like old friends, something you don’t always see when there are a bunch of disposable types in the mix. I actually felt sorry for the ones who had enough screen time, to get to know them.
The CGI lions are, well they look terrible. I’ve seen video games with more believable looking animals. It’s an action movie on a budget and it shows, but you can tell the movie’s creator is aware of the limitations and they try not to show them too often. There’s also a couple of kills that look pretty decent (the one through the lens of a night vision goggles was a smart and cool choice).
Rogue is definitely one of the better “action movies of the week” flicks I’ve seen. It’s no The Ghost and The Darkness and it does look like something you might come across on the SyFy channel, but I was never bored by it. And when it comes to small budget, straight to video/streaming movies, that’s sometimes all you can ask for.
Also…WTF is with that guy’s head??!! Sorry, had to bring it up. It’s the FIRST thing you see people!
Rating: 5.5 out of 10
For more of my take on Rogue you can check out my video review here. For my review of assassin flick Ava you can click here. And to follow Redmangoreviews on Facebook click here.
Sommerleigh of the House Pollonais. First of Her Name. Sushi Lover, Queen of Horror Movies, Comic Books and Binge Watching Netflix. Mother of two beautiful black cats named Vader and Kylo. I think eating Popcorn at the movies should be mandatory, PS4 makes the best games ever and I’ll be talking about movies until the zombie apocalypse comes.
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