Claysaba
Excellent, Without a doubt!!
CrawlerChunky
In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.
Chirphymium
It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional
Leofwine_draca
To be honest, the first ART OF WAR film was bad enough, and the sequel worse. This final, clunking addition to the series loses the star (Wesley Snipes) and replaces him with the weak 'Treach', a rapper-turned-actor with all the presence of a lounge singer.The narrative is set in Seoul, and sees our hero and his associates attempting to stop a gang of bombers from blowing up a peace summit at the U.N. What this means is that Treach and a couple of others hang out for a while in parks and hotel rooms and occasionally take part in some ill-devised action sequences which showcase both cast and crew at their absolute worst.The pitiful action in this movie has to be seen to be believed; choreography doesn't get much worse than here. Even the C-grade likes of Gary Daniels movies have better fights than this. Director Gerry Lively also made the execrable DUNGEONS & DRAGONS: WRATH OF THE DRAGON GOD so it's no surprise that this effort here is so terrible. Watch out for the red lights flickering at the end of the toy guns they use in the shoot-outs.Add in some clichéd supporting cast members, including the wannabe-funny British sidekick and the kind of Asian actors who've eked out a living playing racial stereotypes in Hollywood fare. Groan as Treach bashes some goons with some sub-par martial arts abilities and cry at the boring climax. Even B-movie fans will hate ART OF WAR II: RETRIBUTION. Even writing this brief review is spending too much time on it.
gridoon2018
For the third entry in the low-profile "Art Of War" series, rapper / actor Treach takes over the role of U.N. agent Shaw from Wesley Snipes (who was having problems with the law during that period). When he doesn't speak, Treach actually makes a sound action figure; it's his occasional "rap-style" talk ("Where is the nukes?") that sort of ruins the illusion. The plot is muddled, but the action is decent enough to keep this painless (short running time helps, as well). For girls-with-guns fans, the super-hot Sung Hi Lee strikes an iconic pose, holding two guns aiming at opposite directions, while wearing a sleeveless and fairly revealing dress. Apparently I wasn't the only one who liked that image; they even put it on most DVD covers, thereby spoiling the one major twist of the movie! ** out of 4.
catuus
The "Art of War" franchise has produced 2 good, fun films. Wesley Snipes has been largely responsible for how good they are, but there are also smart script-writers and effective directors involved.Somehow, the 3rd film has run badly off-track. Since Mr. Snipes isn't in it, my guess is he saw the script in advance (they'd have been fools not to ask him), and gave it a big, big pass. Judging from what we now see on the screen, he was wise to do so.The subject of the film is, generally, illegal arms trading. Namely, selling a nuke to North Korea. The primary focus is a UN-sponsored meeting on the issue in South Korea. The Secretary-General (a woman, which has not yet happened and may not since none of the Islamic nations, which have a vast, unreasoning fear of women, would vote for her) underplays a pivotal role here, and needed to have appeared a lot more.Unfortunately, the film treats this subject in a somewhat fuzzy manner that obfuscates the seriousness of the issue. We know that the tyrant of North Korea wants a nuke so badly he can taste it. But my guess is that having it would be a prestige item much more than a threat – the Nuclear Club is a very exclusive one. Using a nuke invites retaliation – and North Korea's infrastructure is so fragile that a single hit – certainly more than 2 – would leave the state unable to manage itself. It can barely manage now. (By contrast, even if Seoul is completely flattened, South Korea would still be viable.) We should mention that the major characters are: Neil Shaw (or Agent #1), played by Anthony Criss (billed as "Treach"); Jason (or Agent #2), played by Warren Derosa; Sung Hi Lee, played by Sung Yi; and the aforementioned Secretary-General, played by Janet Carroll. Criss, who is pushing 49 and doesn't really look it, has had a robust film/TV career and manages to play his role as if he half-way believes it. The dynamic between Criss and Derosa is exactly the same as that between Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith in "Men in Black" – who gets to drive, who gets the big gun, and so on. It would have helped to play this bit for comic relief, but you're not working with first-rate movie-makers here. Sung Hi Lee is an anomalous character who's found with the bad guys early in the film, but then plunges in to cooperate whole-heartedly to help the good guys.The story is developed through a lot of shooting and fisticuffs and implausible misses by the bad guys, who can't seem to hit the good guys with a hail of bullets. The fights are too obviously staged. The ultimate mystery here is the identity is the main bad guy. Some red herrings are dangled, but on the precedent of previous films it has to be somebody under our noses. Main candidates: Derosa's and Lee's characters. He is always seem to be a squeaky wheel and she, the sweet innocent, turns out to know her way pretty well about kung fu. Of course, since they're so obvious, the bad guy may be someone else entirely. The Secretary General? Kim Jong-il? Wesley Snipes? I'd tell you, in order to spare you having to go through this thing in order to find out, but there would be the usual bad-movie-masochists who will complain I committed the "spoiler" heresy. Hell, this film was spoiled the moment it went onto celluloid.Some of y'all will just love the senseless violence. For the rest, avoid this turkey. Sayonara, "Art of War" franchise.
virtualresidence
Awful is the not the only word that comes to my mind after I watched The Art of War 3. Others like: sucks, terrible, shame, waste would be inspired by The Art Of War 3. The very last minute almost made me it was actually a parody, but it wasn't. Terrible lines including some overused ones such as the main character's reply: "it's not a matter of luck..." I have been in love with Sung Hi Lee for many years and followed her career as a model, she's simply stunning. In this movie she appears as an unpretty and poorly skilled actress. Not to mention the 2 male main characters. It is, again and too often, sad to see how money can be used in such a bad way and I still can't understand how the cinema industries works so this kind of project can actually benefits to someone. Gery Lively, Joe Halpin, go hide yourself!
