Diablo

Meedily meedily meeeeeeeeee. Classic, solid action flick. Lots of shooting and fighting. The story develops. The characters become more fleshed out. Interesting locations.

I'm not sure why they can't consistently give poor Scott Adkins, a well rounded action flick worthy of his martial arts talents? There have been a few of his action films that were well done but "Diablo" isn't one of them. A pervading sense of "B grade" rears its head.From the hammy daughter lost daddy back story, the cheesy captain Hook style villain, to the badly choreographed fight scenes, there's little to like here. I managed about half of this before throwing my hands up in despair and walking away. In summary, I wish I could say nice things because I like Scott Adkins but well, it is what it is, which is pretty bad, in most respects.

When it comes to these Adkins DTV actioners, i already know what to expect. Usually i'll get some good and sometimes great action sequences, alongside a fairly average/cliched storyline. But from time to time, these DTV actioners can sometimes whip out some hidden gems, and DIABLO is now its newest addition. Scott is his usual acting self. He isnt awful, but not really that great either. BUT as proven before, when Adkins is paired with great material (JW4, Avengement) he does become serviceable. But the same could not be said for Marko fucking Zaror, who is the absolute highlight of this film. As he gives us an absolutely scary and menacing slasher villain performance alongside few but great comedy chops as well. The fights here are also some of the best from both Zaror and Adkins not only in the martial arts choreo but also in it's bigger setpieces and shootouts. The main highlight of which is Zaror's amazing slasher villain mode robocop-esque shootout. However, there is a noticeable tone shift when going from non-action to action. While admittedly, this becomes less of a problem by the 2nd half. The more quiet tone from the non-action stuff in the first half just made the film feel kinda slow and disjointed. Thankfully as aforementioned, once the action picks up and Zaror and Adkins' characters finally meet, the film just fires a shotgun of entertainment to your face, making up for a lot of the film's faults.