Ackshun

There's something I really like about straight-to-video action movies. There's a whole different thing going on there. There's a whole different roster of stars who loom large in that arena. The action is different, because they have to come up with things, I guess, that are impressive in some respect without being so expensive. Other people who are into tape collecting like I am are apt to go for scifi and horror movies, or maybe martial arts movies, but not straight action, I don't think.

I may or may not have mentioned "Ballistic", which is about my favorite. Marjean Holden is Detective Jesse Gavin, who is bearing the twin crosses of being a female cop and the daughter of a wrongfully imprisoned cop dad. They actually don't do the worst job of setting Holden up for some kind of success. Of course they exploit her sex appeal with a gratuitous shower and a subsequent sex scene with her boyfriend, but it's striking to me that she winds with him resting on top of her after it's over.

Holden plays a tough cop. She's worked her way up to an elite police unit, and she proceeds to beat ass and rock a sweat black leather jacket. She poses as a prostitute to make a drug bust, presides over the failure to protect a key witness, and winds up battling Braden, a guns AND drugs runner who spends most of his time either attending parties with the cream of society or watching men engage in no-rules fights for his own amusement. It's pretty amazing.

After that, I don't know that I have anything so good in my own collection. I'm dying to rectify that error, but I think it may be necessary to scout out some of the less prime spots for tapes again. At Amoeba, they have too many of the good scifi and horror stuff. At book stores and thrift shops, they often have more of the low rent action movies and thrillers that I'm fond of. Here's hoping that I can snap up some more, but not until I get that backlog under control.