Matt Kracht I've seen some truly awful action movies in the past few months. The good news is that this is better than Amsterdam Heavy. The bad news is that it's not much better. The plot is serviceable, though not really what I would call "good". It's got lots of extraneous, unnecessary details in it, like dead brothers, dead mothers, bad childhoods, abusive fathers, etc. It's just one big heap of melodramatic back story for every character. Now, while I'm grateful for the effort, I have to wonder why they thought all that was necessary. The directing was manic and overly stylized, with constant use of slow motion and close-ups of violence. The soundtrack was absolutely horrible, consisting of what sounds like the most derivative and bland music imaginable. On the positive side, there were some attractive people in the movie, and sometimes they managed to act passably well. The fight choreography was generally pretty good, but the fight scenes were filmed rather poorly. If you like exploitative, MMA-style violence, you may enjoy this movie. Traditional martial arts fans may find the nihilistic, fetishistic violence to be distasteful and a bit too white trash.If you're desperate for Michael Bay-inspired MMA fights, then I suppose this might be the movie for you.

charlytully While the similar MMA-themed flick DAMAGE throws everything but the kitchen sink into its plot--including organ transplant shortages, canine abuse, naked woman suicide attempts, gambling debts, a mysterious holy roller Bible verse spouter, implausible coincidences, fight cages plunging through floors, shipping containers-top battles against fearsome "truckers" (Jimmy Hoffa still would be enjoying retirement if Teamsters fought like this in real life), and about 12 guys who appear beaten to death or into comas--BEATDOWN is down-to-earth plausible when compared to DAMAGE. While it shares many of the off-putting MMA conventions in depicting bare-knuckle violence (where do these guys get their indestructible hands from?), BEATDOWN has a linear plot that you can follow without needing to throw your remote at the TV in disgust. In other words, BEATDOWN can be seen as the RAGING BULL to DAMAGE's over-the-top ROCKY 5. While BEATDOWN's training sequence montage looks like Peewee Herman trying to do homage to Sylvester Stallone beating on raw meat in the walk-in freezer (where were the health inspectors?), the handlers of all the opponents Brandon (Rudy Youngblood) vanquishes humanely throw in their towels at the first opportunity, and most of the fights are finished in 20 seconds or less. I can say from personal experience that this in closer to how the fight game works in real life (which is why it's so important to throw the first punch!).

Kelchubordnor Before I start my review, please don't watch this if you have epilepsy or any reaction at all to flashing lights. I have very bad eyesight and believe me this movie hurts to watch. Simply put the details are guy is a fighter has to pay off brothers mob debt and fights underground to do it, throw in a beautiful actress and some very decent mma guys including Michael Bisping who is one of the best. That is the story in a nutshell and yes it has been done before a few times. What ruins the whole thing is the atrocious editing. there is so much camera movement, flashing in and out and I could go on but this movie literally made my eyes ache. And I don't just mean the fight scenes which have been obliterated by the atrocious editing. The camera seems to be constantly fighting with the camera man and the director and the editor and nobody wins. This movie would have worked if the camera had stayed focused and just stayed still. I wont get technical about the quality of mma etc as it is too hard to see anything with this movie. I love my action flicks and to be honest I think mortal kombat had better editing than this . Such a shame. I bought this DVD because I saw Michael Bisping on the cover. Wish I hadn't.

tommy-geerts You have some nice fighters , you have a OK story.. and what did the directory do ? Ruining the movie with so many unnecessary "effects" from 30 different camera angels in the space of 5 minutes and filling the screen with ongoing blurs, zoom ins/outs and the famous shaky effect that would make anybody with a slight case of Epilepsy seizure up after only watching 10 minutes of it. So final review.. The movie contains a story ,has some fights in it but isn't great. If you want a action movie to fill bored Sunday night with absolutely nothing on TV then you could watch it but be sure to find out if you have epilepsy first.