Deadly Prey - 1988 - USA - Action/Exploitation
In Vietnam he was the best...I'm going to start this review of by simply stating that Deadly Prey is fucking fantastic. Its been a long time since I've stumbled upon a gem as shiny as this one.
Deadly Prey starts off with a credit sequence in which every big ass gun known to man gets loaded with clips and ammo in close up shots between names of cast and crew. From there a group of rowdy mercenaries chase a man through the woods accompanied with some awful generic 80's music. It soon becomes apparent that this poor fellow being chased is a laughably horrific actor...along with every other actor in the film. All the acting pretty much stinks, but it all adds to the charm of this flick.
The plot closely resembles that of John Woo's Hard Target. People are randomly abducted from the street and used as bait for mercenary training, set loose and hunted down. But they picked up the wrong guy this time. They picked up Vietnam war hero Micheal Danton, a 'roid ragin, mullet sportin' badass, and the hunters soon begin to become the prey!
Our hero Micheal Danton was fully clothed when he was abducted from his suburban neighborhood, but for some reason appears at the mercenary camp with nothing but a pair of cutoff jean short-shorts. He is set loose into the woods and the body count quickly starts racking up.
Danton ruthlessly begins picking off baddies at a break-neak pace. Stabbing, shooting, blasting, choking, mangling and punching his way through hoards of mercenaries. The action is surprisingly satisfying and looks pretty convincing for the most part considering the very low production value. There isn't much blood shed, however there's some great impalement scenes and most of the kills are rather brutal, and to top it off Danton occasionally mutters an angry "Fuck you" before he offs someone. It's exactly as cool as it sounds. This extremely fast pace keeps up throughout the entire film, and is complimented with some hilariously bad dialogue and one liners, like "Now you're gonna die, tough boy!" I found myself laughing out loud several times.
As the film nears its end Micheal Danton gets further hellbent for revenge, becoming an even nastier badass. He even kills a guy by hacking off his arm with a machete, beating him to death with his own severed arm, and scalping him! Fucking wonderful.
I was extremely happy with this film and wouldn't hesitate for a second to recommend it to someone. It may be a blatant Rambo rip-off, and it may be so cheesy that some folks wouldn't be able to sit through it, but I absolutely loved it. Deadly Prey is certainly what I would consider a "Gem".
You can get the DVD from Amazon, however there's no "official" DVD releases, and the ones sold are all DVD-R's however they have all the cover artwork and disc artwork as well. - Deadly Prey DVD
If you don't want to spend money on a bootleg you can find the entire film on Youtube - Here's a link
Plot - 4/10
Acting - 2/10
Action - 10/10
Blood n' Guts - 4/10
Cheese - 9/10
OVERALL - 9/10
Opening sequence
Danton interrogates a bad guy at knife point.
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