The 2012 Best In Badass

Happy New Year everyone! Yes, it's time for the obligatory "Best of 2012 Top Ten List". So in no particular order:

The 2012 Best In Badass


1) Haywire - MMA star Gina Carano makes her film debut kicking all sorts of ass in this much maligned spy flick.



2)  The Raid: Redemption / Dredd 3D - These two films are ranked together because they are so similar. The difference is that the violence in The Raid is brutal, quick, and dirty. In Dredd 3D, it is almost beautiful and operatic in order to take advantage of the 3D bullet time effects.




3) The Cabin In The Woods - This is the horror movie that every fan of horror movies wishes they could make.



4) Safe - Jason Statham once again proves that he is the most reliable action star working today.



5) The Avengers - Two words: Hulk... smash.



6) Piranha 3DD - A little bit funny, a little bit stupid, and a whole lot of killer fish eating people.



7) The Dark Knight Rises - Batman is always Badass. Always.



8) The Expendables 2 - Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Chuck Norris... what more needs to be said?



9) Skyfall - Much like Batman, James Bond is always Badass.



10) Django Unchained - Cool, violent, smart, mature... Django just might be Quentin Tarantino's masterpiece.

Is Haywire Badass?

I have a confession: I have been waiting to see Haywire since it was first announced. When the trailer was released, I thought it looked amazing in a modern day, 80s action film kind of way. Last week, several of my friends saw it and almost all of them hated it, saying it was boring and pointless. Tonight, I went to see it and it was everything I wanted it to be.

MMA star Gina Carano plays Mallory Kane, a security contractor who is betrayed, framed, and has to fight to clear her name. That's it. That's the whole movie in a nutshell. If you go into Haywire looking for anything more, you're in the wrong movie. The dialogue is direct and to the point with volumes conveyed in few words, with the acting just as sparse. Those who complain about the acting or lack of dialogue on display here need to go back and watch such genre classics as Commando, Bloodsport, Enter The Dragon, or Predator. Nobody watches those films for soliloquies or nuanced portrayals... they get watched for the action. And that's the reason to watch Haywire: the action.



Carano is virtually untouchable right now as a Hollywood action star since Haywire features some of the best fight scenes ever put on film. Director Steven Soderbergh chose to film the action so you can see every single punch, kick, choke, and throw in all their elegant brutality. Simply, it's The Bourne Identity without the shaky cam. And that is very, very Badass.

Trailer Alert: Haywire

Directed by Steven Soderbergh, and starring Gina Carano, Channing Tatum, Ewan McGregor, Michael Fassbender, Antonio Banderas, Bill Paxton, and Michael Douglas.