Review: After mob boss Bellavance discovers that $500,000 of his money is gone he hires 4 trained killers to hunt down the man who took the money from him. The men show up at the culprits house to get the money and send a message to them, but they are in for more than they would of ever expected. They have a young teen boy who is very mentally disturbed and born to kill to deal with. Who will survive in this savage game of cat and mouse?
Most of the time I personally would pass up this film because of it being one with a plot that I have seen over and over again. Now the thing that really makes this one I could not pass up is the cast. Yes I was lured in by the cast. Namely 3 out of 4 of the hit men. Lets see you have Derek Mears who was in the remake of Friday The 13th which I did not like but I still like the actor, Dana Ashbrook of Twin Peaks which was a pretty good show, and lastly Jacob Reynolds who played in the very bizarre but great film Gummo. Also I would have to say Ray Wise(Reaper) who plays Ballavance in this film. Now even though I was drawn in the by those specific cast members I will say that the rest of the cast was great each in their own right. Esecially the young kid Ryan Hartwig who played as Owen. Owen is basically a very fucked and disturbed version of Kevin McCallister from Home Alone (1990).
Getting back to the plot I did find alot of it to be stuff I have seen before, but there is enough twists and turns to keep the film fresh and entertaining. One of the best things is that when you reach the point of the 4 hit men showing up to the house the action and story really starts to get moving and doesn't slow down much at all. Even in the parts where they are trying to hunt down the 2 kids still stay tense and kept me on the edge of my seat. Now as much as I liked this film I could see alot of people not liking it so much for a variety of reasons. Namely that there is no A-List cast member or really any action stars in this film. To me that's a plus because it gets old seeing the same actors doing the same stuff over and over most the time.
The only thing I can think of that was kinda weird in ways is that they used Jacob Reynolds as one of the killers. The reason why I say this is because he just doesn't seem intimidating at all and I guess I keep seeing him as the odd little boy from Gummo. Nonetheless I was just glad to see him in this film. Really there is nothing really that I would change about The Aggression Scale, it has great pacing and a really cool cast. Basically if you want to watch a good thriller give this one at least a shot because I think you may actually like it. Bottomline is that it is not a bad low budget action/thriller flick, so grab some popcorn and enjoy!
-Daniel "Damnation" Lee
Director: Steven C. Miller
Genre: Action/Thriller
Blu-ray/DVD Release Year: 2012
Theatrical Release Year: 2012
Time Length: 85 mins.
Company: Anchor Bay/Starz Films
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