Substitute 2: School's Out
|
List Price: Our Price: $1.40 You Save: $8.58 (86%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Canada
Movie Reviews of Substitute 2: School's Out
Movie Review: A hot mess, but it has its moments
Summary: 3 Stars
This is one of those movies that was supposed to be in the style of Dangerous Minds. The script is not the best, but Treat Williams and B.D. Wong do a good job with what they have to work with. If you like violent, campy films this might be your thing. Lionsgate Films has the entire movie posted on their channel at YouTube if you want to check it out before buying this DVD.Movie Review: problem with the movie
Summary: 3 Stars
Have the whole series and the substitute #2 is good. But , my copy the dialogue does not match up with the talking.Movie Review: A pointless sequel
Summary: 2 Stars
The original "Substitute" starring Tom Berenger and Ernie Hudson was an over-the-top but admittedly clever take on the "tough teacher/tough class" sub-genre started by "Dangerous Minds". Unfortunately, such movies typically spawn mediocre sequels to capitalize on even moderate interest, which leaves us with "Substitute 2: School's Out", starring Treat Williams instead of Berenger.To say that this movie is unoriginal is an understatement. It more-or-less puts us into the exact same situation as the first film, only done worse than before. When his brother is murdered by a violent street gang called the Brotherhood in a carjacking, mercenary Karl Thomasson (Williams) decides to take on two roles. The first is to take care of his brother's daughter. The second is to become a subtitute teacher for his brother's Brooklyn high school class, which some of the Brotherhood thugs attend. He suspects that the school's auto shop teacher, Warren Drummond, is involved in a car-stripping operation with the Brotherhood and its violent leader, Lil' B. Naturally, it's up to Thomasson to teach the tough class while working to take down Lil' B and Drummond's operation with his mercenary pal Joey 6 and a janitor named Johnny Bartee.
The most dissapointing aspect of this movie is the acting. Before you say, "It's a B movie, so what do you expect?", consider the cast involved in this film. Treat Williams may be a direct-to-video actor for the most part, but considering his number of Emmy nominations and his achievements in "Everwood", you'd expect a little more from him. He simply comes off as too nice a guy to be a hardened merc. Longtime Broadway actor and recent "Law & Order: SVU" cast member B.D. Wong doesn't fare much better as Drummond; he's either over-the-top or very dull. Michael Michelle ("ER") as teacher and love interest Kara Lavelle and Angel David ("The Crow") as Joey 6 are both OK, but wasted for the most part. Daryl Edwards, who plays Johnny Bartee, ends up becoming very annoying in this film. And while rapper Guru (of Gang Starr fame) is one of the most gifted hip-hop lyricists around, he's no actor, and he really embarrasses himself as Lil' B in this movie.
Aside from the weak acting, the movie doesn't really do much with its characters or plot. The relationship between Thomasson and the gang-bangers in his class (one of the better points of the original film) never works at all, especially his attempt to connect to Mase (Eugene Byrd of "8 Mile" fame). At one point, Thomasson throws Mase's stereo out the window because he's playing rap music really loud in class. Mase gets angry and attacks him with a switchblade, but after Thomasson subdues him and leaves him in charge of the class for a moment, Mase later apologizes for what he did. In the space of one class, Mase changes from "I'm-a cut you up real good" to "yeah, I was wrong". Right.
There are other problems, too, including some ridiculously unrealistic action sequences. How does somebody manage to survive an attack by gang-bangers firing automatic weapons at them from BOTH SIDES of a narrow corridor? Beats me, but Thomasson, Joey 6, and Bartee do somehow. Equally bad is the scene where Drummond kills Lavelle by shooting her at point-blank range and then wipes her blood off his hands on a stuffed teddy bear AT THE SCENE OF THE CRIME. Oh, yeah, and I'm still very puzzled as to how they got that laser trick to work on the Brotherhood when laser sources are very easy to spot at any range. The hoods in Brooklyn may not be Ivy League material, but I really didn't think they all have the intelligence levels of rodents.
In the end, "Substitute 2" never works as well as its predecessor did, or as well as many such movies in general. The poor acting and weak plot make it hard to like. If you want to see a movie in this genre done right, see the first film or "187" with Samuel L. Jackson. You can definitely do better than this film.
Movie Review: Um.
Summary: 2 Stars
Well. What exactly do you say to this movie? Treat Williams is terrific, I must admit. There's the required reference to Tom Berringer's character in this one, just to have the tie-in. There's the family connection (this keeps up, I'm going to believe that every merc is related somehow to a high-school teacher). It's really a very sequel-sih sequel. Sort of a crayoly copy of the original. It's like, you know how you have those old music files called midis, where the notes to the song are on key but played in that awful synthysized tone? Well, that. The original Substitute was the song; this is the midi. I should have rented it, not bought it. I'm still glad I got to watch it, but unlike the original I'll probably never watch it again.
1 2