Did you ever click on a movie only to be alarmed by its content closely. That’s precisely what one would think after watching Derek Ting’s Agent Recon. It’s the type of a school movie where everyone is just pretending to be something else during recess without the movie magic of blowing up things. What can one expect in a film where battle scenes are composed of poorly animated drumsticks, and the terrain is made up of poorly rendered forest clippings, only to be bemused by how a bad take looks like, thanks to the poor screenplay. It makes the original intent look like a parody version from Adult Swim where all Universal Soldier prototypes have been spat on. Don’t bother if you haven’t watched the previous installments in the franchise Agent Intelligence and Agent Revelation. This is actually a dumb movie that is intentionally made for someone who is very stupid in the first place, ‘Ting style”. It is difficult to decide whether watching this is fun or not because at such amateurish stuff one would be expecting it not to be boring.
Ting plays superagent Yung Jim, a covert warrior searching for a presumed alien threat. There are whispers of an ‘infection’ referred to as ‘ash’ and a commotion from a site in New Mexico burnings involving alien technology. Thanks to Jim’s superhuman abilities, he is one of the soldiers alongside Colonel Green (Marc Singer from Beastmaster) to invade an abandoned base where Captain Lila Rupert (Nikki Leigh) is imprisoned. With the assistance of an innovative A. I. from organic (Chuck Norris), Jim performs the mission which he claims is crucial in the field although this is what the film makes us believe in a viciously poor feature with a horrible script, it really doesn’t come through.
Everywhere you look in this film, you are faced with the flaws of the picture. The locations culturally look like forest paintball arenas constructed out of plywood which cinematographer Zach Trout misguidedly shoots from the interior leaving one with bad views of the ‘aesthetic detail’. Gun fire looking aspects are all CGI built where there are pixelated wounds, and muzzle flares that take you back to 90s video games. There’s slack and ad hoc, then there’s not able and not able. Ting’s third venture hardly stands at par with somebody of his experience, who only looks somewhat decent when he strikes someone in the face or when kicking someone in the stomach. Everything else is a lot worse than what high school students performed in theatres where kiddie brand tablet pcs and cheap sheets of plastic acted as sophisticated advanced technology.
The entire concept of “Agent Recon” can be summarized in the phrase: Judy is the Chuck Norris of it all. Norris clearly came on set for one day to essentially pull a trigger on a computerized minigun and that is why Ting chooses to just photograph Norris and paste him on the places he intended to be beforehand. If I hadn’t signed a non disclosure agreement, I would’ve complained about the film’s execution and slapped screenshots of every single ill advised decision that a director makes. Most of the actions of Norris appear as stock’s bad stage Such a professional was expected to shoot for barely a couple of minutes but then opted for a body double to save time. Norris is far from being defined as an actor, yet Danny Trejo manages to appear in a dozen films per year while humping even his cream colored boat. Even Trejo does it efficiently. Norris on the other hand seems like a completely half hearted effort on all fronts.
The disorientation of fast paced camerawork or mediocre stunts by second rate hired hands doesn’t do action scenes in Agent Recon anything good. Attempting to assault Jim conveys the impression of a bunch of “aliens” (as low budget extras wearing black masks) who are really bad antagonists and fail to integrate into a more productive perspective. I’ve seen better physicals from more believable sources on the indie wrestling scenes of Ukranian recreational halls and better theatric performances too. The lines are poorly crafted and red neck surplus warrior stereotypes utter them like Russian dolls made in America by failing actors impersonating boorish action movie icons. Dilettantes abound, hollering and shouting military jargons or their few moves that resembles kung fu performed by white belts.
What doesn’t disappoint in Agent Recon? Faced with the prospect of advanced technology and up to date graphics, the end products are more reminiscent of the graphical capabilities of Showdown: the Battle of the Future, Stylus vs Draztik than those of today. As if world building is such an unimportant detail: you are likely to reconsider the value of “ash” or “mana” explanations more than once or twice in the rest of the boring 80 or so minutes of the film. The film has bare geography transition montages that consist of still images that could be found somewhere on the internet or can be downloaded free of charge for use as television sets for Chromecast slides. Even the voices are unconvincing because there is no effort to inflect them, as if for the first time actors have seen the movie and are just sight reading. This list does not end there.
Detect sarcasm when its there: while in the middle of understanding this unbearable review and looking for further evidence as to why I, a and a pirate, should check out such a horrible looking movie, look no further than this. Watching it is an even worse idea. Agent Recon is beyond terrible. Yes, Mr. Ting was somehow able to convince investors to fund and distribute his 3 film escapades, but all it takes is common sense to see that it is just a glorified cosplay. Agent Recon starts with a terrible scene and gradually loses the plot until it ends. This visually awful film did not have to end well: there was never any glory, just a horrible ending. Bad movie is bad, ‘nuff said.
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