Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

It is because of movies like this one, ‘Blood and Bone’ that this website was conceptualized and it is because of movies like this that the television show offshoot of this website, ‘Totally Twisted Flix’ was born. Probably eighty percent of the movies on this site and 100% of the movies on Totally Twisted Flix are of the Direct to DVD variety and as such we are privy to a lot of really, really bad movies. So while I will never tell you what you should or should not watch, every once in a while a movie comes along that I believe you might want to check out. Particularly if you’re a cat who’s fond of things like football, Bruce Lee, Sergio Leone movies and 80’s action flicks. If those are the kinds of things that float your boat the ‘Blood and Bone’ is a movie that you might want to rush to the top of your list. For real.

First of all this flick has like the best opening scene ever. James Bond be damned. The man’s name is Bone (Michael Jai White) and he’s in prison. Apparently his prison buddies don’t like his attitude, I mean he acts like he’s better than them or something. Worst still is that this crew of miscreants is led by no less a badass than Kimbo Slice. To be fair, Bone did ask these gentlemen, quite politely, to step off... but did they listen? Eighteen seconds later there is nothing left for these cats except chaos, carnage and pain.

Fast forward a bit and Bone is out of jail and is staying at a little halfway house for kids and old folks run by a sweet lady named Tamara (Nona Gaye… whom we love) and Tamara lets Bone know from the start that she won’t be tolerating any funny business in her place.

Right now we don’t know exactly what Bone is up to except that he hanging out at illegal street fights which is lorded over by the Top Dog of these streets, a bloodthirsty

criminal named James (Eamon Walker), and Bone for whatever reason wants in. He enlists the help of a street hustler named Pinball (Donnie Basco) to get him his fights with his ultimate goal being a big fight against James’ top fighter... The Hammerman (Bob Sapp).

It doesn’t take long for us to see that Bone is a master in the art of ass kicking as he makes quick brutal work out his opponents. Our hero’s angle is still a bit shady but we know that somehow it centers around James’ heroin addicted girlfriend Angela (Michelle Belegrin).

Eventually Bone’s plan becomes crystal clear but there is still the matter of a couple of big fights for our hero to deal with before he can achieve his ultimate goal. And after seeing what my man Bone can do, I’m really not liking his opponents chances to stop my man’s ultimate goal.

I mention Sergio Leone earlier because ‘Blood and Bone’ is very much a modern day Spaghetti Western set in an urban setting with hip-hop substituting for Morricone. Michael Jai White’s character of Bone is almost the epitome of the Man with No Name, coming from parts unknown, his origin being completely obscure and the source of his skills or his past will become no clearer after you’ve seen the movie than when you started watching the movie. As a bad guy, as you would expect from one of those old time westerns, Eamon Walker’s character of James is about as bad as bad gets possessing not one single redeemable quality. Nothing. The cinematography is gritty, the setting his harsh and the pace is fluid.

Then you have the fight scenes which were about as well choreographed as any fight scenes that I’ve recently seen, especially considering this a movie that I figure was shot on minimal budget. No wires, just a bunch of athletic dudes kicking much ass in a brutal way. I don’t know if Michael Jai White can REALLY beat up Kimbo, Bob Sapp and Tanoi Reed but I didn’t doubt for a moment that his character of Bone could kick that ass. It is Michael Jai Whites ability as an actor and as an athlete that drives this action flick, but no surprise there because a few years ago I crowned his movie ‘Undisputed 2’ the best Straight to DVD movie of 2006 and ‘Blood and Bone’, which I think is even better than that movie, just might be the best Straight to DVD movie of 2009. Why this cat isn’t a bigger star is beyond me.

A while back I saw a movie called ‘Love and a Bullet’ directed by the man who directed this movie, Ben Ramsey being the man's name, and while ‘Love and a Bullet’ was definitely flawed it was still oddly entertaining. Entertaining enough to think that this guy would’ve a directed another movie between the seven year span that separated these two movies. Nonetheless Mr. Ramsey did a fine job in crafting and pacing this film as it held my interest from start to finish. Unfortunately for Mr. Ramsey I also see that he is the credited screenwriter for ‘Dragonball: Evolution’ which has fans of the DBZ series cursing his eternal bloodline. I wouldn’t do that to my man, despite the fact that was a terrible movie, but in his defense I will say that once the pre-production decision was made to turn Goku into a spiky haired white dude, that movie was doomed.

Other than the fact that we wouldn’t have been mad at the filmmakers if they could’ve somehow convinced Nona Gaye to perform her role in her underwear, we couldn’t find anything wrong with this movie. So I need you people out there to do me a solid. I know a lot you cats steal movies, and I’m not here to give you a hard time about that, but go ahead and actually rent this one after you’ve finished watching it. Put it in your Netflix or your Blockbuster cue and than just stick back in the envelope and send it back. You see I really wouldn’t mind seeing a part two of this one and that’s only gonna happen if it makes a couple of bucks. So think about me. If everybody on the planet simply started out their day just thinking about how to make my life better, imagine how great my life would be.