film review: Crank: High Voltage (2009)
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After watching Crank the other week, I was really looking forward to Crank: High Voltage. Crank was one of the maddest films I’d ever seen… it wasn’t THE maddest film; I’d have to review the IMDb list to be sure but The Spirit, which I saw earlier this year, is definitely a contender; but it was pretty mad nonethless…
The review for Crank was pretty short so I’m gonna keep this one short too. Again, it’s not really worth worrying about spoilers when it comes to Crank films, so I’ll tell you a little about it. If you recall, that mad day he had did not end well for our friend Chev Chelios. Luckily for us, he got better and now, a few months later, he’s well up for sorting out the problems that have befallen him. There’s no point in saying much more about the plot except that it is reasonably well thought out, as was the plot of the first film, but it’s completely irrelevant. Basically someone has stolen Chev’s heart and replaced it with a battery powered one. So obviously Chev’s pissed about that and is on the rampage trying to get it back.
I would say that you should watch Crank before watching Crank: High Voltage. Most of the characters from Crank make a reappearance and there are a few flashbacks so it might be a bit confusing if you haven’t seen it. That said, maybe you’d just appreciate it on a different level if you haven’t. I don’t know. I’m in two minds about it actually, because I didn’t like Crank: High Voltage as much as Crank and I don’t know if that’s because I already knew pretty much what it was about.
Crank was so crazy and so different, Crank: High Voltage is crazy and different too but in the same way. They do ramp it up a bit, a lot actually, and I did appreciate that and I did really enjoy it, but at the end of the day it’s the same thing. Also I think keeping the characters didn’t really help it. They did bring in a couple of new ones but they seemed to try to mix all the old ones in as well. There were just too many in end. I think they could’ve taken out some of the scenes with the old ones and developed a couple of the new ones a bit more and it would have been better off for it. Could have made it a bit more interesting. In fact I do think they wasted Bai Ling a bit, her character could definitely have perked things up.
That said, it was still a great film and if you loved Crank you should definitely go see. If you hated Crank then there’s absolutely no point in watching this one. In fact why are you even reading this review? This is not the film for you!
I’m gonna give this an 8. Maybe I’m just being a bit moan-y because it really was great fun but I thought Crank was near perfect for the kind of film it was and I was hoping that the follow up would be too.
8/10
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