dworldeater A Man Apart is a more gritty, more realistic type of film than leading man Vin Diesel usually participates in. Vin Diesel is a former LA gangbanger that is a top undercover DEA agent. When a big bust headed by Diesel is successful in bringing down a Cartel drug lord, it is not without repercussions. In retaliation, The Cartel sends shooters to Vin Diesel's crib. Of course they all end up in body bags, but not without murdering his wife. This has Vin Diesel on a all out roid rage until the film's conclusion. He enlists the help of his partner and a homie from the hood, Big Sexy to avenge his wife's death. Vin Diesel now operates on both sides of the law to achieve his means of street justice and vengeance. It seems that this film was meant to be more of dramatic piece than one as action driven as this is. Vin Diesel is cool, but he lacks range as an actor. However, he is real good at kicking ass and acting hard at all times. His support cast is pretty strong though and the film itself is pretty quick paced, action packed and is pretty entertaining. A Man Apart may have some flaws and Vin did not possess the acting chops to play a character that is not a superhero, but otherwise the film is fairly cohesive and well done.

SnoopyStyle Sean Vetter (Vin Diesel) and Demetrius Hicks (Larenz Tate) are part of a DEA team sent to join Mexican police to take down drug lord Memo Lucero. Memo is captured and brought back to the US. A mysterious new player Diablo is taking over Memo's territory and killing his men. Diablo's men kill Sean's wife (Jacqueline Obradors) in a failed assassination attempt. He goes to seek revenge for his dead wife. They start investigating Hollywood Jack (Timothy Olyphant).It's a crime melodrama. There is a good deal of overacting. The story has several cliché plots jam together. Vin Diesel tries to do a lot. I don't blame him because that's the way it's written. He's a super cop. He's a happy street-wise family man. He's a grieving widow. He's a gangster thug avenging cop. He's too much and the movie suffers. It feels like a lot of poser acting. It doesn't get the benefit of gritty realism. There are quite a bit of gun action but it's not fun or exciting. This movie is going for a lot and probably too much. Around the halfway point, I stop caring about this movie.

ajs-10 This is maybe not one of the films I would have chosen; however, on recommendation (you know who you are) I decided to give it a chance. There's nothing earth shattering about it I'm afraid, just another run of the mill Action/Adventure with plenty of plot twists and an enormous body count. The Mexican drug cartels are the bad guys this time and a rough-tough DEA agent and his partner are the good guys. I'll tell you what I thought after this brief summary.A group of DEA agents have been allowed into Mexico to participate in the arrest of one of the drug cartel's top men, Memo Lucero. Amongst the agents are Sean Vetter and his partner, Demetrius Hicks. The take down goes well and Lucero ends up in a US jail. At this point a character named 'Diablo' makes himself known; taking over parts of Lucero's operation and killing his people. Eventually the 'Diablo' cartel turns their attention to Sean; attacks his house and kills his wife. Seeking revenge, Sean visits Lucero in jail; he cannot initially help him, but when his own wife is killed, things change. Can Sean and Demetrius track down who is behind 'Diablo'? To do so they will have to sometimes stray outside the law! I won't say any more or the Spoiler Police (DEA division) will have my badge (again).Quite well made though I did find the action scenes a little confusing at times. Decent performances all round, although I felt nobody was really stretched; and so honourable mentions go to; Vin Diesel as Sean Vetter, Larenz Tate as Demetrius Hicks, Timothy Olyphant, woefully underused, as Hollywood Jack and Geno Silva as Memo Lucero.Many films have been made on this subject before and there have been many films of this genre. The hard thing to do is to make a film of this type that doesn't fall into cliché. Unfortunately this one does, and it suffers for it. A much better film of this type (IMO) would be Tony Scott's 'Man on Fire' (2004). I guess I can sum it up by saying 'it does what it says on the tin', this film is what it is and, although a little too cliché for my liking, is still worth a look if this is your kind of thing.My score: 5.9/10.IMDb Score: 5.8/10 (based on 19,342 votes at the time of going to press).Rotten Tomatoes 'Tomatometer' Score: 11/100 (based on 130 reviews counted at the time of going to press). Rotten Tomatoes 'Audience' Score: 40/100 (based on 82,184 user ratings counted at the time of going to press).

Maleplatypus OK, everything in this movie has been, one way or the other, seen in many movies before and after. Even the "twist" (which should not be surprising if you've watched carefully, which you won't, of course), but it's somehow relaxing and simply good made in every (technical) aspect. Casting is good (Diesel and Olyphant stand out a bit, which was also to be expected), directing, editing... Everything done with some sense of measure for a story. There's a head and the tail, and a good balance in-between (especially in the matter of black/white presenting of the characters). However, clichés could be assembled in good, bad, awful and so on kind of fashion. This time it was good and I recommend it as a relaxing 100+ minutes after a working week.