Directed by Dolph

It's funny, but I never really thought of myself as much of a fan of  Swedish action star Dolph Lundgren  until just recently. Sure, I respected the guy - it's difficult not to respect a 6'5' authentic genius (reported IQ of 160) with a master's degree in chemical engineering and a 3rd-degree black belt in karate - and I certainly enjoyed his screen work in the early 90s, like Red Scorpion, I Come In Peace (a/k/a Dark Angel), Showdown In Little Tokyo, and Universal Soldier, but I didn't keep up with his filmography past '93/'94. In fact, I only rediscovered Dolph when I was sent some of his later movies for review at my DVD Late Show site. It was then that I noticed that his DTV movies were generally more entertaining than those starring most of his contemporaries (like Jean-Claude Van Damme and Steven Seagal, for instance.).

Part of the reason for that, I think, is that starting around 2004, Dolph started personally directing some of his direct-to-video flicks, starting with The Defender. Now, I haven't seen all of his self-directed efforts, but I did enjoy The Killing Machine (a/k/a Icarus), Missionary Man, and, in particular, Command Performance.

I'm about to go sit down and watch his second film as director, The Russian Specialist, a/k/a The Mechanik. I've read some favorable reviews of the flick, and found a very inexpensive copy of the DVD for sale online (less than $5, including S&H). It sounds like a fun revenge flick, and I'm looking forward to it....