Movie Review: 'The Retaliators'

The Retaliators stars Michael Lombardi as Bishop, a widowed pastor in a small town. His life is rather perfect, raising two beautiful daughters, teenager Sarah (Katie Kelly) and pre-teen, Rebecca (Abbey Hafer), and overseeing a thriving parish. Familial tension arises mostly through restrictions like curfews and time spent looking at phones. There is also a small matter of Sarah thinking her dad isn’t strong as we watch him allow a bully to take the Christmas tree he and his daughter’s had just chosen from a tree lot. Bishop sees this as a teachable moment about turning the other cheek. Sarah sees it as weakness.

Bishop’s notion of turning the other cheek is about to be challenged in the most horrific and terrifying ways imaginable. After agreeing to allow Sarah to go hang out with friends, including boys, at a party, Sarah calls her dad in a panic. Having stopped at a gas station, Sarah heard a man screaming for help from the trunk of a car at the next pump. The car belongs to a hulking drug runner named Ram Kady (Joseph Gatt). Sarah manages to escape the gas station but Kady gives chase and as Sarah frantically calls her father for help, she’s run off the road. While a helpless Bishop tries to get Sarah on the phone, she’s murdered by Kady.

Sarah’s murder rocks Bishop’s life and shakes his faith in God in a way that even the death of his wife couldn’t. Suddenly turning the other cheek becomes an eye for an eye and Bishop wants to know who killed his daughter and how he can punish them for what they’ve done. Watching over Bishop is the detective assigned to his daughter’s murder, Jed, played by Marc Menchaca. At first, Jed appears to be an upstanding cop who wants to keep Bishop out of trouble. Eventually however, Jed reveals a dark side wherein he has a sidelight in kidnapping bad guys and torturing them in ways the justice system would certainly not approve of

The Retaliators is the brainchild of Darren and Jeff Allen Geare, who co-wrote the screenplay and the directing duo of Samuel Gonzalez Jr and Bridget Smith. The style of The Retaliators is grim and gritty with a hardcore violence and graphic sense of blood and guts, just tame enough to stay in R-Rated territory. The film begins with a tease of what is to come as we first meet Bishop as he is beheading what looks like a zombie in the middle of a forest. He’s trying to save a young woman but she’s soon torn apart by these zombie-like figures while Bishop himself appears to be a victim before the camera cuts away and the credits kick in.

It’s a visceral and memorable start to a movie that thrives on big violent set pieces of speed and gore. The final act reflects that statement as the overarching narrative of Bishop reconciling his desire for revenge with his commitment to his faith comes to a head. That might seem like a dramatic and compelling conflict but trust me when I tell you, Bishop doesn’t remain conflicted for long and when he sees one of these pseudo-zombies is about to attack an elderly couple he goes from man of God to God of violent retribution very quickly.

The Retaliators may have several pretensions toward a greater meaning and a deeper point about faith and revenge, but the reality is that this is a horror thriller, a facile excuse for bloody, gory violence and little more. On that front, strictly as a means of delivering horror visuals and bloody special effects, The Retaliators isn’t half bad. The would-be zombies have a bizarre twist to them that makes them, at the very least, a unique creation and while they are a threat, they are also satisfactorily dispatched in gloriously bloody and brutal fashion.

If you have heard anything about The Retaliators that is likely due to the film’s soundtrack and unlikely co-stars. The band Five Finger Death Punch have prominent roles in The Retaliators as the leaders of a drug dealing biker gang and their music is featured on the Heavy Metal heavy soundtrack. Along with Five Finger Death Punch, Papa Roach lead singer Jacoby Shaddix has a prominent role and Motley Crue drummer and pop sub-culture icon, Tommy Lee is typecast in The Retaliators as a sleazy strip club D.J.

The Retaliators played the opening night of ScreamFest in Los Angeles in late September. There is no word yet on a nationwide release.