Undisputed 3: Our generation's Citizen Kane

The first of what will hopefully be a recurring segment here at the VA Gentlemen Blog, movie reviews by our resident and long time movie critic...Dreamboat.  For those of you who are not familiar with Dream, he is a man of simple pleasures.  He loves beef jerky, video games, and...well...is probably the greatest appreciator of this:

Enough introduction, you'll get to know him soon enough.  Without further ado... 

If you are wondering whether you need to have seen Undisputed 1 or 2 to understand what is happening in Undisputed 3, the answer is no. In fact, I’d recommend not seeing them. I’d recommend unlearning any of your knowledge of mixed martial arts. And I’d definitely forget anything you thought you knew about post-Soviet state correctional facility prison fighting tournaments (I smell a great premise for a Locked Up Abroad episode).

Undisputed 3 tells the tale of Yuri Boyka, the most fit janitor ever and self-proclaimed “world’s greatest prison fighter” (wow Yuri, brag much?), fighting his way through a single-elimination prison fighting tournament against representatives from across the globe. It’s basically Punch-Out meets The Quest (please tell me I’m not the only one to have seen this movie) times Shawshank Redemption. Seriously, there’s even a budding black guy-white guy friendship. But Red Redding and Andy Dufresne these two are not.

Every character we meet at the “maximum security prison” (it’s literally called that in the film), is some sort of stereotype. I say “some sort”, because there are obvious stereotypes in this film, and then there are those that teach you something new about a culture and/or make you yell “WTF?” For instance, you have the fat Italian Mafioso with a New York accent, a Korean who utilizes taekwondo, a Brazilian fighting with capoeira, an African-American who fights during rap music – cultural clichés we’re all familiar with. Then, you have the weird ones, like a testy Columbian in a Georgian prison who uses steroids and likes to read. There was no background or reasoning provided for any of his behavior. What sort of fascinating philosophical literature were you reading anyways? The director features the Columbian's book so prominently and never expands on it. Are we to respect the Columbian for being well-read? Or hate him for cheating? Tell me how to feel, director man! That leads me to my next complaint. The character types are so conflicting to the viewer in this “film”. Do we root for the moody protagonist or the annoying American? This mixed bag of emotions we feel doesn't happen because this film is a thought-provoking mind-f*ck featuring excellent direction. It happens because the character development is so lazy and incomplete.

Actually, that can be said about the entire movie as a whole. I didn’t go in expecting Academy Award-winning stuff from a movie I’m almost positive went straight to DVD, but, c’mon guys. If you have the time to film impressive and complicated fight scenes (and they were), take your time with the filler, too. I get the feeling the director assumed everyone would just fast-forward to the fighting and skip the rest of his movie. He fails to explain a lot of things, even though ridiculously expository dialogue would not have been out of place at Maximum Security Prison. Fast-forwarding will save you some time, but the filler parts are where things get fun. After looking what I wrote down during this film, you will see what I mean.

Hotel Deluxe – Best Fake Hotel Name Ever. No, I'm not a movie reviewer, but I did stay at a Hotel Deluxe last night

The Italian guy is eating a Panini

Even the prison death fight circuit is rampant with steroid abuse

The black guy’s name is Turbo and they play rap when he fights

If he injects his neck with steroids, why did they give him a tourniquet? For jerking it? Of course.

Magic flowers that heel your bum knee found at a prison labor rock-breaking facility – WTF?

To say Undisputed 3 is a good movie would be a discredit to other movies I think are good.  But it’s not all bad, either. It was fun. It’s so bad it was good, but certainly not on purpose. Undisputed 3 is a cheeseburger with donuts for buns: Some parts of it are awesome, though they don’t work that well together, you won’t eat it again, and you won’t brag that you did.

Stay Classy Internets,

~ Dreamboat