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Guns (Mill Creek Entertainment) Blu-ray Review

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    Ian Jane
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  • Guns (Mill Creek Entertainment) Blu-ray Review



    Released by: Mill Creek Entertainment
    Released on: September 17th, 2019.
    Director: Andy Sidaris
    Cast: Erik Estrada, Dona Speir, Roberta Vasquez, Danny Trejo,
    Devin DeVasquez, Cynthia Brimhall, Phyllis Davis
    Year: 1990
    Purchase From Amazon

    Guns - Movie Review:

    “Locked, cocked and ready to rock!”

    At a Hawaiian resort, two cross-dressing hitmen take out a pair of honeymooners - but why? Well, it turns out that they were looking for Nicole (Roberta Vasquez), the new recruit assigned to work with special agent Donna Hamilton (Miss March 1984 herself, Dona Spier) but they screwed up and killed the wrong person.

    Of course, Donna and Nicole are on edge when they learn of this. The man behind the hit is Juan Degas (Erik Estrada), who guys by the nickname 'Jack Of Diamonds' and who makes quite a nice living for himself as an arms smuggler. He wants Dona and Nicole out of the picture because he doesn't want them messing up his latest plan, which involves smuggling a whole bunch of weapons into the United States by way of the island paradise they call home. As the story evolves, Dona and Nicole wind up going on the offensive, hoping to track down and eliminate Degas - but of course, he's got a small army of hired killers working for him, not the least of whom also happens to be his main squeeze, a stripper/assassin who goes by the name of Cash (Devin DeVasquez, Miss June 1985).

    Dona and Nicole, however, get some help from a lounge singer/agent named Edy Stark (Cynthia Brimhall) and, of course, have a few tricks up their sleeves - and when Donna's mother (Phyllis Davis) gets kidnapped by Degas' crew, they're going to need them!

    This one is lesser Sidaris but it's still pretty fun. We get some oil wrestling, the requisite remote control vehicle attacks that Sidaris was so clearly enamored with, a supporting role from Danny Trejo as Estrada's right hand man, a pretty great ninja attack scene and, of course, quite a lot of nudity and softcore humping including a scene where a chick gets boned on a motorcycle (it's not moving at the time of said boning, however). Oh, and we get to see Kym Malin and Donna Spangler engage in an oil wrestling match! Both Spier and Vasquez get naked in this one, as does DeVasquez and hey, Lisa London from Sidaris' Savage Beach, made a year prior to this one, also shows up in the picture.

    It's fun seeing Estrada play the villain. He also worked with Sidaris on Do Or Die a year later (Spier and Vasquez reprise their respective roles in that one as well) but he played a completely different character in that one - he was a good guy. He works just as well as the heavy in this one, seeming to have a lot of fun with the role. It's also cool to see Cynthia Brimhall get more screen time in this one than she has in the other movies she made with Sidaris. Phyllis Davis from Sweet Sugar also has a small role in the picture, which is kind of rad.

    As it typical with Sidaris movies, the whole thing is a lot of preposterous nonsense but everyone seems to be having a blast here and it's hard not to get caught up in the fun. If it isn't quite as unique or quirky as the director's best material, like all of his work it's very nicely shot, making great use of plenty of neat locations. There's a good amount of action in the picture and a sense of humor to all of this that's hard not to appreciate.

    Guns - Blu-ray Review:

    GUNS arrives on a 50GB Blu-ray disc framed at 1.85.1 widescreen in an AVC encoded 1080p high definition transfer taken from a new 4k restoration provided by AGFA and it looks really nice. The feature takes up just under 28GBs of space on the disc. Colors are nice and black levels are also strong. The greens of the Hawaiian scenes look particularly lush. The film's many, many skin tones look nice and natural. There are no noticeable issues with any edge enhancement or noise reduction and the disc is free of obvious compression artifacts. There isn't much in the way of print damage at all either, a few white specks now and then but unless you're looking for them for the purpose of writing an anal retentive review, you're not going to even notice them. All in all, a very solid picture in line, quality wise, with the other Sidaris Blu-ray releases from Mill Creek so far.

    The DTS-HD 2.0 audio track does what it can with the limitations of the source material. Dialogue is clean and clear and properly balanced and both the score and the effects work all sound just fine. There are no problems with any hiss or distortion and optional subtitles are provided in English.

    The main extra on the disc is a commentary track with Andy and Arlene Sidaris. If you've heard their other tracks then you know what to expect here - a very jovial talk detailing who did what on the shoot. Andy talks up the action set pieces and the ladies, making some quips in the sex scenes about why they were shot the way they were shot. The pair discusses the locations used in the film and how and why they were acquired, they talk about how much they enjoyed working with the different cast members involved in the production and quite a bit more. It's charming, really, they just seemed to really love working together and seemed to have a blast doing it.

    Also on hand is a fifty-eight-minute Behind The Scenes featurette featuring Sidaris and Julie Strain in the intro part. From there, Sidaris hangs out with Devin DeVasquez for a bit and shows off some footage from a nudie video she made. After that we get some time coded behind the scenes footage shot on the set of L.E.T.H.A.L. Ladies: Return To Savage Beach where we see Julie Strain and a muscle guy get into it with Gerald Okamura. From there, Arlene hangs out with DeVasquez again for a bit and we see more nudie footage of her before we cut to an interview with Sidaris conducted by Joe Bob Briggs. After that, more behind the scenes footage from Return to Savage Beach featuring a blonde assassin on rollerblades before finishing up with some more Joe Bob footage where he interviews Roberta Vasquez. None of this actually has anything to do at all with the making of Guns, but it's cool that this archival material is being preserved.

    Rounding out the extras are trailers for a host of Malibu Bay productions like Malibu Express, Hard Ticket To Hawaii, Do Or Die, Savage Beach, Guns, Do Or Die, Hard Hunted, Fit To Kill, Enemy Gold, The Dallas Connection, Day Of The Warrior and Return To Savage Beach. Menus and chapter selection options are also provided. All of the extras included on the disc are carried over from the older DVD releases.

    The Blu-ray also comes packaged with an insert card containing a code for a digital HD download version of the movie, redeemable via movieSPREE.

    Guns - The Final Word:

    Guns isn't Sidaris' best but it's still a pretty fun time at the movies thanks to a game cast, plenty of exploitative elements and some nifty action set pieces. Mill Creek's Blu-ray carries over all of the extra features from the special edition DVD and presents the film in very nice shape. Recommended!

    Click on the images below for full sized Guns Blu-ray screen caps!



















































    • Darcy Parker
      #1
      Darcy Parker
      Senior Member
      Darcy Parker commented
      Editing a comment
      The Blu-Ray review section Has been corrected! Yay!
      Darcy Parker
      Senior Member
      Last edited by Darcy Parker; 10-12-2019, 11:58 PM. Reason: Updates

    • Jason C
      #2
      Jason C
      Senior Member
      Jason C commented
      Editing a comment
      Someone responsible for putting these Sidaris films together is putting in some extra effort. Each time two new films get released they have their trailers upgraded to HD using the new transfer. As a fan of trailer comps and old school trailers in general this is greatly appreciated. I feel like there might have been some interesting tweaking to the beach skinny dipping scene in SAVAGE BEACH as well. Kudos to whoever is working on these titles.

    • moviegeek86
      #3
      moviegeek86
      Senior Member
      moviegeek86 commented
      Editing a comment
      AGFA is the ones responsible for restoring these gems. Heroes I say. HEROES!
    Posting comments is disabled.

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