Let me start off by saying I'm not a wrestling fan. This may not make sense by the end of this post, but let me explain -- I'm all for the value of entertainment for the sake of entertainment but my beef with wrestling is that WWE, WCW, etc. actually believes that I'm stupid enough to believe that it's not fake. If they would just acknowledge the fact that we're not quite dumb enough to buy it, I might give it a shot, but to watch it and have Vince McMahon imply to me that "no, we're serious -- Undertaker really DID hide a chair under the stage before the match!" is simply insulting to my own intelligence.

I rented "The Condemned" last night. There comes a time in every blue-blooded American man's life (well, several times) when he's just got to blow off some testosterone with his buddies. Into Movie Gallery I went, and as the wife was eyeing "Good Luck Chuck", I saw Stone Cold Steve Austin on the cover of this flick and said "THIS IS THE ONE."

A note about Stone Cold Steve Austin -- while I previously explained that I'm no wrestling fan, I do have friends that are fans (well, *A* friend who is a fan) so I'm no stranger to the characters. Not to mention that at one time, when I was just a little itty-bitty-Blue, I actually WAS dumb enough to believe it was real. The Hulkster and Macho Man Randy Savage were heroes to any male who grew up in the 80's. Steve Austin is certainly post-80's -- he started on the circuit when I was in high school, watching the occasional Monday Night Raw with my aforementioned good friend. I couldn't care less for any of the guys in WWF during that period, but Stone Cold was a 100% American Badass (notice the punctuation -- that's a formal title). But I digress.

Against this backdrop, on this cold, rainy January afternoon, staring at this movie, in a movie store, while my wife peruses for another chick flick, you can see why I would be compelled to throw it on the counter. So we brought it home, I invited a good friend and my brother over and we had a good ole' fashioned testosterone grunt-fest. Let me set you straight -- this movie rocked.

But to the point of my post; the reviews for this movie online are HORRIBLE. Allow me to quote:

There are only so many ways to kill a person before it starts becoming utterly predictable, making things feel boring even as they become more harsh.

The Condemned is the latest action film from director Scott Wiper. It is also a noun describing those poor viewers who end up stuck in a theater showing this film.

The film presents its pulp cruelty without irony, and that lack of anesthetic distancing makes its sadism genuinely reprehensible.

I italicize the last review snippet because it drives home my point -- movie reviewers are by and large idiots. First of all, how many thesauruses do you think that guy killed to make that statement? Secondly, to analyze an ass-kicking action movie on anywhere near that level is a bit like Car and Driver giving a Hummer a bad review because it got romped by the Gallardo on the 0-60 and it doesn't handle the slalom well. Are you in "the closet", man????

It's a grudge fest, it's not meant to convey any nugget of moral truth or social commentary -- it's created for the sole purpose of blowing shit up. Is there a plot, sure there is -- it's essentially The Running Man: 21st Century Edition but a plot is only there as a formality, only there because it's a mandatory component of a Hollywood flick. To think even for a second that the writers actually want you to believe that there's a deep meaning in this movie is preposterous. Absolutely naive. These kinds of movies can't be reviewed like Titanic or Driving Miss Daisy, they have to be judged within their own genre. I propose a scale based loosely on a complex formula involving GDPM (Gruesome Deaths per Minute) and the Cruise Ship factor (the exact ratio of the quantity of ammunition utilized during the film to the size of a Carnival Fun Ship, in pounds). Twenty years ago the formula would have also involved the level of gratuitous nudity exhibited, but this is the 21st century and we're above that -- seriously (cough).

To wrap it up, this movie was great. Steve Austin has what it takes to be the next ass-kicking, explosive-detonating, neck-breaking American action hero, and seriously -- we need that. Stallone is on the way out. The new Rambo looks incredible but we all must face the fact that ole' Italian Stallion doesn't have too many more rounds under his belt. I mean, what the hell, the last Rocky movie ends with him LOSING A FIGHT? The writers should be sentenced for treason, but I've covered that ground before.

Then there's always Bruce... sure he's got his share of Unbreakables and then there was The Kid. We can overlook those thanks to a little franchise we like to call Die Hard. But once again, I'm afraid Mr. McLane is coming close to shooting down his last helicopter.

"But what about Schwartzneggar, Jackie Chan, Van Damme?", you ask.

We need an American hero. Don't get me wrong, Arnold and Jean Claude were also heroes, but we as a country need somebody to call our very own, and you can't do that through a thick Austrian accent. Somebody that fathers across the country can watch with their sons and holler when he takes out four bad guys with nothing but a tree branch, a phone book and a car battery. That's quality time -- that's what helps bring up boys that are men as opposed to pansies. By the same token, it provides the kind of opportunity for quality time that is a major component of the cure to this epidemic of absentee parents raising lowlifes, criminals and thugs. We're getting way too soft in these States, we desperately need an infusion of good ole' patriotic, do-the-right thing, survive-against-all-odds whoopass. I'm here to tell you that Steve Austin is it. He is the next chosen one. And he's "gonna kill you, sweetheart."