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 (081723)
Johnny and Clyde is the poorly produced and incompetently directed new splatter
crime film. It’s about a pair of romantically involved serial killers/assassins
that clash with a sadistic and kinky casino owner. When Megan Fox is the biggest
star who gives the best performance in your film you know you have problems.
The movie looks and feels like a cheap knockoff of The Devil’s Rejects. But it
has none of the colorful visually interesting style or effective humor of a good
(not
The Munsters)
Rob Zombie project. This film shares that Rob Zombie film’s macabre humor,
ironic tone, and extreme violence. But few of the jokes here work and the
special effects look like they came from a poor high school production or bad
Troma film (not Tromeo and Juliet or Toxic Avenger-which I liked).
The title of course references the famous real-life bank-robbing couple who were
the subject of the great Arthur Penn 1967 "Bonnie and Clyde", a film that changed cinema history. Johnny
and Clyde is also about killer criminal lovers, but it is nowhere close to the
level of quality either the Penn film or Gun Crazy or Badlands which are also on
a similar subject. Also, while all those films were classy prestigious films
later considered classics, Johnny and Clyde is a sleazy direct-to-DVD (I found
it on Redbox) Z film full of little-known actors that don’t deserve to become
better known.
Clyde here (played by Ajani Russell) is the female assassin’s last name. She
spends an awful lot of time distracting men with flirtation so that her
boyfriend can fill them with bullets. Johnny is her ultra-violent killer
boyfriend played by Canadian actor, Avan Jogia, who is made up to look a bit
like Megan Fox’s real-life beau, Machine Gun Kelly. Apparently, the
ultra-violent, hyper-sexed couple spends almost every waking hour causing mayhem
or having sex with on piles of stolen money.
The two lead actors playing the couple are bland and forgettable. In case you’re
wondering Jogia, who looks good shooting people was the star of the immortal
classic, Resident Evil: Welcome to Racoon City (I’m being ironic here), and
Adjani Russell, who prefers to kill in lingerie-like outfits is a skateboard
athlete and model known for her lead in the timeless cinematic masterpieces
Skate Kitchen (2018.) Relax, I never heard of them either.
Johnny proves he is good boyfriend material and a sentimental guy when he gives
Clyde the knife he used in his first kill. Of course, she is so touched and
covers him immediately with kisses.
The pair plans a big heist to steal a fortune from a crooked casino owner. The
basic premise of criminals encountering monsters during a theft was also done in
Zack Snyder’s
Army of the Dead, but that film had a far better cast and an
actual decent budget.
Johnny puts together a small gang of homicidal hoodlums to help him with a
robbery. Along with his girlfriend, he gathers together the suicidal Butcher
(Nick Principe), the mentally unbalanced Baker (Charles W. Harris III), and the
torture-loving Candlestick (Robert Lasardo). They are all pretty stupid, but
they love to kill, torture, and maim for the love of it. Apparently, the film’s
writer decided that giving them cool names and looks was enough and they didn’t
actually need to write characters for the actors. They are even more shallow and
brutal than the heroes in early Image comics before they hired actual good
writers like Robert Kirkman and Garth Ennis.
Although we are supposed to root for the hoodlums because they have “free”
lifestyles and are antiheroes, when they start dying off it has no dramatic
power because they have so little personality. The filmmakers could’ve learned
something from 2013's Deadpool film. Although he is a homicidal murdering maniac, we care
about him because of his disfigurement and tragic past. In this film none of the
main characters have a reason to behave like monsters so we don’t care when they
are picked off one at a time.
The most famous acting presence in the film is by far Megan Fox, one of the big
screen’s most popular sex symbols. Many people know her from tabloid TV shows as
well as the witless and overlong first two Transformers films. She also is known
for helping to sink the Titanic size disaster, Jonah Hex. Fox was fine and
demonstrated some genuine acting ability in How to Lose Friends and Alienate
People (2008), Jennifer’s Body (2009), Til Death (2020).
But very little she does in this film remotely resembles acting. When she plays
casino owner-Alana Heart, she merely reads her lines in scanty clothes in a
deadpan voice as if she were slightly pleased with herself. But she does have a
bit of charisma, looks great, appears to be having a good time, and seems aware
of how ridiculous everything she says and does in the film is.
Some erotic humor occurs because Heart is a dominating mistress who has a pair
of sex slaves that do her every whim. The subs who constantly parade around in
bondage gear are named Honey (Brett Azer) and Pot (Sydney Jenkins). Pretty
clever huh? She also likes to put water glasses on their heads so she can use
them for target practice.
The plot is further complicated because the casino owner enlists the aid of an
immortal demon, Bakwas who likes to chop off heads and eviscerate anyone who
gets in his path. Bakwas (who is also played by Principie) looks sort of like he
is wearing a dime store grim reaper outfit with a Walgreens-purchased skull
face.
In addition, Heart gets help from the local Police Chief (Armin Garo) who wants
revenge because Johnny and Clyde who tortured and murdered his daughter in cold
blood. After his daughter’s death, he became an alcoholic which led to his being
fired so he desperately wants to get revenge. He is the only somewhat realistic
character in the whole film.
The decent Chinese actress, Bai Ling who was terrific in Richard Kelly’s
Southland Tales (2006) as well as Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004) is completely
wasted playing a rival assassin/ninja who is hired to go against the Johnny and
Clyde gang. Her role fades into the background like wallpaper.
Johnny and Clyde is a candidate for the worst film of the year. It's rare to see
a professional production that reaches screens with such sub-par acting, lousy
visuals, and such schlocky gore. The only possible reason to see it is if you
are a Megan Fox completist or if you’re looking for a film so terrible that you
can enjoy it as an unintentional comedy.
This website doesn’t allow me to give films a zero-star rating. This is as close
to a zero-star film as I have seen since I started reviewing for this website.
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