3 out of 5

Directed by: Jesse V. Johnson

This is the most bare-bones actions flick I’ve walked in quite some time, in the sense that it is dang stripped down: no flashy tricks, no excess, no subplots, no over-the-top camera work or gore; it’s the ‘pure’ kind of simple movie you’d catch late at night on HBO or USA in the 90s.  The DTV golden era stuff.  …Which I’m learning is star Scott Adkins forte, and which I’ll also say, at least in the case of Savage Dog: is a fun thing!

Some pitch-perfect voiceover narration from Keith David (spoiler alert: it’s hilariously from beyond the grave, as he dies in the movie, and there ain’t no mention of the logic of that) tells us of the ‘legend’ of the warrior crawling back from his grave for revenge, with flash cuts of a muddy Adkins crawling out of the dirt.  So we’re not hiding what’s what, but that doesn’t mean the film doesn’t do its due diligence: setting up ex-Legionnaire Martin (Adkins) in an extended stay in prison, released on the regular for some bloody pit scraps on which his keepers make plenty of dosh.  A request to throw a match for a final big payoff goes the wrong way – though not exactly the way you’d think – and Martin’s life gets topsy-turvied by the bad guys, who go on a killing spree of Marty’s friends and family for no particular reason.  And sure, bury the guy without checking if he’s dead.  How else is he supposed to crawl back from his grave?

Which he does, and stalks down his prey for the remainder of the movie, with satisfyingly straight-forward relentlessness.  It ain’t torture, just occasional pauses for fisticuffs and lots of gunfire.  Again, I must underline: Savage Dog is straight to the point, excised of mugging and swearing for a pretty nonstop pace from start to finish.  Even the comparatively slow build-up at the start has a sense of purpose, which carries us up through the final conflict.  And even then, with a WTF bit of overkill, the movie maintains its desire to not dawdle.

A B-movie gem, which by definition can’t really raise above 3 stars.  But this is exactly the kind of stuff you’d love to have swam across late at night on cable, now gifted to us via streaming.