Hey, I remember this movie. Kinda.

David Michael Latt has had a long and apparently successful career producing mockbusters: cheap knockoffs of popular movies, with titles like Tomb Invader, Fast and Fierce: Death Race, Battle Star Wars, Top Gunner, and Jurassic Domination. A lot of his early success probably hinged on people renting his movies from Hollywood Video by accident. Occasionally Latt stumbles into a production that's borderline decent, like King of the Ants. Most of the time he grinds drivel off a conveyor belt. Killers is an example of the latter.

The original poster for Killers compared it to Reservoir Dogs, because that's how Latt rolls. Allude to a better movie in the hope that some unfortunate renter will pluck it off the shelf. It's a strategy that somehow managed to outlive video rentals. Let a hustler play, I guess.

The storyline is skeletal. Five friends go to an abandoned warehouse to buy stolen drugs. The gang who lost the drugs shows up to retrieve them. People get shot, maimed, and tortured over the course of an interminable game of cat and mouse. After the gang arrives, the rest of the movie is 99% running on stairs and hiding in empty rooms.

The choppy editing leaves everything with no sense of time, place, or continuity. In one scene, Kim Little is descending a staircase, and the shotgun she's carrying disappears between cuts. Latt occasionally tries to get stylish with his direction, but it's not enough to make the story or characters interesting. If he had been less ambitious, maybe he could have spent more time on core competencies like framing and focus.

The cast ranges from bland to cheesy. The only actor who's remotely notable is Paul Logan, who manages to generate a bit of intensity with his formidable presence and persistent scowl. At least he knows how to come across as a genuine threat.

The only reason I watched this movie on streaming is because I vaguely remembered watching it on VHS twenty years ago. I remembered it being low budget, but good enough to hold my interest. In particular, I remembered a dolly zoom of Paul Logan that was appropriately intense. On rewatch, Killers did not live up to the low expectations of my memory. Maybe I was drunk the first time I watched it. Or maybe I just didn't want to admit that the buck fifty I spent at Hollywood Video was a waste of money.

Latt made a sequel called Killers 2: The Beast, featuring the original heroine, Kim Little, trapped in an asylum. I don't think I have the patience for it.

3 out of 10.

Seen on Tubi.