Verdict
Summary
A nifty concept almost undone by bad writing, poor directing choices, and an unfortunately annoying performance by the appealing star Danielle Ryan, whom I’ve liked in other films, Double Threat has enough of a thread of appeal for me to recommend it with strong hesitations, but the film might’ve greatly benefitted had it cut out all the chipper banter and dialogue and focused in on the complexities of its main character. This could’ve been something like The Long Kiss Goodnight as a road movie, but instead it comes across as a Lifetime movie with some action and a sex scene.
Plot:
A dangerous woman with a split personality teams up with an innocent bystander to get her revenge.
Review:
Double Threat starts out almost like the beginning of a good joke: A man walks into a liquor store and looks at the pretty girl at the counter, but before he has chance to say hello or goodbye, she pulls out a shotgun and methodically kills two other men who enter the store with guns, pointed at them. The woman (played by Danielle C. Ryan, a.k.a. Danielle Chuchran) grabs her ready-to-go bag and hops in the gob smacked guy’s truck, and he drives away in shock. The young lady is Natasha, but sometimes an altered version of Natasha, and she’s been on the run from the mob, or more specifically the son of the Don, a love-struck sap named Ellis (Kevin Joy) who thinks that his past relationship with Natasha actually meant something, but the truth is that she used him to skim money from the organization, but now Ellis and dozens of goons, including a “cleaner” named Ask (Dawn Olivieri) are out to simply wipe Natasha from the map. Natasha is a handful and a mouthful with her perky face, cute body, and millennial motor mouth, but it takes awhile for the guy she basically hijacked to take notice that she’s two people in one. The guy is named Jimmy (Matthew Lawrence), and he’s a humble dude in mourning, carrying around his brother’s ashes with the intention of spreading them at a beach, but now that this crazy pretty lady Natasha has commandeered his life, he has no choice but to be an accomplice to whatever shenanigans she puts him through. It’s inevitable that they’ll fall for each other (in a forced, unbelievable way), but afterwards Jimmy is perplexed when Natasha / alter Natasha can’t remember that they hooked up. Who said romance was easy when you’re on the run from killers with a woman with a split personality?
A nifty concept almost undone by bad writing, poor directing choices, and an unfortunately annoying performance by the appealing star Danielle Ryan, whom I’ve liked in other films, Double Threat has enough of a thread of appeal for me to recommend it with strong hesitations, but the film might’ve greatly benefitted had it cut out all the chipper banter and dialogue and focused in on the complexities of its main character. This could’ve been something like The Long Kiss Goodnight as a road movie, but instead it comes across as a Lifetime movie with some action and a sex scene. It’s already a suspension of disbelief for me to accept that Ryan can knock down dozen of guys much bigger and stronger than her in fights, but then I have to accept that the movie does it with a smirk and a couple of quips, which is too much for this seasoned reviewer. I’ll give the movie points for having a foundation that could’ve launched a thousand ships, but the execution and delivery can’t play with the big boys. It’s stuck in the sandbox. From director Shane Stanley.
Double Threat is now available to own on DVD from MVD Visual. No special features are included.
