Tyler Jon Olson | Through the Shattered Lens

The first question that one might want to ask about 2021’s Out of Death is what is going on with that title.

Out of Death? Did they run out? Is there an issue with the warehouse? Is it a nationwide outage or just a regional problem? How exactly does someone find themselves out of death? I mean, there are plenty of shortages in the world. There are people who can’t get clean drinking water or tasty food. I had to wait an extra day to get my new scanner because of a supply chain issue. These things happen. But people never seem to run out of death. Death is the one thing that we will always in large quantities.

As for the film itself, it is rather death-obsessed. Shannon (Jaime King) is a photojournalist who has recently lost her father. All she wants to do is spread his ashes in the woods. However, when she witnesses a murder in the woods, she finds herself being pursued by a compromised deputy (Lala Kent). Meanwhile, Jack Harris (Bruce Willis) is a retired detective who has recently lost his wife. He wants to spend some time alone in his niece’s cabin but instead, he finds himself mixed up in Shannon’s problems. The corrupt sheriff (Michael Sirow) wants to be mayor and he’s not going to let Shannon and Jack stand in his way, even if it means killing every possible witness.

Even though Bruce Willis gets top-billing along with Jaime King, he’s not in much of Out of Death. Out of Death was one of the many film productions to be delayed by the COVID lockdowns. When production finally did begin, Bruce Willis shot all of his scenes in one day. (The entire film took 9 days to shoot. Roger Corman, if he was still with us, would want to know why the production took 9 days when it could just as easily been done in two.) Sadly, this is one of the films that Bruce Willis made after it became apparent that he was having serious issues with his health. Willis delivers his lines in a halting manner, which technically works for his emotionally shattered character but which is still hard to watch now that we know that Willis was suffering from frontotemporal dementia at the time. Producer Randall Emmett made his career by convincing big stars to appear in B-movies and he shouldn’t be faulted for that. However, the later films he made with Willis not always easy to watch. Say what you will about the films that Sylvester Stallone and Robert De Niro have made with Emmett, they all knew what they were getting into. It’s hard to say whether the same was true with Bruce Willis.

As for Out of Death, it’s a fairly dull cat-and-mouse game but I will give it some credit for capturing the atmosphere that goes along with being isolated in the Southern wilderness. This is a film where you could feel the humidity rising from the screen. And Jaime King, who deserves better, gave a strong performance as Shannon. Otherwise, the most interesting thing about Out of Death is the mystery as to what exactly the title means.

Out of Death? It’s a nice thought.

2016’s Precious Cargo tells the story of Jack (Mark-Paul Gosselaar) and his ex-wife Karen (Claire Forlani).

Karen is a professional thief who has botched a robbery for her former lover, crime boss Eddie Filosa (Bruce Willis). Eddie wants Karen dead so, of course, Karen flees down to the Florida everglades, where she finds Jack living in a swamp shack and making love to his latest girlfriend, Jenna (Lydia Hull). Karen tells them to go ahead and finish up and she’ll just wait out in the kitchen. Jack in not particularly happy to see Karen again but then he notices that she has a baby bump. “Always use a condom,” Karen tells Jenna. Eddie’s men, led by Simon (Daniel Berhardt), attack and it all leads to a boat chase that is surprisingly exciting when you consider that Precious Cargo is a low-budget, direct-to-video offering.

It turns out that Jack can save Karen from Eddie’s wrath by planning and executing a heist for the crime boss. Jack assembles his crew, Jack gets ready for the heist …. uh-oh, it’s time for a double cross! The plot is nothing special. It’s identical to a hundred other low-budget crime films that you’ve seen recently. It’s the type of thing that Michael Mann could have turned into a metaphor for American ennui but, in this film, it’s just a typical heist. The viewer enjoys it while it’s happening and then forgets about it two minutes afterwards.

That said, Precious Cargo is not quite as bad as the typical direct-to-video film. Mark-Paul Gosselaar — yes, Zack Morris himself — gives a reasonably compelling performance as Jack. To a certain group of people, he’s always be Zack and I imagine he’s sick of people asking him about whether or not he still has his giant phone but, as he’s gone from teen idol to adult actor, Gosselaar has shown himself to be a talented actor. (For the record, Zack lost his phone in the drunk driving episode. I know some people say that episode doesn’t count because it was a Tori episode but I say that it does. So there.) Claire Forlani is actually more compelling in these direct-to-video films than she ever was in any of the big budget studio films that she used to appear in.

Of course, I imagine that the main selling point for this film was meant to be Bruce Willis. This is one of the direct-to-video films that dominated the last fourth of Willis’s career. When Willis retired due to aphasia, there was a general assumption that all of Willis’s direct-to-video films were made as a result of his condition. I don’t know if that’s quite true. (It’s entirely possible that he just wanted a quick payday.) But it is true that Willis only has a few minutes of screentime in Precious Cargo and that several shots involving Eddie were accomplished with a stand-in. That said, in this film, Willis still brings some energy to the part. He’s an effective villain, even if I think everyone prefers to see Willis saving the day. Even in the direct-to-video era, Bruce Willis still had a definite presence.

Precious Cargo is predictable and ultimately forgettable but it’s still entertaining enough for 90 minutes.