First Shift

First-Shift
First Shift

Follows a NYC officer and his rookie partner Angela who spend a hard day in the line of duty the most dangerous and routine work of the cop in the city.

As much as you would want to ignore it, the monstrous director Uwe Boll has finally come back to the world of film. First, through an extended cameo in Radu Jude’s Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World, where he recalls the good old days of when he slipped on boxing gloves and beat up reviewers who couldn’t stop trashing his movies. Yes, that truly happened, This is then followed up with him in one of Angela’s (Ilinca Manolache) Bobita avatars as he bellows out to all of his enemies in a video.

It continues to be the best single scene and the best cameo of the year. It has funny moments because it functions to ridicule the contributions of Uwe Boll in the film industry. It was not Roger Jude who had such goals. I am not a hater and I also accept Boll, his ‘resilience,and his capacity to face and go on even if some people say well we don’t like what you are doing. But he keeps doing it’, as he said, one has to do all those things with Eric Marchen.

First Shift marks a comeback for Boll as a director after the 2016 Rampage President Down. So here I am trying to provide some kind of appreciation towards First Shift that is interesting solely because of its production value, as most critics do thrash the film for being a clichéd poverty porn revolving around cops. Yes, aspects of its editing by Ethan Maniquis, considered one of the trusted confederates of Robert Rodriguez, do indeed create a level of disorientation for the viewer.

I expect some plausible evolution in the film’s narrative around the figure of NYPD Detective Deo Russo (Gino Anthony Pesi) and his recent wife Angela Dutton (Kristen Renton) on their new duty, especially considering that there are many parallel stories featured such as geriatric in a grocery store who keels over, hitmen who are engaged in a double homicide, and a woman preventing her boyfriend, who is attempting to strangle himself in a bathroom.

However, it is quite evident that, in spite of all the hate that a great many people share regarding Uwe Boll films, there is something fundamentally enjoyable in the experience of watching most of Uwe Boll’s movies. This reluctance to bash his filmography such as Postal, BloodRayne, House of the Dead, In the Name of the King, and notably Assault on Wall Street, is quite understandable people regard this simply as a creative undertaking, with no limits to the genre exuded by the director. Surprisingly, Dominic Purcell is among the most underrated actors in today’s Hollywood and it is a mystery as to why Uwe Boll’s films were ever criticized which caused people to hate the bash of it, his filmography simply cannot be destroyed as there is no boundary, it is notably expansive.

Let’s be honest, generating that volume of movies in the span of ten years alone is very good, and Philip Seymour Hoffman speaks for a majority of directors who have devoted a huge number of decades aiming to cripple Boll who in fact produced so many movies. His feature is in many ways because of small films: he is very, very productive. Explaining the director further, Jude illustrated that, He has many, many, many Stelen. A broad spectrum and volume of works are with he’s much different.

First Shift is very different than Postal but it’s still a Uwe Boll movie, and yes it has a lot of violence, a lot of stylized camera work (but no one can equal the energy of the Hollywood classics), and the most obscene and savage humor where for example Russo says that he had enough of Angela. If you are a supporter of Boll there are some changes that are highly likely, however, for prevalent haters, nothing would really change.

But if you find something in Boll’s fortitude not to budge at the many tomatoes launched at him, I hope it is some sort of respect to the comeback that is First Shift.

Most of the plot of the film revolves around Deo and Angela, trying to understand one another, and it is not so bad. Yea, there are a few of the lines that are definitely not very people-like (for instance when Angela tries to find out about Deo’s past by repeatedly asking him Why?), but lthe evel of chemistry between Pesi and Renton is more than adequate, with the latter being the most impressive performer in First Shift. There is something quite attachable to her personality, and I am not surprised to see people admire her more than the male lead (especially judging from the painstakingly slow shots of him in the opening credits putting on shoes, a watch, a belt with a badge, and then finally mixing protein powder into a shake).

However, Pesi is still able to sell the character through his eyes, drawing the audience to the tortured mind. He is able to connect with himself, perhaps, and even try to be nice to Angela when taking care of a dog, probably the film’s most humane moment. There is not one cheap moment, and his last words with the dog owner, Willie C. Carpenter, are moving to say the least. With scenes like these and rock solid chemistry at the heart of First Shift, it is not a catastrophe and certainly not an eyesore. There are many cheaper, poor quality movies that have been released that engage audiences and treat them like complete idiots (coughAlienRomuluscough) and leach viewers of their tickets in exchange for lazy imagery of undead with some clapping from the audience for effect.

While it is easy to loathe Boll for being a serious mischief-maker with a thick skin who has hurt many with his tendency to offend view the supermarket collapse sequence even if it does not work, it is apparent that Boll is working hard on being creative. Infinitely many movie directors are too afraid of doing things, now it seems that Boll draws with all the movement ideas from the far edges, while here the shot is often clouded and lacks a sense of depth.

The rest of the film is for the most part, not that great, and a lot of the more engaging plot threads don’t resolve satisfactorily. Actually, this entire 89-minute picture could be described in one phrase the slow build up where world building is done whilst the viewer watches two cops during a shift before a mob war seems about to break out as seen in what appears to be a good shot of Garry Pastore who will probably be the villain of the series. And yes, Boll would like First Shift to be the first film in a trilogy, finishing with a scene very much like how Kevin Costner leaves Horizon An American Saga Chapter 1 and just shows the audience First Shift Part Two for a minute. To be quite honest, I would much prefer to see Boll take a radical step in expanding the storyline in Postal 2 rather than theme the First Shift series followed by two more movies as it is difficult to tolerate what his directing style looks like in the previous film.

Boll, however, already has another film ready, the migrant thriller Run (also featuring Renton), and other projects in the pipeline. However, the bigger audience does not wish him to make a comeback in filmmaking as his movies are said to be among the worst ever made, which makes his comeback in this instance rather amusing in the eyes of this critic who has always enjoyed how Boll never shies away from saying he tells people who.

What about the First Shift? Is it any good? Well, not really so much. Should it be taken as such? Not really so much the name of Boll will always remain in the minds of people after reading the words history of cinema. Even his determination to keep filming despite such feelings from the audience in 2008 there existed a petition against Boll with over 1 million signatures is quite inspirational, in a misguided manner, to as many as possible. Of course, First Shift is a bad film and will probably earn scorn from the critics.

But it is also one of Boll’s most respectable films which aims to slowly coax the audience through the course of the first part of the event until it finally all comes together in Parts Two and Three. I doubt it will happen but one does find it humorous to witness this kind of overconfidence being fulfilled. I would be lying if I said there’s no enjoyment to be had watching any Boll (actor) head on screen again in Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World and again directing after he took a bow and left the stage in a post-credits scene presumably of Rampage President Down.

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