Debt Collectors (2020) Review

“The Debt Collectors” Theatrical Poster

AKA: The Debt Collector 2
Director: Jesse V. Johnson
Cast: Scott Adkins, Louis Mandylor, Marina Sirtis, Demitra Sealy, Vernon Wells, Catherine Black, Josef Cannon, Ski Carr, Charity Collins, Mayling Ng, Aaron Toney
Running Time: 97 min.

By Paul Bramhall

In 2018, hot off the heels of Accident Man and anticipating the all-star Triple Threat, director Jesse V. Johnson and star Scott Adkins snuck in a little movie called The Debt Collector. Pairing Adkins up as a rookie debt collector with a grizzled veteran of the trade in the form of Louis Mandylor, this unexpected gem is my favorite of the Johnson and Adkins collaborations. The daytime noir feel in sun-soaked L.A., the chemistry between Adkins and Mandylor, and a cast of characters who seemed like they stepped straight out of a gravelly voiced pulp crime novel, all combined to create a tightly paced and entertaining action flick.

A word of warning that the rest of this paragraph will contain a significant spoiler (well, kind of) if you’ve yet to see The Debt Collector, so you may want to consider skipping to the next one. The ending of The Debt Collector saw Adkins and Mandylor do their best Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, as they went out in a blaze of bullet riddled glory, clearly marking The Debt Collector as a stand-alone affair. Director Jesse V. Johnson commented on COF’s very own review that “We didn’t want to sell out, to throw in the towel for a happy ending, a potential sequel, screw all that, we went for broke.” Thankfully for us, he changed his mind, allowing 2020 to grace us with a sequel in the form of Debt Collectors.

There’s been many great onscreen partners through the years – Martin Riggs and Roger Murtaugh, Jack Cates and Reggie Hammond, Dirty Harry and Al Quan – and even though French (Adkins) and Sue (Mandylor) aren’t exactly on the right side of the law, their antics are no less entertaining. So much so that Debt Collectors is the first Adkins movies in a long time that I wanted to check out for more than just guys being punched in the face. Proceedings open 7 months on from the events that close out the original, and the titular pair have parted ways. Adkins now works as a bouncer in a spit ‘n’ sawdust bar, while Mandylor continues his debt collector gig, only now he’s teetotal, not that he really looks any healthier for it.

A job comes along which is too good to refuse, but comes with an odd condition – he’s to team up with Adkins again and do the job together. So the pair find themselves reunited to hit up 3 scores and collect their debts, little knowing who’s pulling the strings behind the scenes. Let’s address the elephant in the room first. Yes the events of the original’s finale are explained, albeit in the form of some unavoidably clunky exposition between the pair, which asks the audience to invest in a serious suspension of disbelief. But ultimately, if like me you can accept Chow Yun Fat returning as the rice loving Ken Gor in A Better Tomorrow II, then its an investment worth making.

Debt Collectors see’s Johnson and Adkins re-team with the 3rd component of their iron triangle – writer Stu Small. Apart from penning the original along with regular writing partner Johnson, Small is also responsible for the scripts behind Accident Man and Avengement. Disregarding the necessary exposition to explain why we’re watching Debt Collectors, the writing here is probably the sharpest of any production Adkins has been in. Several lines draw genuine laughs, from Adkins being referred to as Harry Styles and the “English shoe salesman”, to a particularly vicious putdown Mandylor has directed towards him by his ex (played by Star Trek: The Next Generation alumni Marina Sirtis), that I won’t spoil here. The banter between Adkins and Mandylor is a delight, making Debt Collectors feel like a genuine movie, and not some 90 minute piece of crap when anything between a fight scene is coma inducing filler.

Of course no one is clocking into an Adkins flick to see if he’s become the next Robert De Niro yet, so Debt Collectors does indeed have a healthy quota of fisticuffs. Johnson has paired up once again with frequent collaborator Luke LaFontaine for the action, who’s worked with many of the cast and crew previously, having choreographed both the original and the first of the Johnson and Adkins collaborations as director and star in Savage Dog. Most recently LaFontaine worked with Johnson on the Dominiquie Vandenberg vehicle The Mercenary, which may have lacked Adkins, however it did feature Mandylor as the villain of the piece.

It’s almost becoming a tradition for any of Johnson and Adkins collaborations together to feature a bar fight, and Debt Collectors utilises one to deliver the first action beat, when Adkins has his cereal time interrupted by a group of daytime drinking rednecks. A healthy beatdown is delivered, with a lesson on English and American history provided as an additional bonus. While The Debt Collector was structured in such a way that it almost felt like a series of vignettes that followed a 1. Attempt to collect debt, 2. Have Adkins get into a fight, 3. Collect debt model, the sequel feels like more of a wholistic narrative, and when the action hits its nicely integrated into the plot.

There’s an entertaining boxing match which pits both Mandlyor and Adkins up against stuntman Aaron Toney, who if you look close enough can be spotted playing one of Tony Todd’s henchman in the original, and who’s worked with Johnson as a stuntman as far back as 2007’s The Last Sentinel (he’s also notably lent his choreography talents to the likes of Wolf Warrior 2). The real action highlight though, and one that belongs in any top 10 of Adkins fight scenes (do we not have that feature yet?), is one that pits the British star against his onscreen partner Mandylor. While it would be a spoiler to go into why they fight, the reasons that lead to them coming to blows provide a real emotional kick to the encounter, making it a confrontation that the audience is fully invested in. This is what fight scenes in a movie are supposed to be like, not just there because it feels like they have an obligation to be (see Legacy of Lies and Seized).

Clearly paying homage to the alleyway fight from the John Carpenter classic They Live, the fight pits Mandylor’s boxing versus Adkins style of MMA, and it’s a brutal exhaustive encounter in which you feel every hit. Credit to everyone involved for crafting such an awesome scene, and both parties finish substantially bloodied and bruised. Not all of the action talent gets to shine though, similar to Juju Chan in Savage Dog, here Mayling Ng of Lady Bloodfight and Wonder Woman fame is underused. Considering how great Adkins fight was against another Lady Bloodfight alumni, Amy Johnston, in Accident Man, incorporating a confrontation between the pair into the narrative feels like a missed opportunity (and Adkins does comment on how much he’d like to be squeezed between her thighs – it was right there!).

Like its predecessor, Debt Collectors stumbles in its finale thanks to an unremarkable shootout. Despite being within the confines of a small bar, the geography of the shootout is confusing, with far too much machine gun fire and very little of it seemingly able to hit anyone. In particular, cutaways which feature a villainous femme fatale played by Charity Collins angrily shooting everything to hell and turning the air blue almost look like they’ve been pasted from a different production altogether, Godfrey Ho style. Still, it’s not enough to damage the overall integrity, and has a negligible impact on the all-important entertainment factor. Johnson seems to know he’s onto a good thing with the chemistry that Adkins and Mandylor have together, so this time he wisely leaves things open for a potential 3rd outing in the closing frames.

Debt Collectors is an unexpected and welcome follow-up to the equally unexpected 2018 entry in the Adkins and Johnson repertoire. In addition to the action beats, the killer sense of humor really shines through, showing off a script that’s had as much attention paid to it as the action choreography, whether it be Adkins delivering a monologue about being flaccid, or Mandylor being recognised as the guy from the Ninja movie. Here’s hoping that this won’t be the last of the Adkins and Johnson collaborations, because together they seem to have the Midas touch. Now the only question remains, what ever did happen to that dojo Adkins was trying to rescue from bankruptcy!?

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 8/10