“Max Cloud” Theatrical Poster
Director: Martin Owen
Cast: Scott Adkins, John Hannah, Lashana Lynch, Elliot James Langridge, Tommy Flanagan, Franz Drameh, Sam Hazeldine, Isabelle Allen, Lois Amber Toole
Running Time: 89 min.
By Paul Bramhall
British action star Scott Adkins has been doing his best to throw his fans off-guard in 2020. Sure, we’ve had the traditional Adkins action vehicles like Legacy of Lies, The Debt Collectors, and Seized, but there’s also been a couple of titles that definitely weren’t what his fanbase have come to expect. First up was Dead Reckoning, which cast him as a terrorist determined to blow up a 4th July beach party, in what its own marketing material proclaimed was “a millennial romantic thriller”. Next up was a science fiction movie, in which a teenage girl in 1990 Brooklyn is sucked into the video game she’s addicted to playing, which sees a group of heroic space adventurers battle against an evil force.
Going by the pre-production title of The Intergalactic Adventures of Max Cloud, Adkins latest feature eventually makes it to the screen as the arguably less unwieldy Max Cloud. Rather unfortunately the plot involving the video game, which is where we spend most of the runtime, bears some resemblance to Adkins last foray into sci-fi, with the close-to-unwatchable 2018 effort Incoming. While the plot for that one involved a prison set in space, here our heroes crash-land on a planet which is being used as a prison. Thankfully, that’s where the comparisons end, and while Incoming was a torturous slog to get through, here proceedings are kept light and breezy, with tongue firmly in cheek throughout the punchy 88-minute runtime.
It’s safe to say nobody was expecting to finish 2020 watching a Scott Adkins science fiction movie shot entirely in Yorkshire, England, but in a year which has panned out in a way many of us weren’t expecting, it’s one of the lesser surprises of the last 12 months. Directed and written by Martin Owen, variations on reality seem to be a theme of his work, having helmed Let’s Be Evil in 2016, which sees an augmented reality experiment go wrong, and 2015’s L.A. Slasher, which sees a disgruntled viewer kidnapping various reality stars. Max Cloud is by far the most colorful and light-hearted entry in his filmography, and it’s a tone which serves the production well.
The nuances of the plot assist in the setup of some of Max Cloud’s best moments. Isabelle Alan (who’s worked with Owen before on both Let’s Be Evil and Killers Anonymous, his last movie before Max Cloud) finds her wish to play video games “all day every day” granted when she’s sucked into the sci-fi game she’s playing. Alan only has a few minutes screen time, as she’s transferred into the body of the spaceship’s resident chef, played by Elliot James Langridge (also in both Let’s Be Evil and Killers Anonymous). Unlike Casey Ryback, in this instance the chef isn’t that useful, but thankfully they have help from the “devilishly handsome masculine space hero” Max Cloud, played by Adkins. It’s up to Alan’s friend Cowboy back in Brooklyn, played by Franz Drameh (Firestorm from DC’s Arrowverse) to control her character and get them through the game in one piece.
Adkins is clearly having a blast playing Max Cloud, and his enjoyment comes off the screen. A brash, slightly sexist, overconfident alpha male, he plays his character exactly like you’d expect a character from a 90’s video game to act, complete with cringe worthy lines such as “I’m Max Cloud, I don’t have time for death!” Landing on the hilariously named planet Heinous, Adkins and Langridge team-up with another member of the crew, played by Sally Collett (who co-wrote the script with Owen), and an intergalactic bounty hunter, played by Tommy Flanagan (American Fighter, Wu Assassins). Together they have to defend themselves from constant attack by “space ninjas”, sent by the planets anxiety suffering overlord Revenger, played by John Hannah (probably still most recognisable to U.S. audiences as the bumbling sidekick in the Brendan Fraser starring The Mummy trilogy), and eventually find a way to get off the planet back to safety.
Max Cloud gets plenty of comedic mileage from its video game setup, from a button on the controller left accidentally pressed down resulting in Langridge stuck walking against a wall, to enemies going back to their reset position whenever a character ducks behind an object out of sight. The video game setup is also integrated well into the action, something which is particularly tricky to pull off, as anyone who’s borne witness to similar scenes in Philip Ko Fei’s 1997 oddity Techno Warriors will attest to. The fact that the most skilled player is stuck as a character in the game, left at the mercy of a not-so-skilled player in the real world, leads to an entertaining scene which has Alan yelling out which buttons to press from inside the game for Drameh to execute in reality.
The action is handled by former Jackie Chan Stunt Team member Andy Nguyen (Luc Van Tien: Tuyet Dinh Kungfu, Commando 3), who now has his own stunt team, and is joined Dawid Szatarski from his crew. Long has worked with Adkins before, being one of the opponents in the standout 2-vs-1 fight against the most complete fighter in the world in Boyka: Undisputed, so it’s great to see him have an opportunity to choreograph the British star (I admit the selfish part of me was also hoping for a rematch). Adkins get a handful of action scenes to strut his stuff, and credit to both his performance and the choreography that the fights maintain the 90’s video game aesthetic, complete with a fist pump at the end of each one.
The video game based nature of the action is also taken advantage of to hilariously ramp up the violence, and while I never thought I’d find myself laughing at a scene which involves Adkins repeatedly stabbing a character at least 10 times in a row, here the environment it plays out it in somehow makes it forgivable. In other scenes characters receive a knife straight in the face, and we even get a little of The Raid influence, when a knife is stabbed into the top of an attacker’s arm and dragged down the length of it. As ridiculous a description as it may sound though, ultimately the action is all good clean fun, allowing for a distinctly different aesthetic than anything we’ve witnessed in the Adkins filmography so far. Arguably, it works, but I’ve no doubt there’ll be some of his fans out there that will hate it.
The low budget does occasionally rear its head, with a battle involving a monster playing out only via the lo-fi video game graphics rather than with the actors and special effects, but these creative choices are the kind of workaround that’s to be admired rather than derided. What’s less forgivable is the decision to not give the final fight to Adkins, one which is equally shared by Revenger himself as he declares “I want to fight the main guy!”, however in the context of the plot the way the narrative plays out does make sense. I have no issue with Adkins not having a final fight if the context doesn’t call for it (we also don’t get one in The Debt Collectors or Legacy of Lies), however here it really felt like having Adkins take on a guy decked out in B-movie Darth Vader get-up would have been a lot of fun.
Out of all the titles in Adkins filmography that feature him in a starring role, Max Cloud stands out as an anomaly, but it’s a welcome one, and it does what is sets out to do in an entertaining way. I found myself being won over by the sheer audacity of its knowing cheesiness, and would argue its one of the best video game adaptations out there that isn’t actually based on a video game. Good natured, humorous, and colorful, the 1990 vibe is captured perfectly, and except for a few CGI shots, could just as well have been made in the era that it’s set. But then again, if it had been made in 1990, it’d probably have ended up a Don ‘The Dragon’ Wilson flick shot in the Philippines, so let’s be thankful it wasn’t. Up there with The Debt Collectors as the best of Adkins 2020 output, Max Cloud ends the year on a high note.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7/10
YES ! HE LIKED IT ! HE FUCKING LIKED IT ! WOHOOOOOOOOO !
That sound you hear is the collected exhalation of relief 🙂
Do you accept PayPal payments Paul? – Well Go USA
The easiest way to debunk this would be a review for “The Invincible Dragon”. I’m putting that one in the suggestion box.
“The easiest way to debunk this would be a review for “The Invincible Dragon”. I’m putting that one in the suggestion box.”
Delivered last September Mr. H! Check it out via the link.
Oof, where have I been? 😬
Dan, you need to start requesting currency. =)
“Do you accept PayPal payments Paul? – Well Go USA”
The agreement was unmarked banknotes, it’s too late to go back now. I will find you.
The agreement is real, not even a joke. I submitted an article about Adkins to COF, only to have it rejected because it was “too negative” … The writing quality, of what was still a a draft, was never called into question. It was about commercial relationships. And now knowing this, it calls into question the integrity of ALL reviews and editorial on COF. Its doing the genre a disservice.
It probably had more to do with your intense hatred for/infatuation with Adkins. Their integrity’s still there.
Great to see you back Mike! You’ve betrayed your own logic here though by only raising the argument when we give a positive review to an Adkins flick, and disregarding the fact we slammed his titles from earlier in the year, Legacy of Lies and Seized. As for your article, since you’ve brought it up yes, we decided not to run it. While it was well written and articulated like all of your writing, the issue as we discussed at the time is that it’s a hate piece against Adkins framed from a completely negative perspective. While we’ll happily rip into any movies, and the performances in them, through our reviews, as a site COF isn’t about singling out certain performers and putting a spotlight on why the writer hates them. Contrary to what you’ve stated in your comment, this is because we have integrity, and we stand by it. As we discussed previously, you remain welcome to post your rant as a comment.
Explain to me how it was a “Hate piece” .. And better yet, why dont you quote from it directly to prove it was filled with hate? You have a copy of the draft, so prove it was hateful by directly quoting it. Otherwise, you are making this up because there was no hate (accusing me of writing something I haven’t). Im guessing you wont be quoting, because there’s nothing there. At worst, I wrote a bit of jokey dismissal. I don’t hate Adkins, I just don’t think he is a viable leading action star. Great screen fighter, he just hasn’t got the goods as a lead and I spent my time on that article to explain why. This is an Adkins propaganda site, you may criticize his movies sometimes, but you wont allow serious criticism of the actor himself because of your commercial arrangements. Again, quote and prove my article was “hateful”, prove your claim.
Are you the same guy that appears under the name Port on Ben Shand’s youtube channel The Dusty Bogan? Shand is the Australian representative of the U.S. neo-fascist group Proud Boys, so if you are I’d like to think that’s why this site isn’t posting whatever article it is you’ve written.
How is not liking Scott Adkins as a lead actor fascist? You have quite a low bar for putting people in a digital gulag..
So that’s a yes. Danke schön.
You didn’t like these Scott Adkins movies, I agree, wait you liked a Scott Adkins movie…you must be paid and selling out! How dare you have a different opinion to me!!!
I think the last few months have seen City on Fire offer varied and honest opinion on a number of Scott Adkins movies, as with any actor he has ups and downs and with Max Cloud, I’ve been wanting to see it since i first heard of the project and the concept…
Now are the negative reviews of “Invincible Dragon” also gonna be accused of being paid for? Let me guess that was just a one off to make us all believe they aren’t living it up in the employ of WellgoUSA etc? Or is it just when they like a Scott Adkins movie?
Vanguard didn’t get a glowing review, isn’t that also coming out from Wellgo?
I’ll put it in clear terms for you. It was stated to me that my article about Adkins could effect commercial (money-making) arrangements.
JJ Bona – I’ve sat through a lot of Scott Adkins this year, and haven’t seen a damn cent from it. If Mr. Retter’s comment is true, then I’m going to say you’ve been holding out on me, and that means we need to have a talk. You may be the founder and patron saint of COF, but I deserve a slice of the Adkins revenue stream, it’s time we made a deal.
Sure. But you better credit me back for the Legacy of Lies and Seized reviews.
Great, now its a pro wrestling site…
So CITY ON FIRE is now an “Adkins Propaganda Site” ??
If i was paying for propaganda i think i would want glowing reviews of all my movies?
And if the people who run the website don’t want to run your article, couldn’t you either run it on another website or even as they suggested post it or extracts from it as comments?
I wish i’d known about the propaganda aspect i’d have enquired how much for glowing reviews of everything I’ve ever been involved in….
how much for a glowing review of Blackie Ko’s INVINCIBLE starring Wang Chieh, with Billy Blanks, Stefanos Mikloas, Jerry Trimble, myself, Mike Miller and co as French Foreign Legionaires? I could offer Twiglets?
Max Cloud is a fun little romp. It’s pretty impressive that the film makers succeeded in making such a retro looking film with the limited budget and resources they had. Though it wasn’t the focus of the film, Andy Nguyen’s fight choreography was very nice and the movie felt balanced out between action and comedy.
Scott Adkin’s performance reminded me of Chris Evans in Scott Pilgrim with his over the top-ness. I can only imagine what this film would be like with a bigger budget.
Yeah man this movie was very enjoyable, I wish there was more action particularly with Adkins, knowing how amazing Andy Long’s choreography can be, but altogether I came out of this movie very entertained.