Written and directed by Valeri Milev and co-written by lead actor Timur Turisbekov, during the Third World War, the American government creates super soldiers by inbreeding human being with pigs, but 25 years later this new race of “Muzzles” have taken over. Ex-bounty hunter Rob Justice (Turisbekov) is tasked with finding out how they came to power and destroying them. Also starring: Danny Trejo, Doroteya Toleva and Yana Marinova.
This film kicks off guns blazing, there’s no building up to the action, it’s ready and raring to go which sets a tone full of energy and confidence. The style feels like a modern western, especially with its use of colour often favouring that almost desert landscape look but at the same time it’s akin to a Frankenstein’s monster made up of Deadpool, Dredd, Mad Max and Preacher, to name a few. Milev’s direction fits perfectly with its action-filled intentions, admittedly there are a few shot choices that are questionable depending on the viewer but that’s part of a larger choice in tone that the film sets.
It sadly has an adolescent boy’s obsession with breasts, it goes slightly out of its way to include them any chance it gets and throws in uncomfortable and unnecessary sex scenes to facilitate that. However, the most questionable choice is including an incest vein of the storyline, the script has issues in general but that choice alone is baffling. There’s a very specific sense of humour at work here, it’s outlandish and plays with the ridiculous but the incest still doesn’t fit in with that, neither does the unexplained moustache that Rob’s sister sports. The tone of the writing in general will likely only connect with a certain portion of viewers, it really pushes how far it can go before becoming outright offensive and while it never quite strays into that territory, it’s intent on getting as close as possible. Unfortunately, the story it’s actually telling gets messier and disconnected as time goes on, it forgets to focus on the action and instead tries to quickly add several different threads to its story and can’t sustain them, resulting in its hold on your attention lessening as time goes on.
The performances are more difficult to explain, most of the film is performed in a broken style of English with occasional switches to other languages, which prevents the actors from really being able to get into a good rhythm. Turisbekov’s Rob is extremely wooden but gets away with it feeling intentional, his character is cold and solely focused on violence, but it doesn’t give him much personality to work with despite being the film’s lead. It’s hard to really take Toleva’s Raksha seriously while watching her with a moustache that’s never explained, if they’d fed in the joke early on, it would have been easier to ignore but as they drag it out and ultimately leave it a mystery, it entirely distracts from her performance. Trejo is always a great addition for chaos and mayhem but sadly his appearance is extremely short lived which is a shame as he could have stepped up the personality and charisma to the film.
Bullets of Justice knows what it’s about and goes barrelling down the hill towards a ridiculous, outlandish and inexplicably strange turn of events. It has created for itself a very specific audience who will revel in its chaotic antics and penchant for nudity and gross humour, but for the wider audience, the comedy may fall flat. Had it stuck to bringing out an insane amount of action stuffed into 79-minutes then it might be a different story but it tries to complicate things and misses the opportunity to set up a stronger rivalry or hero vs villain theme to drive it home. All things considered, it’s still difficult to get past the nonchalant choice to have its two main characters be incestuous siblings and it’s choices like that which hold back the film.
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