Acts of Vengeance

Directed by Isaac Florentine and performed by Antonio Banderas with an air of itch-scratching purpose that syncs well enough with its fast, cheap and stupid thrills.

Banderas proves more than capable of playing the sort of strong, silent type who resorts to vigilante justice.

Revenge for the death of family members is a frequent boilerplate hook for mid-budget action movies, and that formula could hardly get a more perfunctory recycling than in "Acts of Vengeance."

It's a cameoing Robert Forster as Frank's embittered father-in-law who provides the acting class.

Maybe if one of the movie's biggest lines extols the virtues of shutting (...) up, it might be a novel idea to pass that aphorism along to the writer.

I tend to value earnestness, and enjoyed watching one of my favorite action filmmakers continue on with his work even after a personal tragedy and choose to address and wrestle with that loss in the film he's sharing with us.

Borrowing from all manner of similar films and television shows, Acts Of Vengeance fails to blend these elements into a cohesive narrative.

The smartest aspect of this formulaic low-budget vigilante thriller are the Marcus Aurelius quotes that introduce each chapter.

If this all sounds preposterous, it's because it totally is. But Banderas brings such a fiery commitment to the role that we buy into Florentine's world of cleanly choreographed battles and the Russian tough guys who engage in them.

Hits its clichéd notes efficiently.