One More Shot joins that elite list of sequels that surpasses it’s predecessor. I wouldn’t exactly call it
Godfather Part 2 or
Aliens, or
The Empire Strikes Back, but it
is better than
One Shot (2021). And to be clear –
One Shot is great. It wound up on my best of 2021 list (and this will more than likely be on my best of 2024). But where the first film may have a had what some would consider "slow moments",
One More Shot is just non-stop in the best way possible.
Thanks to films like Extraction, the newer Mad Max films and the John Wick series, there’s a place for fast pace action films that take little no breaks. Even when punches aren’t being thrown and bullets aren’t flying, the tension in One More Shot is so intense.
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| One More Shot / Extraction |
There's a few tense moments early on in the film that borrow heavily from a scene in Children Of Men...
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| Children Of Men / One More Shot |
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Children Of Men / One More Shot
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Tension is the unsung hero of this film. Director James Nunn pulls from his influences like Michael Mann & Steven Spielberg all throughout the film…
It was actually watching JURASSIC PARK in the cinema when I was 9 years old and I just fell in love with the idea of making movies and telling stories and bringing things to life - James Nunn, easternfilmfans.co.uk
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Jurassic Park /
One More Shot |
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One More Shot plays out like the most basic yet fun video game with multiple levels. It picks up literally seconds after the first part. There’s no pause or intermission. We’re thrown right in to the thick of it in the opening scene. The hostage from the first film has been secured but there’s another “level” our hero Scott Adkins must go through to get him and his family to safety. In addition to a lot more action and intense moments, the film adds Michael Jai White to the cast as the main villain.
While White’s addition to the film is sparse, it’s still the high point.
One More Shot succeeds because they use the formula of a lot of older action films where we get the final one-on-one showdown between the main protagonist and the main antagonist that’s been teased throughout the film. Michael Jai White is a varsity letterman when it comes carrying the final fight on his shoulders (see
Skin Trade &
Blood and Bone for further examples of this). And at this point, White & Adkins hove so much history & on-screen chemistry that it’s probably impossible for those two to choreograph a disappointing fight scene. White & Adkins use a combination of modern MMA (that they both helped popularize) from the John Wick films and the early MMA fighting style found in Bruce Lee films…
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John Wick 3 / One More Shot
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The Chinese Connection / One More Shot
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The beauty of
One More Shot is that you don’t actually have to watch
One Shot first in order to enjoy things or know what's going on. I strongly suggest watching
One Shot because it’s very good, but I almost prefer folks watch the sequel first and then treating
One More Shot like a prequel.
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