The Detonator (2006) starring Wesley Snipes, William Hope, Tim Dutton, Silvia Colloca, Matthew Leitch, Bogdan Uritescu, Warren Derosa, Michael Brandon directed by Po-Chih Leong Movie Review

The Detonator (2006)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Wesley Snipes as Sonni Griffith in The Detonator (2006)

At Least it didn't Implode

So there we have it Steven Seagal's "The Detonator", nope wait a minute it was Jean-Claude Van Damme, no that's not right it was Wesley Snipes. Yes we are in the world of direct to video action where Snipes plays a lone agent, protecting a pretty woman and having to dispatch a series of Euro trash baddies, the sort of movie which could have just as easily starred Seagal or Van Damme. I suppose technically "The Detonator" isn't bad, the action is good and basically lives up to some low expectations but it is such a generic piece of movie making that once it is over you quickly forget everything about it.

Lone agent Sonni Griffith (Wesley Snipes - Chaos) finds himself in a Romanian jail cell after a sting operation to buy weapons goes wrong, thankfully his CIA friend Michael Shepard (William Hope) is on hand to get him out and persuades him to help escort Nadia Cominski (Silvia Colloca), the widow of a Mafia accountant, back to America. Unfortunately someone in the CIA is leaking info to the Romanian mafia, the same people who Sonni was after for gun trading, and the safe house where Nadia is hiding comes under attack forcing Sonni to go on the run with her.

Silvia Colloca as Nadia Cominski in The Detonator (2006)

So as already mentioned "The Detonator" is yet another one of these play it by the book action movies which have dominated the careers of Snipes, Seagal and Van Damme in recent years and from a storyline point of view it offers up nothing of interest. From stereotypical Euro trash bad guys and heavies to suspicious CIA agents and of course the lone good guy Sonni who is tough as nails, everything is familiar. And as such you end up paying very little attention to what happens but then it is what you expect.

What that means is the attraction, if that is the right word, is the action, the car chases and Snipes kicking butt. Now in fairness the action in "The Detonator" isn't bad with some pretty impressive stunt work going on which is well paced to make what is routine a bit thrilling. But of course it helps that in Wesley Snipes we have an actor who you can see does his own action and doesn't rely on clever editing to cover up a body double.

Aside from the action well it is a case of Sonni being an uninteresting character who says things which are too wordy although then again he is the most interesting character. I suppose I could say that with a cast which features Michael Brandon, Tim Dutton and William Hope the acting is a bit better than usual but in truth Silvia Colloca makes more of an impact because she is smoking hot in pretty much all her scenes.

What this all boils down to is that "The Detonator" is in truth nothing more than you expect from a straight to video action movie which whilst starring Wesley Snipes could have just have easily been a Seagal or Van Damme movie. It isn't terrible and the action is an improvement on other similar movies but it is forgettable which probably isn't a bad thing.


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