SPADES Review: Aces Go Some Dark Places In Johnny Yong Bosch’s Scintillating New Action Thriller
Spades is now available on Prime Video for rental or purchase on Digital.
One of the best facets behind the legacy of Ameritoku properties like “Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers” is the friendships that stayed the course over the years. Specifically speaking, if you told me thirty-some odd years ago that the kind of friendship we’ve seen between actors Johnny Yong Bosch and Jason Narvy would also see them pairing up for some amazing film work together a time or several, I would’ve been intrigued to say the least; Koichi Sakamoto’s Extreme Heist was certainly the biggest and most memorable bookmark for me at the time I even heard the film existed (I tried like hell waiting for it online back when DVD stores like HKFlix were viable dot-coms at the time and the damn film remained “Out Of Print” for so long).
I would actually love to locate another copy of that film one day because of how awesome it is, but I guess that’s another article for another hopeful time. Anyway, to this end and long since the propitious ceremony of Bosch’s last tete-a-tete with Sakamoto with another lost gem called Broken Path, recent years have proven more opportune with the 2017 launch of Bosch’s independent label, Vox Rocket Studio, followed by Narvy’s induction into the firm a few years later with the promise of seeing them back together in feature film fruition after more than two decades. At some point therein, those plans would include shortfilm proof-of-concept “Ark Exitus,” and more currently, Spades, which now makes its way to Prime Video this month after a successful run at film festivals that began back in January.
Spades is definitely a benchmark for Bosch here. There’s a litany of film fandom all over it if you’re a fan of directors across a spectrum of genres, mainly if you like cinematic tropes ranging from cerebral psychological thrillers, dark fantasies and guilty pleasures. That’s not necessarily what the trailers for Spades hints at, while they moreso tease what you might expect to be palatable, stimulating action thriller about a lawman whose latest investigators travails finds himself crossing paths with a mysterious gun-toting man in black leather with a ghost mask, imaginably going after the worst of the worst. I promise you though, the plot just isn’t that simple, and even as familiar certain aspects and characteristics of the film standout, there’s a genuine authenticity to it.
As far as discernible details go without beating too much around the bush as I usually do sometimes, the story is fantastically led by Narvy in the role of a detective and former soldier suffering from PTSD, and learning to cope with tragedy and loss while working to mend his own broken family. When a scuffle with a murder suspect briefly lands him to the hospital, he awakens to menacing illusions that preamble a spell of murder cases, bringing him face to face with his afflicting past, as well as a network of human traffickers who, in no uncertain terms, become a threat to his own family, as well as the ultimate testament of his resolve.
Spades is everything it promises to be from the offset: Brooding, convicting, a little esoteric and maybe a little weird to the point of cringe for at least one dialogue scene. One facet of the film with respect to the core characters we see in terms of how their assembly comes together is unquestionably vague – namely the enigmatic figure under the helmet, although that is by design as the goal here is to keep you watching and guessing right until the end. The magic behind that, additionally, is how everything is put together from start to finish, and it speaks to Bosch’s sincerity and fledgling aptitude as a writer and director, and putting a little bow on it is the kind of requisite drama handed to us through solid performances in part by leading man Narvy, and co-stars Maya Brattkus, and Nobuaki Shimamoto in a role that’s as villainous as it gets.
Of course, the sweeteners here come in the action scenes by way of Hector Soria, who also garners a small role in the film aside from his employ on the film as stunt and fight coordinator. Most of Spades is steadily paced in its exposition and development segments of the story, thanks to Bosch’s editing which staves off slow burn progression, maintaining an energy about the film that keeps the viewer pulled in with compliments to the acting, topped off with action scenes that promise nothing if not a few favorite clippable moments. One moment sees our dark hero in a taser baton fight not too dissimilar to the amazing work of stunt legends like Jeff Ward and Jeff Imada, as seen in certain niche favorites. Soria’s got the action movie sauce like that.
I haven’t gone much into the movie itself for this review, but as blind as I was going in – even with the trailers, initially – I’d like to think this review paints a good overall picture of how impressive it is without spoiling anything, and it’s not easy to make a film as ambitious, or even remotely smart like this on independent means. Given the confidence Bosch’s people has put in him to do so, Spades stands exemplary here in the rewards awaiting that stretch of investment. Spades is a purposefully strange film, and given its assembly, makes it exciting, and all the more fun to watch, and if that’s any hint as to what lies ahead for Bosch as a successor to the stunt and action cinema stalwarts that came before him, then I’m here for it too.
Native New Yorker. Been writing for a long time now, and I enjoy what I do. Be nice to me!
