Treasure Raiders (2007)

When does homage cross the line into plagiarism? When it's the joint U.S./Russian film, TREASURE RAIDERS--or as I call it, "Indiana Jones and the Fast & Furious Da Vinci Code." After sitting through 90 minutes of this, I'm thinking Glasnost was not such a good idea after all.Michael (Steven Brand), an American professor teaching history at Moscow University, finances his passion for treasure hunting with competitive street racing. His racing nemesis, Wolf (Alexander Nevsky), becomes his ally when they embark on a quest to search for an ancient Russian treasure. There's also a sub-plot involving drug dealers, and David Carradine turns up as well.Nevsky, a one-time bodybuilder, appears to have based his acting style on Schwarzenegger--understandable if you've no ideas of your own. His acting makes Steven Seagal look like Daniel Day-Lewis. Not that the rest of the cast is any better. Steven Brand, a Tim Allen lookalike, is about as credible an action hero as Will Geer. Sherilyn Fenn, who plays Wolf's sister, shows none of the acting chops that got her cast in "Twin Peaks," "Wild at Heart," and "Of Mice and Men." As for Carradine, he shows even less interest here than in "Wizards of the Lost Kingdom 2." (If you haven't seen it, spare yourself the agony.)There is literally nothing to recommend this film to anyone. The plot is wafer-thin, the dialogue forced, the camera work is amateurish, and even the car chases are uninteresting. There are some feeble attempts at humor too, but I'll show mercy by not giving an example.Item: Though the film set in Moscow, not one character has an authentic Russian accent.Item: Wolf's car features a collapsible headlight that conceals a missile launcher. I knew street racing was dangerous, but goddamn!Item: In the final car chase, a policeman pursues our heroes and villains. Since he never calls for back-up, I'm guessing there's only one police car in Moscow.Item: Alexander Nevsky studied acting at the Lee Strasbourg Theater Institute. He must have threatened to beat the crap out of someone, because he damned sure didn't get in through his talent.Item: The budget for this film was $10 million. Except for the wrecked cars, I've no idea what they could have spent it on.

I gave it a try, stayed with it for about an hour, but I had to give up. It beat me. Although there was an effort, as one other reviewer noted, it appeared the producers figured they had to dumb it down for the masses. Editing was weak. At one point, the police get a call of a disturbance so they decide to go investigate. Next scene, the disturbance begins! No respect for the viewer. And the clichés - Lord, I lost count. From your typical fight at the bar to the comment, "If I tell you, I'll have to kill you." I can see middle school kids being entertained, but certainly not grown adults. Although I must say, the character of "Wolf" had the best Schwarzenegger impersonation I've ever heard!

David Carradine what are you doing? Sherilyn Fenn what are you doing? Since when does unknown beef boy Alexander Nevsky get top billing over Carradine? Man this movie simply sucked. *** May contain Spoilers here *** A professor who likes to race at night as a hobby gets caught up with the usual suspects: Russian drug lords, backstabbing Columbian doctors and - David Carradine. Oh and this professor is on a journey to find the secret treasure to the nights templar - could they have found more to put into the plot? Sure! Why not throw in an irrelevant useless police force in there as well?! and have them appear whenever we need them to tie up loose ends in our swiss cheese plot?! or how about we kill interesting librarian characters without any explanation whatsoever? yes! let's do it! We've got ourselves a winner here! *** End Spoilers *** The only reason it gets 2 stars is because I found some serious scenes hilarious. The plot is all twisted up in the wrong way, but what I don't understand is how they've got explosions and cars getting busted up but the production quality looks like a film made on a 10g budget! Actually I've seen films made on a 10g budget and at least the acting was decent!! Sad to see actor's grab up a role just to keep themselves busy.

Absolute rubbish...Editing, acting & storyline was very poor... production values not too bad, but overall, RUBBISH!The new would-be Russian big-guy that plays "Wolf" can't act for toffee.Carradine's role is predictable and the closest thing to a good turn in the whole thing... and that's saying something!The Russel Crowre look-alike in the lead role was acceptable, bit that's the best I can say...What a waste of time!