Max Havoc: Ring of Fire (RiffTrax)

Film Year:  2006

Genre:  Action

Director:  Terry Ingram

Starring:  Mickey Hardt, Christina Cox, Linda Thorson, Dean Cain, Rae Dawn Chong, Martin Kove

RiffTrax Year:  2022

Riffers:  Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, Bill Corbett

The Movie

Max Havoc is back by lukewarm demand!  Despite nobody really noticing that the previous film had existed at all, this sequel was made.  According to the Wikipedia article for the first film a sequel was always supposed to come out and help set up a Max Havoc TV series.  This wasn't it.  That film's production wound up being a disaster, with lawsuits being tossed around as a result, and all of that was scrapped.  But it looks like someone decided to throw star Mickey Hardt a bone and dust off Max Havoc for a second film two years later anyway.  Little information seems to be out there on the production of this eventual second film, except that it jumped ship from the Guam locales to Canada as the Guam government was a nightmare to work with.

Max Havoc:  Ring of Fire sees the titular kickboxer-turned-photographer as he arrives in Seattle to perform a photoshoot on a sexy tennis player who is henpecked by her managing mother.  While there, Max befriends a small orphan child who winds up witnessing the murder of his brother and becomes the target of local corruption, led by villainous hotel manager Dean Cain.  Can Max find the child, beat the bad guy, and bang the tennis star in the span of a single day?  You bet!

Ring of Fire tries to scale back to a less trainwrecked production to see if Mickey Hardt has it in him to be a direct to video franchise star, maybe like a lesser Jean-Claude Van Damme or Jason Statham.  Unfortunately the Swiss kickboxer doesn't have much charisma or screen presence so perhaps while the generosity of a second chance was admirable, it was also misguided.  Max Havoc hardly does anything throughout the movie except get his luggage stolen, then randomly appear in the nick of time when someone needs him to kick someone else in the face.  The film strays away from Max quite often, likely because they realized Hardt was sucking the air out of every scene he's in and they're looking for more engaging personalities.  Dean Cain, for example, is a has-been who has been coasting off of playing Superman in a cancelled TV show for the last few decades, but at least he's a somewhat expressive actor.  It's really no wonder the movie seems more interested in him.

Too bad about that hair, Dean.

In fact a lot of the supporting crew in this movie is more interesting than its lead.  The leading lady is a stuntwoman named Christina Cox, who isn't great in this movie but it seems like she's pushing lackluster material harder than Hardt is.  Probably her biggest claim to fame is being a boxing double for Hillary Swank in the Oscar winner Million Dollar Baby, while genre fans will know her from a bit role as a merc in the Vin Diesel sci-fi/fantasy vehicle The Chronicles of Riddick (she's the one with the abs, and you know what scene I'm talking about don't pretend you don't).  Her badgering mother is played by Linda Thorson, who was the unlucky lady who was chosen to replace Diana Rigg on the final season of the non-Marvel-related TV series The Avengers.  A slight role is given to Rae Dawn Chong, who MSTies will know from City Limits and movie fans in general will love from The Quest for Fire, The Color Purple, and Commando.  We also have Karate Kid villain Martin Kove as a corrupt cop, rounding out this rich cast of "Hey, I've seen them before!" actors.

Unfortunately as downward spiraling careers go down the toilet, a movie like Max Havoc:  Ring of Fire happens, where they all wind up in one place filming a movie nobody really wants to make or to see.  I don't know if the producers were still considering a Max Havoc TV series at the time, though this flick does have several curious fade-outs like they were editing in commercial breaks.  If this were a proposed TV pilot it wouldn't surprise me.  I mean, it's hardly a movie so it might as well be.

The Trax

Max Havoc:  Ring of Fire is a fair riff.  There are a few moments that caused me to laugh out loud, though I can't say that for the entire length of the piece.  For the most part it's engaging.  The movie is bearably stupid and there is plenty to comment on, whether with wit or to just poke it.  One of the biggest reactions I had was early on where Bill had a sudden freak-out because a character had his shirt off for seemingly no reason at all just to put it on.  Moments like this are a lot of fun.

I think the ultimate failing is that as dumb as this movie is, it's unremarkable.  They poke fun at how non-Seattle this Canadian town is, and express surprise that the film is obsessed with using a grungy little tunnel as a walkway as much as they do.  They get a kick out of how overbearing the mother is, even during her introduction scene where Mike just suddenly quips "I'm Karen, by the way."  There is a random scene in the middle of the movie where Max Havoc frets about having lost the orphan boy to his lady co-star, only to bail on the urgency of the matter and jump into bed together.  This is nutty stuff.

The riff never feels whole though.  Quite a bit of it feels like safe, filler material, like just reiterating that the female lead is supposed to be a tennis star over and over again and it often feels like stating something because they have a quota that needs to be met.  They show a bit of restraint on Dean Cain, allowing themselves only a couple of Lois & Clark riffs, of which usually feel like a wasted opportunity.  The statement "I was in a room with Teri Hatcher's breasts!" isn't really all that funny while the image of a beaten up Cain with the jab of "I'm nobody's favorite Superman." just didn't land like I think they wanted it to.  And when they have nothing else to say, they find themselves questioning what the film's titular "Ring of Fire" refers to, which is only tepidly amusing at best.  There are some highs to this second round of Max Havoc action, but the whole is not the sum of its parts.

Average