PENTATHLON (Bruce Malmuth, 1994)

[ShawnWatson]

Who the hell is still buying DVD?

Steven Seagal once said that he was amazed that Bruce Malmuth could make it as a director as the man was barely capable of putting one foot in front of the other.

[Jox]

He must have had the right connections as they are stories of him not being competent on the main films he did. I'm even surprised they still wanted to work with him on PENTATHLON, after he quickly brought STONE COLD over budget (and was then replaced by Craig Baxley). He may have known the producer, who told me Malmuth was in almost in tears on the set, truly believing he was making a masterpiece and Dolph would get an Oscar for it. Reportedly a very nice guy though.

[Jox]

Who the hell is still buying DVD?

The latest numbers in France for DVD/BR sales are 84% for DVDs in volume (units sold) market share and 75% in gross (and yet the number of titles being released on BR is very important):
http://www.zdnet.fr/blogs/digital-home- ... 847460.htm

Business-wise the physical market dropped from 1.385 billion € gross in 2010 to 596 million in 2016... Numbers can vary depending on the territories (Germany's being quite strong supposedly) but this seems somewhat representative of many countries markets.

[TEMIRLAN]

even as a kid i never heard about this film! is it any good?

[Jox]

20-22 years ago it's was his worst film by far, but even with its obvious issues it holds up better today (just don't expect an action-packed movie)...

[Jox]

A new DVD Japanese edition scheduled for June 29.
https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B06Y2CGSVD/



Too bad that the Blu-ray format doesn't sell well enough in Japan for the distributors to release Dolph titles in HD, they would probably have some of the best masters and encoding/compression...

[Scifibuff5]

Saw this one when El Rey aired it during their Dolph Summer Movie Marathon (they also played The Last Warrior, which was also cited as one of his worse but played more like deleted scenes from Bridge of Dragons, LOL).

I can't honestly say it's mediocre as Dolph once again tries to cheat his accent, gets some solid fights and it's another rather unusual premise. I won't deny it that it sort of ends rather anti-climatic as if the budget suddenly collapsed or they only had a few days to get certain takes. I didn't know director/actor Malmuth also handled Stone Cold initially but I do know he also worked on Nighthawks and it seems like he should've cooled off since Hollywood never really seemed to know how to market Dolph and most of his films did better in Japan or on home video than any LA or NY premiere, let alone his own career.

I realize Seagal is a stuck-up nimrod when it comes to logic and given his unprofessional behavior but Hard to Kill is definitely a film that sort of gooses around before suddenly erupting into non-stop violence so I'm definitely seeing some forceable habits here from director Malmuth.

[Jox]

I won't deny it that it sort of ends rather anti-climatic as if the budget suddenly collapsed or they only had a few days to get certain takes.

Well the budget collapsed well before the end production and that shows everywhere. I think Dolph was told and expected twice as much the budget that it had when he first arrived on set. Despite being made during his bankable years, distributors and financiers probably did not care about the project even though the previous drafts of the script were much more action/adventure oriented.

[Scifibuff5]

That makes better sense because before the ending, you have Dolph's coach pal vanish, the love story doesn't entirely materialize and how the villains smuggle in some of these acts of violence without being seen does take some extra suspension of disbelief.

[Jox]

A new DVD Japanese edition scheduled for June 29.
https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B06Y2CGSVD/



Too bad that the Blu-ray format doesn't sell well enough in Japan for the distributors to release Dolph titles in HD, they would probably have some of the best masters and encoding/compression...

Final cover:

[Jox]

New Japanese DVD back cover

[savagesketch]

Any ideas as to what exactly was Malmuth's issues on set? Was watching a Q&A that was conducted with Brian Bosworth during a screening of STONE COLD:

https://youtu.be/jeBXCxPXl3g

Bosworth also alluded to Malmuth's ineptitude on set. Bosworth claims that he had some "personal issues that got in the way" of directing, resulting in his being fired. Any idea what these issues were? Alcoholism? Seems like every film of his was plagued with problems that Malmuth allegedly caused...

[Jox]

On STONE COLD, Malmuth also reportedly blew up the entire budget in a very short time which was a big reason for firing him and getting Baxley to replace him (who actually had turned down Seagal who wanted him to direct HARD TO KILL, officially credited to Malmuth funnily).

In a nutshell from what I gathered from the PENTATHLON producer Martin Caan, Malmuth was a nice guy but kind of an illuminated person (really believing Dolph would win an Oscar for it, having tears watching the dailies) and very slow on the set which was not well organised, there would be constant arguments between the three of them, Caan, Malmuth, and Dolph... From what I gathered overall, Malmuth seemed to be someone who somehow managed make his way into directing whereas he was not really competent.

[Jox]

Roger E. Mosley (left on the pic below) almost got to play Apollo Creed in the first ROCKY...

[savagesketch]

Happy Easter all! Here's the latest episode of "I MUST BREAK" THIS PODCAST, this time focusing on 1994's PENTATHLON! Joining me to discuss this somewhat misguided film is Mike Fury, author of LIFE OF ACTION!

Please continue subscribing and helping spread the word!

https://imustbreakthispodcast.wordpress ... entathlon/
https://soundcloud.com/imustbreakthispo ... pentathlon