High Voltage

Plot synopsis:
The film begins with a bus driving along a snow-covered roadway in the Sierra Nevada between Nevada City, California, and Reno, Nevada. Soon the vehicle gets hopelessly stuck in deep snow forty miles from the nearest town. Needing shelter, the driver "Gus" (Billy Bevan) and his four passengers find refuge in an isolated one-room log church. The passengers include "Billie" (Carole Lombard), who is an escaped criminal being escorted back to jail in New York by a deputy sheriff, "Dan Egan" (Owen Moore); a young woman, "The Kid," (Diane Ellis) on her way to Chicago to meet her boyfriend; and "Hickerson," a pompous, ill-tempered banker. In the church the group finds "Bill" (William Boyd), a self-described "hobo," who had found shelter there earlier. Tensions quickly arise in the group over their general plight, petty jealousies, and concerns about how six people are going to share the small supply of food that Bill had brought with him.
After a few days being stranded, the group sees a passing mail plane high in the sky. They try to attract the pilot's attention, but he is too far away to see them. More days pass, and the group continues to ration their dwindling supplies and battle the subfreezing temperatures. To keep warm they begin to break up the church's pews and other furnishings to use as firewood in the room's potbelly stove. The group's desperation intensifies, as does a romance between Bill and Billie. Soon Bill confides to her that he too is a wanted criminal, a fugitive from Saint Paul, Minnesota. As conditions worsen, The Kid collapses from hunger and become delirious; and the church's interior becomes almost bare as more furnishings--even the church's pulpit and pump organ--are consigned to the stove. Bill and Billie finally commit to leaving to avoid being imprisoned if the group is somehow rescued. They quietly depart during the night, hoping to reach a ranger station ten miles away. Everyone else is sleeping except Dan, the deputy sheriff, who sees the two leaving; but he does nothing to stop them. After walking a short distance through snowdrifts, Bill and Billie hear and then see a search plane slowly circling overhead at low altitude. Realizing that the others inside the church will not hear the plane's engine, they rush back and awaken them. The group hurriedly builds a signal fire, which the plane's pilot sees. He parachutes a box of provisions to them with a note saying that help will be sent immediately.
The next day the group sees a rescue party heading toward the church. While awaiting their rescuers, Dan observes Bill and Billie sitting together on the floor. From his coat pocket Dan pulls out Billie's extradition papers and a "wanted" notice that includes a photograph of Bill and information about his being a fugitive from Saint Paul. Dan walks over to the stove, now cold from no fires, and tosses both papers into it. Bill and Billie see him discard the papers, and they look at one another. Bill then gets up, retrieves the papers from the stove, gives them back to Dan, and asks him to drop him off in Saint Paul on his way back to New York with Billie.

Tags: violence, murder

Review:
really good action.
Although the plot is really transparent action and cast made this movie look better.
Acrobatic fights and shooting are nicely done, you can watch them over and over again.
This is type of movie to relax after long day.I like this one and I recommend it to anyone who like well done action and tired for the day of thinking.Just sit back relax and enjoy the show.
I gave it 8 out of 10.
Not Bad John Woo Style Action Film With Good Performances and Plenty of Action That Overcome A Weak Script.
It's kind of a weak film, but it's rather entertaining and the late night crowd in the mood for a fast and fun actioner should enjoy it.
I thought the cast did a fine job, Antonio Sabato Jr., is a cool action hero and I was glad to see the great, rising young star Lochlyn Munroe (Dead Man On Campus, A Night At The Roxbury) in it as one of Sabato's members who may or may not be a bad guy.
Shannon Lee (Bruce's daughter) and some famous Hong Kong stars also turn in good performances.
Done in the style of John Woo, this has lots of fast paced shoot outs, good surprises and twists, and a cool "Pulp Fiction" like score in the background.
The story is cliched at times and it gets a bit melodramatic when it comes to the end, but I still enjoyed this film and it should please ones looking for a good way to kill 90 minutes..
Excellent John Woo Style Action Movie..
This movie is really good, especially for a direct to video movie.
The gunfights are cool and the fights are well executed.
Lots of action to keep people happy.
The theme song is awesome!
I saw this movie almost a year ago and I still find myself humming the theme from time to time!
A sure bet for action fans!.
An excellent film that was totally under rated.
An excellent film that was totally under rated.
the film comes across as having a very "pulp Fiction" feel to it, and yet it delivers a lot of fun action!!
. "High Voltage" really marked the action debut of Shannon Lee , alongside Antonio Sabato Jr looking the most impressive martial arts wise he's ever looked..
Excellent!!!.
An Excellent yet underrated actioner, with a "Pulp Fiction" feel.
that never got the respect it deserved.
Sabato has a star quality.
good action, good humor and good drama.
No wonder this film became  a cult  movie to  Martial Arts/action fans..
This movie reaches all time lows in the Awful Cheesy Kung Fu Movie genre..
I laughed so hard watching this movie I nearly killed myself.
It is so unbelievably bad and so completely unaware of how bad it is that you can't help staring in shocked disbelief.
The dialogue is horrible, the acting sucks (save for a pretty OK performance by Monroe), and the directing is a textbook of cheesy bad timing.
But what really makes the film worth watching is the action sequences.
These little cut rate gems rival even the worst overseas, badly dubbed monstrosities.
Examples: A guy dies from a gunshot wound to the shoulder; people jump off walls and fly 20 feet in the air; Every time somebody turns quickly or reaches for something, you get the ever popular "whoosh" sound effect.
This movie is horrible, but it's a great late night choice if you want to see just how bad bad film making can be..
I love this movie.
This is the only time in my life I'll ever be able to say this but I love this movie because my friend, Ivan Visali, made this movie.
Haven't seen him in 18 years but we programmed together in LA for about a year and became friends.
Very talented individual.So looked at from that perspective, I looked at it for where he was in his movie making.
This was his first movie so you have to look at it from that perspective too.Was this a great movie.
No. But you should know something.
He wrote a script for 4 years and got all the funding lined up and guess what, those idiots with the money thought they knew more about writing a script than he did (well my friend and his co-writer).So he said they basically gutted what they wrote.
Would have loved to see HIS movie made.What's totally cool is that Amy Smart got her first movie credit in this movie!
How awesome is that!
Not sure how that happened.
Ivan, if you read this, get back in the game buddy.
I believe in you!.
Horrible..
Basically, most of the actors rush their lines, and except for the two Antonios (Lochlyn Munro somewhat OK), the acting basically sucked, which means the directing also sucked.
Weak story, weak writing.
Worst of all was the music.
It's also funny that the writer (Mike Mains, the worst actor in the film) wrote himself the part of having the first primary relationship in the film.
The interaction between the two of them is about as exciting as that between a turtle and a rock.The positive reviews here are a joke.
It is however, an adequate film for those who want to get high and laugh at how awful this film is..
embarrassing to view.
Some guy...
RUGBY15 or something was talking about how awful this movie is.
Well let me tell you he is dead wrong...Sort of.Yes. The movie is bad in all those ways he mentions, but what's worse is the music.
A character can't even remove a pair of sunglasses without some ridiculous cymbal crash or something.
The soundscape is so ludicrous that it reaches a point of being grotesque.I could not turn this piece of solid waste off, it seriously was the most embarrassingly hackneyed pile of sh** in the world.
In one of the last gunfights, the entire shootout comes to a dead halt as a character named Bulldog rides through a door on his motorcycle with a chick wrapped in a leather bra.I have a little hint here to filmmakers -- simply standing behind a wooden door or desk, or an upolstered armchair will not be enough to stop a bullet.This movie has a lot of characters jumping through the air sideways and in slow motion as they fire off two guns at once while they have at least a dozen gun battles with the Vietamese mafia (yes, you heard right...
It's those god**** Vietamese again...only now they are in a mafia apparently).This film looks as though it were directed, shot and written by really uncreative and possibly mentally retarded 12 year old whit-e-trash orphans.Here's a sample of some brilliant dialogue in an exchange between Bulldog and Johnny: "Go to hell Johnny!" "...No." "Yes. That's where you're going.
To hell.
Because you'll be dead." "You're the one whose gonna be going to hell and be dead mother f****r."I felt physically embarrassed watching this..
I rented this because of Koichi Sakamoto......
....and I have to say this movie SUCKS.
I loved Sakamoto's stunt coordination of his other movie "Drive" which featured some of the best martial arts choreography way before "Matrix." After watching "High Voltage" though, I was left with a bad taste in my mouth.
The script was beyond incoherent and don't get me started with the acting.
Well what else can one expect from a B-movie.
The action was obviously contrived from the numerous Gun-Fu, John Woo style movies and the director doesn't even add his own touch to it which leaves the action scenes bland.
It is a shame for the guns was the reason why I rented the movie.
I have to say to all those who want to kill time, you can do something much better, like read a book or go for a drive.
By the way, I highly recommend you people rent "Drive" instead.
Yeah, it has a bad script and mediocre acting but it far surpasses the fizzle known as "High Voltage."The Movie 0 out ****  The action scenes * out of ****.
Move over "Plan Nine From Outer Space" ....
a new "worst film ever made" has arrived.
This thing should be shown to every aspiring actor, director, writer and producer, to show them how really bad "bad" can be.
Why it's not billed as a comedy is the big question.
Everyone involved should hang their heads in shame, or better yet, they should all be drummed-out of whatever guild or union they belong to.
I have to admit I watched it from beginning to end, sort of like watching a terrible train wreck.But the real puzzle here is why any of the other reviewers would say they enjoyed it.
The fact that these people are living among us, walking around in public, and worse yet, driving on our streets, panics the hell outta me.