Movie Review: Hunting the “Enhanced” among us…again?

So many (rhetorical) questions. What DID bad guys look like before three-day stubble was perfected by Don Johnson? What did they drive in the years before the black Excursions and Escalades?

“Enhanced” is a unimaginative and generally drab sci-fi thriller about experimental “enhanced” humans on the run and those from SAISEI who hunt them.

The “enhanced” live as off-the-grid as they can, sleeping in vans, doing menial work.

The simple act of defending themselves gets people killed. They can summon up this psychic EMP that knocks electronics out and knocks their adversaries for a look.

They don’t realize they should worry that one of their own might be out hunting and killing them. But there also might be someone from their ranks looking to save them.

No, he’s not bald, not named Xavier and doesn’t have any “special school.”

Anna (Alanna Bale) is our heroine, lying low as a mechanic who needs fewer power tools than most who do that job. George (George Tchortov) is a SAISEI operative, “just following orders…I’m protecting people from their mistakes…try not to take it personally.”

The “subjects” are classified as “Delta, Charlie, Echo and Bravo” class “enhanced.” What about Alpha?

“Enhanced” is the sort of script (James Mark of “Kill Order” wrote and directed it) where a character says “Alphas don’t exist,” and we know before seeing one (Chris Mark) that they do.

There’s a cool bright-blue-eyeball effect that the “enhanced” exhibit before they show how “enhanced” they are. There are cheesier effects — little arm-shield gadgets the SAISEI agents wear over their matching Old Navy pea coats, retractable nightsticks with bright blue bulbs on the tip.

The fights are staged at not-quite-full speed, the dialogue is cheesy and of the “You have what belongs to me” variety.

The performances? Perfunctory.

People put up money for this, other people put in effort. It’s always a shame to write off a picture with “nothing new to see here,” but that pretty much covers “Enhanced.”

MPA Rating: unrated, violence, profanity

Cast: Alanna Bale, George Tchortov, Chris Mark, Adrian Holmes

Credits: Scripted and directed by James Mark. A Vertical Entertainment release.

Running time: 1:40

About Roger Moore

Movie Critic, formerly with McClatchy-Tribune News Service, Orlando Sentinel, published in Spin Magazine, The World and now published here, Orlando Magazine, Autoweek Magazine
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