The Specialist: A low-rent, lousy plot "thriller" from the early 90's which plays like everything bad in film from that era - big, loud, and dumb. Sylvester Stallone is Ray Quick, a former government operative specializing in explosions. After leaving the company over a difference of opinion (he didn't want to kill innocent civilians; his partner, psychopath Ned Trent, played by James Woods, did), he re-settles in Miami and offers his services as an independent contractor. Enter May Munro (Sharon Stone), a woman with a past that wants revenge on a Cuban-American mobster (Rod Steiger) and his son (Eric Roberts) who were responsible for the death of her family years ago. So Quick agrees to help her, while dodging Trent, who wants to settle the score with Quick as well as May's own agenda. A ponderous movie attempting to be an action thriller with a heavy romance angle to capitalize on Stone's popularity at the time, it comes across as sloppy and silly, with an incessant over-dubbed conversation between the two leads that gets old quickly. Bad casting all the way around here - Roberts and Rod Steiger are the least believable Cubans you have ever seen. In fact, Hispanics should be offended by Steiger's portrayal, who apparently used Desi Arnaz as his dialect coach. Not to mention Stone is playing a woman whose family was murdered when she was a child, but neither Roberts or Steiger aged one bit from the various flashbacks and all the make-up in the world won't make Stone look less than middle-aged. Woods comes out best, but even he can't make chicken salad out of chicken crap. Composer John Barry must have re-used every cast-off James Bond snippet he ever wrote, mostly the schmaltzy ones. I kept thinking I was watching "Moonraker". Another waste of time from director Luis Llosa, whose best movie is equal to that of a good director's worst. Completely disappointing in almost every way. Woodchuck sez, "Avoid this."
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