With Den of Thieves, debuting director Christian Gudegast has made a heist sandwich, with bookended shootouts subbing for slices of Wonder Bread. Having penned the 2016 action sequel London Has Fallen, Gudegast sticks with the ingredient he knows best: Gerard Butler.

The Geostorm star takes the lead as “Big Nick” O’Brien, a detective with the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department. As the head of its Major Crimes division, O’Brien is a roguish bender and breaker of rules — your basic bundle of unshaven swagger. He also operates within that swath of gray that allows him to act like the criminals he earns a salary to catch; the movie more than suggests the only difference between O’Brien and his prey is the badge — in fact, it underlines it in a finale that literally sticks a label on the lawman (“SHERIFF”) to distinguish him from the other armed tough guy in a bulletproof vest.

The other armed tough guy in a bulletproof vest is Merrimen (Pablo Schreiber, 2018’s Skyscraper), a freshly sprung felon who wastes no time planning the heist of a lifetime: robbing the Federal Reserve Bank of Los Angeles of millions in untraceable cash headed for the shredder. Stuck between the two men is Donnie (O’Shea Jackson Jr., Straight Outta Compton), a member of Merrimen’s crew forced to be an informant to O’Brien.

Playing like Michael Mann’s Heat shorn of its great soundtrack and Oscar-caliber performances, Den of Thieves could be called Canned Heat. With swinging-dick posturing and testosterone squeezed from each sprocket of film, it also could be called the greatest David Ayer movie David Ayer did not make, presumably because he was too busy counting his Netflix bucks. Meanwhile, Gudegast swoops in and shoves an overstuffed crime epic onto our plate, complete with an ending that dares to go full Keyzer Söze. We didn’t ask for Den, and it sure didn’t look good, but once we took a bite … we liked it! Hey, Mikey! —Rod Lott

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At all of 19 years young, Jeff Roberts (Fart: The Movie’s Jason Majik, redefining “overwrought”) has a problem: In addition to mental issues and acid-washed jeans, he’s got the HIV. Shortly after receiving this death sentence from a rather lackadaisical doctor who can’t be bothered to get up from his chair, Jeff snaps and vows to get back at those who gave — or may have given — him the virus. Filling a syringe with his own blood, he becomes … wait for it … the L.A. AIDS Jabber.

Okay, so while he never goes by that name, the movie sure does. Unfortunately, although unsurprisingly, that eyebrow-raiser of a title is its most interesting aspect. Shot on video, the bad-taste slasher takes itself too seriously as Jeff jabs his way toward vengeance, starting with that whore Tanya. As people die by the little prick, a detective and a news reporter investigate, so much so that the sick flick becomes more about them.

The only movie written, directed and produced by actor Drew Godderis (Evil Spawn), L.A. AIDS Jabber cannot truly be discussed without spoiling its M. Night Shyamalandafuckyousay twist ending: The doctor learns the test results were mixed up; therefore, Jeff is not — repeat: not — infected with the HIV virus. One could say you definitely didn’t see that coming — Godderis included, because if Jeff’s blood was all on the up-and-up, what killed his victims?

The movie is sometimes called just plain ol’ Jabber, but hell, that’s no fun. —Rod Lott

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For her heroic efforts in a hostage situation, the Heather Langenkampy policewoman Lisa Ryder (Donna Adams) is immediately promoted to detective after shooting the crazed gunman dead — and I do mean immediately, as she and her fellow California cops are still at the crime scene!

Her first assignment is to find out who is behind Palm City’s string of prostitute murders. As viewers, we know who’s to blame … kinda: Zipperface, a dude decked out in S&M leather, head to toe. Imagine if the Gimp from Pulp Fiction got his own spinoff movie. That’s what Zipperface is — and also more fun to say than watch.

Ryder’s investigation leads her to local photographer Michael Walker (Jonathan Mandell, California Hot Wax), who’d be creepy even if he didn’t sport a butt cut. Despite being on the authorities’ radar for the serial killings, Walker thinks it’s a good idea to lure Ryder into posing for risqué photos by telling her he’s shooting an “Women of Valor” exhibition for an upcoming gallery show. Despite a rep as a top-notch member of law enforcement, she not only falls for it, but falls head over heels for the goob. Sigh, ain’t love grand?

Directed by Mansour Pourmand (not that that means anything), Zipperface plays like the average Skinemax erotic thriller with below-average lighting. In her lone film credit, Ryder does okay for a neophyte, but the romance forced upon her could curdle milk. The movie is sleazy enough to make one believe the scenes of Zipperface assaulting hookers were Pourmand’s top priority, and anything in between was gravy, however ill-whisked.

Lending credence to this theory is that when Ryder’s William Devane-esque partner (David Clover, Kentucky Fried Movie) unmasks Zipperface, he more or less exclaims, “Hey, it’s that guy you probably don’t remember, but he’s related to that prominent character you do!” Otherwise, the viewer would be confused, since Day-Job Zipperface basically shows up in one scene early in the film — a cheat as egregious as the denouement of the first Saw. —Rod Lott

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Displaying the lens-flared glaze of your grandmother’s favorite CBS prime-time procedural, Warner Bros.’ direct-to-video Deep Blue Sea 2 swims into sharksploitation-friendly waters … and sinks straight to the ocean floor. Directed by Darin Scott (Tales from the Hood 2), the belated sequel to Renny Harlin’s 1999 hit arrives with a title sequence that thinks it’s in a 007 movie, complete with a shapely scuba diver in silhouette and a jaw-droppingly horrendous ballad. A sample of the theme song’s IP-wedged lyrics:

Tread into the riptide
Falling from the light coming through
Trading dreams for nightmares
The undertow of gloom in the blue
Drowning in the deep blue sea

Folks, the movie only manages to metastasize from there.

Dr. Misty Calhoun (Danielle Savre, Boogeyman 2), a marine conservationist with a ridiculous name and a push-up bra, is offered five years’ funding to consult on a project with a big pharma firm. The research takes place at a tiny complex off the coast of South Africa. There, Rx giant Carl Durant (Michael Beach, Insidious: Chapter 2) runs intelligence-enhancing experiments on highly lethal bull sharks. He teaches them to swim in formation and obey simple commands, with the help of drugs and a training clicker not unlike the one wielded by Chris Pratt to coach dinosaurs in Jurassic World. Here, it’s clicked by Trent Slater (Rob Mayes, John Dies at the End), a living Ken doll sewn into a wetsuit.

Just as in the original film, Durant’s experiment goes awry, but now with markedly less convincing effects and the boneheaded addition of baby sharks that will remind viewers of Baby Groot. Savre, Beach and Mayes fill the movie’s respective blanks left by Saffron Burrows, Samuel L. Jackson and Thomas Jane, aping their character traits and mannerisms, yet only after stripping them to a single, flat dimension. Every scene, every story beat, every camera filter acts as a deliberate recall to Harlin’s picture; Scott even shamelessly tries to duplicate Jackson’s famed holy-shit moment. The sets look like a best-guess facsimile, were Deep Blue Sea fortunate enough to be adapted into an amusement-park attraction. All that’s missing from Scott’s wretched sequel is LL Cool J’s parrot.

Well, that’s not true — entertainment is also a no-show. Whereas I’ve seen the ’99 Deep Blue Sea three times, I barely could stomach a single viewing of Deep Blue Sea 2. I’ll give the sequel this, though: It stopped at 94 minutes instead of going to 95. —Rod Lott

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When Time Ran Out … could refer to the end of producer Irwin Allen’s reign as the movies’ “master of disaster.” A huge financial bomb, the film forced him into made–for–TV movie pastures for the half-dozen years his once-golden career had left. It represents something of an Irwin Allen all-star edition, too, reuniting The Towering Inferno above-the-line talent Paul Newman and William Holden, as well as The Poseidon Adventure second fiddles Ernest Borgnine and Red Buttons. Too bad getting the gang back together was all for naught.

You can break the story down to four primary beats:
• On a South Pacific island, an oil drilling foreman named Hank (Newman) is deeply concerned by a nearby active volcano.
• Shelby (Holden), a money-first hotel developer, not so much.
• Everyone is screwing around on one another, making for a cast list bordering on the incestuous.
• The volcano erupts.

In the compulsory hullabaloo, Hank and his tight-shirted ex-girlfriend/Shelby’s current girlfriend (Jacqueline Bisset, The Deep) rally people to trek to safety — or die trying. Minorities fare poorly, in part because they’re not white enough to hold on tight, I guess. The big set piece is rather dull, unless watching Burgess Meredith (SST: Death Flight) doing a wire-walking act across a rickety bridge in real time is your idea of crackling entertainment. James Goldstone, who directed the infinitely superior Rollercoaster, pulls off a flood sequence that is better than any of the lava scenes, because those look like you’re peering down into a can of red paint being mixed at Home Depot. The climactic hotel destruction should be the pièce de résistance; instead, it’s so cartoony, today’s viewer would not flinch if the word “KABLOOEY!” appeared onscreen.

Early in the movie is a tantalizing bit of would-be foreshadowing as Veronica Hamel (Beyond the Poseidon Adventure) warns of footlong centipedes emerging from the volcano … yet we never get to see them. In their place are James Franciscus (Beneath the Planet of the Apes) in a uniform made of Jiffy Pop foil; Edward Albert (The House Where Evil Dwells) sporting a ’do seemingly shaped by a cafeteria lady’s hairnet; Pat Morita (Do or Die) doing what amounts to an impression of Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany’s; and Allen’s untalented wife, Sheila, in a most unflattering muumuu. —Rod Lott

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