Cutler & Hatch
Paul Cutler (Gabriel Macht) is a top S.W.A.T. leader in Los Angeles which is why he finds himself on a special assignment to bring the Detroit S.W.A.T. team up to current standards. Unsurprisingly he finds his presence in Detroit not overly welcome especially from team member Justin Kellogg (Nicholas Gonzalez) who doesn't take kindly to being bossed about by the outsider. But things takes a turn for the strange when during an operation they take a man down only for the woman they believe is the hostage to commit suicide. The man turns out to be Walter Hatch (Robert Patrick) a highly specialized government agent who was also the woman's boyfriend and now he plans to make Cutler and his team pay.
Here is the good news; "S.W.A.T.: Firefight" was a lot more entertaining than I expected it to be but at the same time this isn't a great movie. In many ways this is a movie which should appeal to those who when they were young played at being the make believe hero who would rush in to danger to take down the bad guy. As such what we get in "S.W.A.T.: Firefight" is Cutler coming up against a highly trained government agent who has those sort of elite skills which make him confident, cocky, dangerous and psychotic. There really isn't much more to say as beyond this set up we have some cliches from some of Detroit's finest not wanting Cutler around to him falling for a police shrink and yes of course she ends up Hatch's target as part of the payback.
The thing about "S.W.A.T.: Firefight" is that beyond the entertainment of the action there isn't much else to it and in fact at times when it is taking us through S.W.A.T. drills it ends up feeling incredibly forced as if it is trying too hard to be authentic when it comes to the details. Thankfully the casting still makes this work with Gabriel Macht doing a nice job of playing Cutler whilst Robert Patrick makes for a good psycho with that cockiness which comes from knowing the system.
What this all boils down to is that "S.W.A.T.: Firefight" is an entertaining action movie especially for those who once played at being a make believe hero. But there is little more to it than that and it is the sort of movie which after you have watched once you will probably only watch again if you come across it whilst channel surfing late at night.
