‘Life After Fighting’ Movie Review: Bren Foster’s High-Intensity Action Thriller Goes for The Jugular
Photo from Vertical Entertainment
From Jeff Nelson
Many modern martial arts action films are judged by their ability to generate massive audience reactions. John Wick and The Raid are obvious benchmarks with some of the most memorable fight choreography in recent times. Bren Foster’s Life After Fighting goes balls-to-the-wall with the best action sequences you’ll see all year. It takes time to get there, although it’s well worth the wait.
Alex Faulkner (Foster) is a martial arts instructor who is forced to put his fighting skills to the ultimate test after two of his students mysteriously disappear. He’s led to a group of international child traffickers, who will stop at nothing to get what they want.
The martial arts studio is Alex's passion and business, but he has a respected professional sports background. He trains students of all ages, while current world champion Arrio Gomez (Eddie Arrazola) tries to rope him back into the sport for an epic one-on-one fight. However, Alex’s days of professional fighting are over. His entire life turns upside down when he quickly falls in love with Samantha Hathaway (Cassie Howarth), who recently signed her young son (Anthony Nassif) up for classes. Trouble stirs when Samantha’s scumbag ex-husband, Victor (Luke Ford), refuses to back down to her new romance.
Life After Fighting spends the first half of the movie building dramatic stakes in the surface-level romance and the investigation of the missing children. It’s a little over-embellished, especially since the narrative hides the incredibly obvious identities of its international child traffickers for too long. Alex and Samantha’s relationship is a plot device that interrupts the status quo, pushing the story forward, but there isn’t anything to make the audience feel any particular way about it other than wanting to see child traffickers get their violent comeuppance.
Alex is an unstoppable, one-man army and the top-tier fight choreography gets better with each passing brawl. He moves from landing clean, technical blows to unleashing all-out brutality on his opponents in a fight for survival. The third act is an explosion of violence that makes full use of small environments, transforming mundane structures into sources of ruthless executions. It’s all sold by Foster, who is a natural action star. Beyond having “the look,” he also has the charismatic screen presence and choreographic ability to follow it all up.
The melodrama and thriller elements don’t always click, but there’s no denying Foster’s ability to sell the deadly action setpieces. When Life After Fighting kicks into high gear, it makes you want to cheer and groan in response to the first-class action and its brutal aftermath. It leans too far into genre clichés, but the last hour is a non-stop roller coaster that is simply irresistible.
Rating: 3.5/5
Life After Fighting is now available to buy or rent via digital retailers.
