Brawl in Cell Block 99

Vince Vaughn is having a bad day. He loses his job at a garage, finds out his wife is cheating on him, and is probably still distraught over the disaster that was “True Detective” season two.

Maybe it’s because he has a giant cross tattooed on the back of his head, but he decides the solution to these problems is to go into drug dealing.

Everything is going fine until he has to work a job with two Mexican partners. Things fall apart, the police arrive, and the Mexicans open fire. Vaughn is in a position where he could escape and get away scot-free. But Vaughn is a patriot. He has two American flags in his home (actual exposition from the film), and he’s not going to let bad hombres hurt good American cops. So he saves the cops and ends up in jail.

On the second day of his sentence he is visited by an associate of the Mexican drug dealers. He learns they have abducted his now pregnant wife and they have an abortionist who knows how to remove limbs from fetuses while keeping the baby alive. That’s what they will do to Vaughn’s child if he doesn’t pay his debt to them. In order to make amends for killing his partners and saving the cops, Vaughn must kill a specific individual. But the problem is that individual is in a different prison, a maximum security prison, so Vaughn has to work his way up the ladder to get transferred. Using his Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson-like strength to defeat multiple waves of officers, Vaughn’s bad behavior earns him a trip to his desired location, the prison within a prison known as Cell Block 99.

Writer and director S. Craig Zahler has been praised as the second coming of Quentin Tarantino on film podcasts, and while “Brawl in Cell Block 99” shows a lot of heart, it’s pure B movie. The dialogue never dances like Tarantino dialogue does, and the violence is over the top and gratuitous in a “Kill Bill” style but never feels as gory as the filmmakers perhaps hope.

To its credit, “Brawl in Cell Block 99” knows exactly what it is and flies its B movie flag proudly. This makes the ridiculousness found around every corner easier to forgive. If you thrive on art and international films you will probably feel pretty trashy lowering yourself to watch the movie. But you will be hard-pressed to deny the two hours fly by.

Is this a good movie? In an Academy Awards artistic sense, no. Is this a fun movie? Yes. And the more friends you watch it with probably adds to the fun. “Cell Block 99” might find delayed success 20 years from now when it is celebrated on whatever passes for midnight cult showings in the future.

This review should warn you to stay away, but it just doesn’t have the heart to do so. Give the movie a couple of hours. You will either love it or hate it with a grin on your face. Whatever the outcome, it will probably be the best bad film you’ve ever seen.

"Brawl in Cell Block 99" is currently streaming on Netflix.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hfAExhHTMM&w=585