"Blood and Bone": one-paragraph review

Isaiah Bone (Michael Jai White) takes another one down.

I didn't go in expecting much, and I wasn't disappointed. "Blood and Bone" is a straight-to-home-video action flick from 2009. It was directed by Ben Ramsey, and it stars Michael Jai White, Dante Basco, Michelle Belegrin, Nona Gaye, Eamonn Walker, Julian Sands, Kevin Phillips, and a slew of martial artists: Matt Mullins, Ernest "The Cat" Miller, and MMA fighters Bob Sapp, Kimbo Slice,* Maurice Smith, and Gina Carano. Isaiah Bone (White) has a friend named Danny (Phillips) who has a wife (Belegrin) and child on the outside. Danny is killed by hulking inmate JC (Slice) and his gang; before Danny dies, he asks Bone to take care of his wife and son. Once back out in the world, Bone heads to a house where there's a room for rent. The landlady, Tamara (Gaye), is suspicious of him at first, but she warms up once she realizes that he's good with kids and on friendly terms with old Roberto (Dick Anthony Williams), who likes to sit on the front stoop and challenge people to chess. Bone picked this particular house because he knows Danny's son Jared (Brody & Cody Lee) is there. Danny's gorgeous wife Angela (Michelle Belegrin is distractingly beautiful) has been expropriated by local crime lord James (Walker); she has since become a drug addict, so Bone is going to have to figure out how to rescue her from her current life and reunite her with her son. Meanwhile, Bone works the street-fighting circuit with mouthy promoter Pinball, who becomes a sort of manager for Bone. As Bone makes a name for himself as the fighter to beat, he gets the attention of James, which brings him closer to Angela. Can Bone rescue Angela, get her in detox, and reunite her with Jared? It's a straight-to-video movie, so take a guess. People don't watch movies like "Blood and Bone" because they're looking for a deep, philosophical message; the movie is structured like an old-style porn flick, i.e., the thin plot exists just to get us from one intense scene to another. Despite the slew of fight scenes, though, "Blood and Bone" actually slows down in the middle to engage in a bit of plot and character development. The story has the sort of logic holes you'd expect in a film of this caliber, but there were moments when the script was smart, even witty. Michael Jai White carries the film on his muscular shoulders; the guy is an expert in nine different martial arts, but the choreography tends to favor the wide stances and powerful, dramatic kicks found mostly in Korean styles. In all, I'd call "Blood and Bone" good, stupid fun. It's not going to win any Oscars, but it was never meant to, and there's something weirdly heartwarming about having a cast so stacked with legitimate martial artists, many of whom get a few moments in the film to shine.

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*Kimbo Slice passed away in 2016 of congestive heart failure. He was only 42.