This review is of the TV-14 version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

At its core, Road House is about how fighting to save a corrupt town from itself can often just result in a lot of infighting and everybody losing. You can’t really save people who don’t want to be saved and you will lose a lot in the process. The message makes sense but the whole film feels ultra empty and hollow by the end of its run. Nothing was really accomplished and you will just be shaking your head the whole time. It’s not remotely satisfying.

The movie follows a guy named James who is supposed to be the best in his field. What is his field? The guy’s a bouncer and gets dangerous bars back into shape. He is hired by a guy named Frank to fix up the most corrupt bar in the business. There are constant fights here and the villains have guns and everything. It won’t be an easy fight but James has never backed down from a challenge before and he’s not planning to start now. Good thing he knows how to fight.

It does feel like a bit of a fool’s errand though because in most cases you would only have to deal with the drunks attacking the bar and stuff. In this case, you have a corrupt guy named Brad who owns most of the town. The reason this ruins the operation is that he can literally pay people to blow up buildings and cause a stir. Naturally the police will look the other way as well and so that means James is now fighting an entire town. At this point there is no way to actually fix things.

So during the movie you have a set formula where James will kick some people out, then Brad shows up with threats. James takes more out and then Brad’s hired goons beat them up. There is rarely ever any big progress here and most of the characters really should just abandon town. Naturally it’s not that easy for everyone though so for those people I can see why they would mainly stay out of the way. If you try to help James out then you might lose everything and it’s not like he’ll help you get the money back.

Where the film just starts to get tiresome is when the villains really ramp the damages up and the hero still can’t do anything. They burn down the store of James’ friend and he is powerless to stop them. Then James murders one of Brad’s top fighters so the guy goes and murders his friends. Every time James makes a move, his friends pay the price. It was just too many people by the end so everything felt hollow.

It also doesn’t help that the romance was really weak. James initially tries to present himself as someone who has no time for romance since he is completely on the job and yet it takes very little effort from Elizabeth to break him. Seriously, I was expecting him to put up more of a fight. Then of course she wants him to lay off the danger and does a complete 180 near the end. She is really upset when James murders the right hand man but then doesn’t care once the main villain is taken out. Even though they’re related?

Her character didn’t really make any kind of sense and they should not have been together. It’s indirectly her fault that James lost his friend by the end although leaving him alone was a terrible move on James’ part once he knew that the danger was around. I know he likes to live dangerously but he gets jumped several times during the movie and never seems to learn his lesson. There are several times where he would have been dead if Wade hadn’t showed up and James initially didn’t even ask for him.

For all the tough talk about how James is the best in the business, he seems only slightly above average in a fight. I know this isn’t a superhero film but they could have still made him a little more untouchable. They never go into his origin all that much but that’s probably a good thing to keep up his air of mystery. A prequel about him actually being the best could be interesting but films like this that just drop you in the middle of the action can be a little rare at times.

Ultimately the film just didn’t execute well enough to stay on top. The best character would be his friend Wade although the guy did flirt a little too much with Elizabeth. I feel like it was to warn James to an extent but even so it wasn’t a great idea. Frank may have hired James but he was mainly useless for the whole film. Brad is basically your classic corrupt villain. He takes a lot of risks and should have been taken out but has the powers of money and good fortune on his side. Maybe even some super durability.

In the climax he gets shot so many times and keeps on moving. I was pretty surprised but I do get the message the film was going for. It was just way too little too late. It sure it easy for everyone to step up once the danger has passed but nobody got up when it counted. The scene doesn’t come across nearly as satisfying as the movie is trying to present it as. It’s the definition of a hollow victory on all sides. The fight scenes throughout the film tend to be pretty fun but the film’s tone is just a bit off. There are not enough likable characters here and by the middle point you don’t really feel like the town is worth saving either. Too many characters are just corrupt so the mission should have been abandoned.

I think there could have been a way to have handled this where James learns that lesson and leaves before it’s too late but at least with the current setup it didn’t work. The first half was a lot more interesting with the setup and seeing James slowly learn how the town works. It’s just going for a much more jaded view on the situation which to be honest is fairly realistic. It just doesn’t work particularly well as a movie.

Overall, Road House is definitely not a film that will be remembered as one of the very good ones. It did not stick the landing but had a lot of fundamental problems even before reaching that point. If anything for once I dare say a prequel about him succeeding at the previous bar would be more interesting. I want to see the main character actually showing why he is the best, rather than trying to live off of the hype and not getting very far. Even if you’re a big fan of bars, I would say to avoid this one.

Overall 3/10