Final Score (2018)

Directed by: Scott Mann | 104 minutes | action | Actors: Dave Bautista, Pierce Brosnan, Martyn Ford, Ray Stevenson, Stella Paris, Lara Peake, Ralph Brown, Lucy Gaskell, Victoria Broom, Amit Shah, Bern Collaço, Craig Conway, Gordon Alexander

Rarely could a simple pitch of a film cover the load so well. Think of Pierce Brosnan and Dave Bautista who have to fend off evil terrorists in a closed football stadium. In other words: ‘Die Hard’ in a football stadium. If that premise already horrifies you, you’d better avoid ‘Final Score’ like the plague. If you can easily indulge in pulp, you can actually have a happy time, because ‘Final Score’ is so over the top and bad that it is actually quite fun at times.

Just to give some context: ‘Final Score’ revolves around war veteran Knox (yes, really), played by Dave Bautista (‘Guardians of the Galaxy’), who visits a football match in London with his niece. Once seated in the stadium, Russian revolutionaries work behind the scenes to completely lock the stadium, because in the stadium is a defected revolutionary Dimitri (Pierce Brosnan who has once again pulled out his accent drum). Ex-soldier Knox soon catches up with things and tries to stop the terrorists with the help of steward and ultimate comic relief Faisal (Amit Shah, “Breathe”) before they blow up the stadium if they don’t catch Dimitri. Too bad his niece is in the stadium; After all, Knox needs a weak spot to provide the terrorists with some extra ammunition.

It should be clear that ‘Final Score’ is a film where you have to put every ounce of your mind to zero. Director Scott Mann (‘Heist’) delivers an ultimate B-movie with ‘Final Score’, entirely with caricatural characters, backwardly fast edited action sequences and a completely stupid plot. Dave Bautista riding a motorcycle at full speed around the stadium, chased by Russian terrorists? It’s just possible in ‘Final Score’.

The moment you’ve turned off all your brainpower and resigned yourself to all the illogical, unrealistic plot twists, ‘Final Score’ is sometimes secretly quite fun, not least because of the ever-present self-mockery of the makers and the actors. Dave Bautista will never be a Daniel Day-Lewis, but still knows how to entertain in every role. Sometimes there is even a successful joke in the film (think of a Briton who corrects an American on the difference between soccer and football). ‘Final Score’ is essentially a dragon of a movie, but bad in such a way that it’s actually fun again. Provided you can tolerate that much nonsense of course.