Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		1.0
Overall		2.5

The Marine 6: Close Quarters Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman December 5, 2018

The last time Sony and WWE drooped a Marine movie onto the DTV marketplace, it was 2016 and the movie was The Marine 5: Battleground, a tiresome, flat, and insipid Action film described in the Blu-ray.com review thusly: "the setting is dreadful, the action is bland, and the performances lack spirit." The franchise has certainly had its modest ups and deep downs, beginning with the enjoyably competent original in 2006 and peaking thereafter with the surprisingly entertaining, albeit very rote, Moving Target, the second film in the series to feature The Miz. Close Quarters is a slight bit better than Battleground, but not by much. The series has been on life support for some time and the movies have been largely stagnant in presentation, with ascents only measured in degrees, not leaps. As with past franchise pictures, The Miz is accompanied by additional WWE talent playing both friend and foe.

Portland, Oregon is home to the Horace Hayes trial. Hayes is a powerful individual with powerful friends, including Maddy (WWE Superstar Becky Lynch) who will do anything to ensure that he is not convicted. Maddy and several thugs kidnap a young girl named Sarah (Louisa Connolly-Burnham). Her father Patrick is a juror on the Hayes trial and is coerced by way of his daughter’s kidnapping into manipulating the verdict and ensuring the jury is hung. Meanwhile, Jake Carter (The Miz) and his friend and fellow Marine veteran Luke Trapper (WWE Superstar Shawn Michaels) go to Oregon Lake Brewery, an abandoned factory that has become a “squatter’s paradise.” Trapper is visiting an old war buddy who has no choice but to call the place home. Unbeknownst to them, the factory is also where Sarah is being held. Jake and Luke stumble onto her and her captors and quickly find themselves at odds, hunted down through the warehouse’s bowels with little chance of survival, relying on their training and one another to make it out safely with Sarah in tow.

Structurally, The Marine 6: Close Quarters is reminiscent of the vastly superior 1992 film Trespass, another picture about a couple of guys who stumble onto a group of unsavory types while moving about an abandoned warehouse. The setups are different -- in Trespass the men are looking for treasure, in The Marine they're helping out an old friend -- but the dynamics are very similar. Unlike Trespass, Close Quarters cannot build much tension through its characters, story, action, or environment. The film transitions from one nondescript locale in the factory to another and one stale action scene to another, each one lacking anything visually dynamic or dramatically arresting. The film does branch out to equally nondescript underground tunnels in the third act, an even more spartan setting that does nothing to liven the film, visually, at least. The location is home to the movie's surprise twist that might just be the kick in the pants the series needs. Or it may be its death knell. Either way it's a welcome jolt from the predictable action doldrums and dreary locales that have plagued the last two films. The twist plays out to completion with a heaping helping of cheese, but, hey, it's something unexpected if it's anything.

Acting not particularly great. Louisa Connolly-Burnham struggles to bring a true sense of fear to Sarah, who often looks not gripped by terror but rather dazed over, the actress unsure of what to do with a character so flat and poorly written she's little more than a living prop, so in Connolly-Burnham's defense there's little she can do with the character as-scripted. The Miz and Shawn Michaels share good screen chemistry. The former doesn't appear overly thrilled to be in the movie, though again in his defense it's not his movie, anyway. It's Michaels' movie. It's his character who is the impetus for the trip to the warehouse, it's his character who is given the more complex back story (albeit one tied to The Miz's), and it's his character who is in the middle of the movie's funniest moment when, after a nasty chest wound has been painfully cauterized, he is given a shirt that identifies him as "grandma" to wear, which he does for the remainder of the movie.

The Marine 6: Close Quarters Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Marine 6: Close Quarters was digitally shot, the standard means of capture for today's B-movie releases. It's nicely textured overall and relatively cinematic for a digital construct. Details are crisp without appearing excessively lower end digital-artificial. A close-up of Patrick in the jury box in chapter five offers nicely appointed clothing and facial textures, the former presenting good, tangible definition on the sweater and necktie and the latter revealing finer pores and facial hair with sharpness appropriate for the format. The movie otherwise struggles to present much meaningful image depth and complexity if only because the location is so bland and barren. It's also a bit dark and frequently lacks spirited color. It is by its very natural a fairly drab film within the confines of its primary set pieces. Colors satisfy as they can. A few examples of clothes and blood are adequately punchy and stand out nicely from the doldrum backgrounds, as does Becky Lynch's intensely orange hair. Noise is never overtly problematic and banding is only an issue in a couple of underwater shots at film's end. Other source and encode flaws are not readily apparent.

The Marine 6: Close Quarters Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The included DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack is serviceable for an Action movie. The film's sound design is nothing special, accomplishing the basic goals of presenting music with width, some depth, and good basic clarity. Gunfire in The Marine 6: Close Quarters will not be mistaken for the real McCoy, but the track does well enough to spread it around and decently immerse the listener in various shootouts throughout the film. When the action shifts to the tunnels, the track's failure to do anything of sonic interest with gunfire is disappointing. Explosions lack depth and environments aren't sonically shaped by much support fill. Dialogue is clear, well prioritized, and positioned in the front-center channel.

The Marine 6: Close Quarters Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The Marine 6: Close Quarters contains two featurettes. A Movies Anywhere digital copy code is included with purchase. The release does not ship with a DVD copy of the film and does not appear to ship with a slipcover.

• Making Maddy & The Marines (1080i, 5:06): The primary cast talks up the film and the franchise, the physicality of the movies, characters and plot details, and working together.
• The Breakdown: Epic Fights (1080i, 4:33): A closer look at fight choreography with Choreographer Tim Man.

The Marine 6: Close Quarters Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

The Marine 6: Close Quarters delivers serviceable entertainment and doesn't aim to achieve at a higher level. That's not necessarily a problem; there's a place for empty entertainment but this film continues a trend towards the bottom of the barrel, playing out in yet another dreary, boring location and doing nothing to heighten action construction or narrative engagement. Sony's Blu-ray is likewise serviceable, delivering fairly good video and audio. Two featurettes are included. Rent it.