Wonderful character development!

There is just so much movie here. For some it may be too much. But in the same secretly sarcastic way most telemarketers say the phrase, the title of this one is particularly apt.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

This is a great little movie. The small cast portray their characters beautifully. The story is simple but perfectly executed. No gimmicks just good theatre. Get a glass of wine, sit back and enjoy this nicely crafted thriller.

I was on the fence about seeing this film, but I'm glad I did. First of all I have to say i completely disagree with the negative reviews for this movie. After all, the reason we go see movies is to escape reality and come out with a different perspective on life (or we should anyway) than try to figure out if the plot or premise of a film is believable or not. Star Wars or Star Trek don't have a believable premise either but we love to watch'em. This movie, although completely different than a Sci-Fi film, is well worth watching from a psychological point of view alone. People make films. And just like people, all films have flaws even the high budget theatrical releases. I watched this film before I even knew it was a strictly video release and the director was popping his cherry for the first time. But considering either of these, I have to give credit where credit is due and say this movie was really good. It was more positive than negative that's for sure.

Good performances, but overall thoroughly unbelievable plot. Sade (Fishburne), a contract killer, murders several people at a funeral then is forced to chase down a witness, Bird( Ballentine), a small girl who stumbles onto the scene. She runs to the nearest house, owned by Carter (Jane), a grieving vet contemplating suicide who responds to Sade's attempt to kill him by retreating into the house after a brief gun fight in which both killer and defender are wounded. The plot is set and the holes start to add up from here.Sade, the master criminal, needlessly exposes himself at the initial site, even though he uses a rifle for the first two murders (a priest and a bodyguard) he decides to perform the final hit at close range with a pistol. His reasoning for this is never explained. Neither is his reasoning for hanging around the crime scene to fill in the grave to begin with, then throwing in the rifle, but retaining the pistol (which would be far more likely than the rifle to link him to the crime).In his haste to dispatch the last witness, he is wounded by the owner of the house. The writer overlooks the fact that this would be the time to retreat, as he would have no way of knowing how many or how well armed the defenders might be. Sade then returns to his, "I got all the time in the world" mode as the standoff develops with him on the ground floor and Bird and Carter on the second. More holes develop as a cop spots the automobiles left by the witnesses uncle (who is also murdered as he looks for Bird) and the original intended victim. He has a "gut feeling" there is a problem, but never bothers to call in the tag numbers to the vehicles despite this being SOP with every PD in the country. He doesn't bother to call in his exit from the vehicle, something that is also SOP, either. It's all down hill from here as Sade shoots him through the door (knowing he's a cop yet forgetting the cops theses days wear vests for just such an event). Luckily for him this cop has also forgotten SOP on vests and isn't wearing one. Good performances by Fishburne, Jane and Ballentine,along with an atmospheric set, wasted on a poor script written by someone who apparently doesn't know the difference between a .45 and a 9mm or that burning farmhouses give off clouds of smoke, something sure to attract attention in such a rural setting.In summation, Standoff falls down before it begins. Too bad.

Just beyond the opening scenes, Standoff quickly rises above its cheapness as an enjoyable and gripping suspense thriller. Then we're treated to an old breed of filmmaking that hasn't been this well-done since the likes of Misery! I love both headlining actors dearly but they've unfairly fallen off the radar in recent years. I still buy into their efforts on occasion despite bitter reviews, though, because budget does not always make for a great movie. In this case, it hits the spot.So an ex-military man turned mafia hit-man hunts the sole witness of a multiple murder - a young girl with a camera - to a lonely farmhouse inhabited by a grieving alcoholic. Literally this is the premise and the scene is set for a siege and an edgy war of wits as one tries to convince the other to let him have the girl and walk away.Sometimes that's all you need; no winding plot twists to keep people guessing. Sometimes it's just about the suspense and the viscera, but Standoff benefits from a great script and the skills of the director who also wrote it.It has an old-school feel to it, and when we get down to it, even the look of the film harks back to a day of shamelessly simple effectiveness.Fishburne is on top form as the villain, bringing the ghetto mentality of former villainous roles from the likes of King of New York and Assault on Precinct 13. He's sharper than ever, bursting with character and both smouldering and cold-blooded.Thomas Jane also throws in his strongest performance in a long time and his man on the edge versus the man on a deadline is both genius acting and writing at once. They don't make characters like this anymore. Back in the '70s or '80s the role could have belonged to Lee Marvin, James Coburn or Roy Scheider.I'm surprised and saddened that Standoff isn't getting recognition. It deserves a round of applause!