Angel of Death (3½ Stars)

Eve is an assassin-for-hire who lives in Los Angeles. She works for an independent contractor called Graham Prescott who has connections with both the mob and the police. She doesn't just work for Graham, she's also his lover, but we see that she's having trouble reconciling the two relationships. During one of her jobs she's badly injured; she has a knife lodged in her brain. She survives, but she's not the same any more. She sees visions of her victims crying out to her for revenge. She steals Graham's notebook with the names of his customers, the ones who paid for her jobs, and then sets out to kill them.

The film was originally broadcast on the web, but it was re-edited for the DVD release. It stars Zoe Bell as Eve. In itself it would deserve a higher rating. The action is both thrilling and realistic, whether it's the hand-to-hand fighting or the gun fights. Zoe is the perfect action heroine, and this film proves that she also has acting talent. The problem for me is the poor production quality. The scenes are grainy and underlit, even the daytime scenes. After watching the "making of" featurette I understand that this is deliberate; the director wanted to emulate the film noir style of the early 1960's. No. This was a poor decision that has spoilt the film's quality.