Indie Aussie action-thriller Unseen Enemy delivers as a glorious genre throwback to when the heroes were honourable, the villains were scum, and the fight scenes pulled no punches.
It is a shame that for a nation that has delivered genre classic ranging from Mad Max to Wolf Creek the gatekeepers of the Australian film industry do not embrace its genre indie filmmakers. Action films have especially been given the short stick, yet punching back are a number of indie filmmakers (Bren Foster, George Basha) who bring an Aussie battler DIY approach to the action film. Add stuntman turned filmmaker Salvatore Samperi to that list, who along with director Matthew John Pearson (Contract Killers) delivers a roadhouse kick of a feature film debut in Unseen Enemy.
Samperi stars Unseen Enemy as Levi, a security consultant gone underground after his last job went to hell, resulting in his family marked for death by the Yakuza. When he is asked by former colleague Marissa (Amelia Conway) to track down her missing sister Suzy (Jamaica Vaughan), a reluctant Levi is pulled into a criminal conspiracy involving dangerous drug dealer Siroos (Artom Simin) and Yakuza boss Osato (Wazza Waseeq) who wants Levi’s head.
Filmed and set in Sydney, Australia, Unseen Enemy makes great use of the city’s various landscapes within which Levi plays private-eye and crosses paths with all kinds of nefarious characters (Aaron Scully steals scenes as a pimp with mullet-moustache combination.)
Samperi brings a grounded humbleness to his role of reluctant hero yet is also excellent when he flips the switch and lives up to his nickname of the “Italian Van-Damme” with fist-throwing, leg kicking power. Countering is Artom Simin who portrays the vagrant gangster Siroos with a suitable amount of sleaze and violent savagery, backed by an impressive athleticism that sets up a hard-hitting fight scene against Samperi that features excellent fight choreography.
So it goes with the films action sequences that – despite average VFX during gun battles resulting in janky gun-muzzle flashes and the like – delivers high energy, hard-hitting moments that would put higher budgeted films to shame.
Samperi and Pearson have delivered a very impressive indie-genre film in Unseen Enemy, an engaging action-thriller that proves the old-school is the best school, and the indie action scene in Australia has plenty of kick.
