Ving Rhames returns as “Animal” and finds himself in his old prison stomping grounds when a riot forces him to transfer back. His old enemies are awaiting his arrival and putting him into the ring in some underground prison fights.
James “Animal” Allen (Ving Rhames) is serving a life sentence in Folsom Prison when a riot forces him to return to Susanville Prison. Animal was incarcerated there before for 15 years (see the first film). He finds that his old enemy Kasada (Conrad Dunn) has been moved to prison chaplain, but seems to have more affiliation with the other team. He gets it so that James, Jr. (K.C. Collins), Animal’s younger son, is framed for murder.
His elder son Darius (Vicellous Shannon) goes to fledgling public defender Kate Martinez (Deborah Valente) to try and clear James Jr.’s name. Both she and Darius are unaware that Kasada has assistant district attorney Dillen (Yannick Bisson) in his back pocket.
So now Animal has to try and keep his kids out of danger from behind prison walls and also keep the prison from erupting into a race riot when Kasada arranges some tension between the racial factions in the prison.
First off I have to say that I’ve not seen Animal, but I was still able to pick up the plot. It’s a typical prison film. The first film also had Chazz Palminteri as Kasada and Terrence Howard as Darius.
Vicellous Shannon takes over for Howard and he seems a bit young to be James’ older brother. Conrad Dunn is pretty nasty as the villain but I don’t think that he rises to the fees that Chazz Palminteri can command.
Ving Rhames is one bad mother and I sure wouldn’t want to end up in a prison brawl against him. However, the movie is just another prison film. I guess it does have the bits with the Animal’s kids outside of the jailhouse, but you really want to get back to the storyline at the prison. It all seems so familiar since it uses plot from many other films that have plowed this ground.
It does have the presence of Rhames and he does well in the part. However, the film ends on an unknown note but also makes it pretty clear that Animal 3 is probably on the horizon.
Animal 2 is presented in anamorphic widescreen (1.85:1) and enhanced for 16x9 televisions. Special features include the 26 minute “Animal 2: Behind the Scenes” which interviews director Ryan Combs, K.C. Collins, Conrad Dunn, Yannick Bisson, Deborah Valente, and Vicellous Shannon. Pretty much everybody buy Ving Rhames, but there’s plenty of cuts from the film of him and behind the scenes footage.
Animal is a pretty good little prison flick and benefits greatly from the presence of Ving Rhames. Some casting changes will probably make fans of the original think they’re in another film (well, I guess they’re in the second film) but I suppose the budget for this one was spent on Rhames’ salary.
Animal 2 is now available at Amazon . As of yet, there is not a release date for the UK. Visit the DVD database for more information.
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