Crank: High Voltage Information

Crank: High Voltage (promoted as Crank 2: High Voltage in some regions and on DVD) is a 2009 American action film and sequel to the 2006 action film, Crank. The story of the film resumes shortly after the first film left off, retaining its real-time presentation and adding more special effects. Crank: High Voltage was written and directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, who both wrote and directed the previous film. The film was released in the United Kingdom on April 15, 2009, two days prior to its North American release date.

Plot

On November 7, 2005, Chev Chelios (Jason Statham) lands in the middle of an intersection after falling out of a helicopter. He is scooped off the street via snow shovel by a group of Chinese medics and removed from the scene. Chelios wakes up in a makeshift hospital and sees doctors removing his heart while Johnny Vang (Art Hsu) watches. The doctors place Chelios's heart in a white cooler with a padlock, and place a clear plastic artificial heart in his chest. He wakes up three months later and escapes. He notices a yellow battery pack is attached to him and sets out to find his heart. After a gunfight and interrogation of a thug, he learns the location of Johnny Vang: the Cypress Social Club.

Chelios calls Doc Miles (Dwight Yoakam), who tells him that he has been fitted with an AbioCor artificial heart. Miles informs Chelios that once the external battery pack runs out, the internal battery will kick in and he will have 60 minutes before it stops working. While driving Chelios crashes his car which destroys his external battery pack. After getting directions from a driver, Chelios has the driver use his jumper cables on him. At the club, Chelios loses Vang but gains the friendship of a prostitute named Ria (Bai Ling) who believes he saved her, who in return directs him to a strip club where Vang is hiding out. In the club, Chelios comes across Eve (Amy Smart), now a stripper. A group of Mexican mobsters hanging out there, led by Chico, engage Chelios in a gunfight. Chelios then learns from a dying mobster that their godfather under moniker "El Hurón" ("The Ferret") wants to kill him, but does not say why.

Outside of the strip club, after single handedly fighting a police squad, Chelios commandeers a police cruiser with Eve and another stripper. The stripper tells Chelios that he should look for Johnny Vang at the Hollywood Racetrack. Along the way Chelios meets Venus (Efren Ramirez), who reveals himself to be Kaylo's brother. Wanting his help, he tells Venus that El Hurón was involved in his brothers death, but escaped. At the horse track Chelios begins losing energy again. Another call from Doc Miles informs him that friction will cause static electricity to power the internal battery. Eve shows up and they have sex on the racetrack before Chelios spots Vang and leaves Eve behind. Vang escapes, and Chelios is about to be apprehended by security when Don Kim picks Chelios up in his limo. He informs Chelios that there is a leader in the Triads named Poon Dong (David Carradine), who was in need of a heart transplant and chose Chelios's to replace his. Chelios kills Don Kim and his henchmen upon learning that Don Kim wishes to return him to Poon Dong for a reward. Meanwhile, Venus calls in Orlando (Reno Wilson) to assist in tracking down El Hurón.

While searching for Vang, Chelios boards an ambulance and steals a battery pack for his artificial heart. Chelios exits the ambulance upon seeing Johnny Vang on the street outside and a shootout ensues while before Chelios subdues Vang. Chelios discovers that Vang's red cooler does not contain his heart and then learns via cellphone from Doc Miles that his heart has already been transplanted into Poon Dong. Johnny Vang is shot and killed by Chico as Chelios interrogates him, after which Chelios is knocked unconscious. Doc Miles uses his secretary to locate Poon Dong to retrieve Chelios's heart.

Chelios is dragged behind a motorboat to an island where El Hurón awaits. It is revealed that El Hurón is, in fact, the brother of Ricky and Alex Verona, both of whom Chelios killed in the first film. He reveals Ricky Verona's head is being kept alive long enough to watch El Hurón kill Chelios. El Hurón is about to kill Chelios when Orlando, Venus and Ria show up, each with their own group of gunfighters. As a gunfight ensues, Verona's head is killed by Chelios. As Chelios starts to slow down, he climbs a nearby telephone pole and grabs a pair of live wires to recharge. He is flung off the pole and set on fire by the massive current. While on fire, he kills El Hurón. Chelios walks towards the camera, giving the middle finger to the audience in the final moment of the film.

As the credits roll by, Doc Miles replaces Chelios's heart, though Chelios has suffered what appears to be fatal burns over his entire body. At first, it looks like a failure but, after everyone leaves, Chelios's eyes open wide and his heart monitor indicates normal activity.

Cast

• Jason Statham as Chev Chelios
• Amy Smart as Eve Lydon
• Efren Ramirez as Venus
• Dwight Yoakam as Doc Miles
• Reno Wilson as Orlando
• Clifton Collins, Jr. as El Huron
• Bai Ling as Ria
• Art Hsu as Johnny Vang
• David Carradine as Poon Dong
• Geri Halliwell as Karen Chelios

Former child actor Corey Haim has a supporting role in the film. Also appearing in the film are porn stars Ron Jeremy, Ed Powers, Jenna Haze, Nick Manning, Lexington Steele, Linkin Park frontman Chester Bennington, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia star Glenn Howerton (both of whom had appearances in the first film), Tool/A Perfect Circle frontman Maynard James Keenan, former Nine Inch Nails member Danny Lohner, UFC fighter Keith Jardine, actress Lauren Holly and the founder of Troma, Lloyd Kaufman. John de Lancie, of Star Trek fame as Q, also appears at the start of the film as the newscaster.

Production

Dismissing that a sequel is not possible, Brian Taylor and Mark Neveldine wrote a script for the second movie, which was greenlighted by Lionsgate. Jason Statham turned down other projects in order to re-appear as the protagonist.

Mike Patton, of Faith No More and Mr. Bungle fame, produced and performed the score for Crank: High Voltage.

Lions Gate Entertainment handled North American distribution of the film, while Lakeshore Entertainment and Sony Pictures handled international distribution.

Filming started in April 2008. In order to help keep costs low, the filmmakers took advantage of low-cost prosumer HDV cameras such as the Canon XH-A1, as well as a consumer model, the Canon HF10.

Soundtrack

Linkin Park's song, "Given Up", was featured in the trailer for the film. The majority of the soundtrack was done by Mike Patton. The soundtrack received an "Incredible" 9.5/10 from IGN.

Original songs not scored by Mike Patton that appear in the film are as follows:

• "Keep on Loving You" by REO Speedwagon
• "The Stroke" by Billy Squier
• "Heard It in a Love Song" by Marshall Tucker Band
• "Let's Get It On" by Marvin Gaye

Reception

Critical response

Crank: High Voltage has received mixed to positive reviews. The film has a "fresh" rating of 63% on the film review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes with the consensus being "Crank: High Voltage delivers on its promises: a fast-paced, exciting thrill ride that doesn't take itself too seriously." Metacritic cited a score of 41 out of 100, based on 15 reviews. Crank 2 failed to score in the box office in its first week, ending at #6 with $6,510,000 in 2223 theaters, although its predecessor only opened with $10 million.

Box office

Crank: High Voltage generated $2.7 million on its opening day. It earned $6,963,565 on its first weekend at #6 at the box office. Overall the film made $13,684,249 at the domestic box office and $20,763,119 as of November 20, 2009 in foreign box offices totaling up to $34,447,368 worldwide.

Awards and recognition

The poster artwork received an IMP Award for best funny poster tagline of 2009: "He was dead ... but he got better".

Home media

Crank: High Voltage was released on DVD and Blu-ray on September 8, 2009 in the United States. At the DVD sales chart, Crank opened at #2, selling 305,000 units which translates to $5,345,078 in revenue. As per the latest figures, 827,000 units have been sold, acquiring revenue of over $15 million. This does not include Blu-ray sales or DVD rentals. In Germany the uncut DVD and Blu-ray was indexed on March 31, 2010.

Sequel

In an interview, when asked about a third Crank film, actress Amy Smart said "It's been talked about," but no actual statement from the writers has been made. Also in an interview with Amy Smart after the release of High Voltage, she mentioned that Crank 3 might be made in 3-D

Mark Neveldine recently stated that a Crank 3 will happen and are looking to include Idris Elba in the sequel. When asked how it can continue after the way the film ended, Neveldine said "That alone, we have 20 ways to tackle it. You know, with Crank, basically, you insert another quarter and you play the game again. It's kind of like what thrills me and Brian, it's whatever we feel like doing there in the moment, whatever we wanna do, we just do and make it happen. The important thing is what powers Chev. It was adrenaline that kept him alive in the first one, it was electricity in the second one, you know, it's all about what will keep him alive in the third one. It's just fun slinging those ideas around."

During an 'Ask me anything' on Reddit, Brian Taylor gave a possible 2013 release date for Crank 3