Cold Vengeance (2003) and Villains Utilizing Public Events

Villains are horrible people. You already know that. They’re the bad guy in any story, which automatically makes them horrible if you’re rooting for the hero. In most crime-related movies, the villain is even worse. They relish in their villainy. They enjoy watching other people suffer because of them. They’ll do whatever they can for money, success, and power. And they’ll do it while wearing a cocky smirk.

Much like magicians, some villains like to use a slight-of-hand tactic when planning their crimes. They want people to look one way while they do something else in the other direction. When they do this magic, they frequently incorporate public events into the proceedings. In order to make this kind of villainy more entertaining for a movie audience, filmmakers sometimes like to set the big villainous crime at a sporting event.

Take Cold Vengeance, for example. Jimmy Coy (Josh Barker) was an assassin for hire. While scoping out a potential new job, he came across Cassandra Diaz (Christina Cox) and the two immediately hit it off. They began a romance. The same romance would be complicated by the new job being an assassination to take place at the same arena where Cassandra trained her sister in figure skating. Jimmy had to stop Russ Fortus (Darren Shahlavi) from committing the same murder that he had refused.

The arena was a major part of the story in Cold Vengeance. Cassandra was a figure skating coach. The movie didn’t shy away from showing the figure skating at various times. Cassandra and her sister were introduced through a skating routine that turned out bad. The climax of the movie involved the sister skating again, this time to a rendition of a song that Jimmy wrote for Cassandra. Part of the conflict between Cassandra and her father revolved around the money he said he wasted on figure skating. That was before the whole spousal abuse aspect came into the movie.

The romance between Jimmy and Cassandra blossomed because of a meeting at the arena, which brings us to how the villain tied into Cold Vengeance. Russ was only a hired gun, replacing Jimmy when he refused to do the job. There was someone above them, someone who was funding the whole assassination operation. His plan was to bring someone to the arena for a figure skating competition, have that person assassinated during the competition, and have mayhem ensue that would cause more deaths. I don’t know why he wanted more casualties. All he ever said was that there needed to be more casualties.

As you can see, the villainy was tied directly into the sports in Cold Vengeance. The assassination attempt was going to take place at a figure skating competition. The mob boss guy who was paying freelance assassins had planned it that way. The sub-villain of Cassandra’s dad was also tied into the sports, as his villainy came from his contempt for his daughters and their burgeoning figure skating career. Both villainous storylines came to a head during the competition, and both villains were killed during the competition. Their plans and their demises came during the competition, as so many do.

Another WolfCop was another movie that featured the bad guy’s plan being executed during a sporting event. Sydney Swallows came to town to open a brewery and an arena. This was under the guise of reinvigorating the economy of smalltown Woodhaven. The brewery would make popular beer for people across the country, while the arena would provide hockey entertainment for the townspeople and any tourists. Only, things weren’t as they seemed on the surface. There was some stuff happening in the shadowy corners of the brewery that Swallows didn’t want people to know until the big hockey event.

The climax of Another WolfCop took place during the opening hockey game at Swallows’s new arena. You see, the beer that he brewed was actually an impregnation formula that bred alien lifeforms into the stomachs of the unknowing public. This might not seem like much of a crime. It might seem like more of an alien invasion than anything. And, sure, it might be. But it was also a mass murder at a hockey game as the alien lifeforms burst from the abdomens of the people who drank the beer. It essentially worked the same way as an assassination, only done by an alien instead of a mob boss. Both murder crimes hinged upon having a bunch of people attending an event at an arena.

One other movie I want to mention with the crimes happening during sporting events is Drop Zone. The 1994 action movie was clearly a riff on Point Break, though it did many things its own way. A U.S. Marshall wanted to take down a former DEA agent and terrorist who had killed his brother. The entire evil plan hinged on the former DEA agent’s plan involving parachuting from a high altitude. The Marshall learned the skills necessary to parachute from extreme heights and tracked down the former DEA agent.

The crux of the villain’s plan involved hacking a government database during a parachuting exhibition in Washington D.C. because security would be relaxed. He was using the exhibition as a cover for his criminal plans. People would be focused on the exhibition, a public spectacle. Security would be focused on that same exhibition. The villain would be able to slip in and out much easier with the security detail looking the other way. He was also going to parachute onto the DEA building during the exhibition, which wouldn’t look as out of place with other parachuters around. The sporting event was integral to the villain’s plan, just in a different way than harming the people who attended.

Many villains like to go big when they commit their crimes. They’ll find some sort of public event that could be the cover for what they’re doing. A sort of distraction that will make people unintentionally look the other way while they do their evil deeds. That’s what happened in Drop Zone. The parachuting exhibition was used as a cover for the villain to break into the DEA headquarters and steal vital information. Other villains use the public events to make their villainy a spectacle. Both Another WolfCop and Cold Vengeance had villains who wanted their evil to involve the audience at major sporting events. They wanted to cause chaos by having people see their evil intentions. The public sporting event was the perfect way to do that.

Sporting events aren’t the only kind of public event that villains use as part of their evil plan. It’s not always parachuting, figure skating, or hockey at the crux of things. Top Dog featured villains planning an explosion at a Fourth of July celebration. But sports are one of the more common public events that attract a lot of people. Sports are something that many more people are interested in than a parade or the opera. It makes them an easier target for evil plans, and villains will pick up on that. More people, more casualties, more chaos, more distraction.

Villains are bad people. They will corrupt what the average person finds joy in, simply to fit their own desires and ambitions. They’ll corrupt these things without any sense of guilt or remorse. They want money, fame, and power. Nobody will get in their way. They’ll use public events or do the crimes behind closed doors. It doesn’t matter to them, as long as they get what they want. That’s all that matters to a villain. They just want to succeed.

Now it’s time for some notes to finish things off:

• One of the villains in Cold Vengeance was played by Darren Shahlavi. He was previously in The Marine 3: Homefront (week 30), Alone in the Dark (week 152), and In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (week 220).
• James Michalopolous was in Far Cry (week 364), 12 Rounds 3: Lockdown (week 460), and Cold Vengeance.
• Cold Vengeance was the third Sunday “Bad” Movies appearance for Paul Wu, following In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (week 220) and Futuresport (week 491).
• Lars Grant returned to Sunday “Bad” Movies in Cold Vengeance. Their other appearance was in The Marine 3: Homefront (week 30).
• Denis Corbett appeared in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale (week 220) and Cold Vengeance.
• One of the actors in Cold Vengeance was Paul Coufos, who was also in Chopping Mall (week 306).
• Finally, Cold Vengeance featured John Sampson, who already appeared in Police Academy (week 400).
• Have you seen Cold Vengeance? What did you think of it? How do you feel about villains using sports events in their plans? Let me know your thoughts on Twitter and in the comments.
• If there’s a movie that you think I should cover in a future Sunday “Bad” Movies post, let me know what it is. Any suggestions can be sent to me on Twitter, or simply put into the comments.
• Check out Sunday “Bad” Movies on Instagram.
• Here’s a look at what’s coming up next week. I’ll be checking out a Christian movie, once again. It’s going to be a politically charged one this time. You might not have heard of it, but you soon will. I’ll be taking a look at The Trump Prophecy. I’m sure it won’t be good. I’m not here for good, though. I’ll see you next week for that one.