Wrestling should stay inside the ring. Only a few months after WWE Films gave pro wrestlers Kane and John Cena a chance at showing off their fighting skills in "See No Evil" and "The Marine", it's now Steve Austin's turn to deliver his best holds and throws on the big screen.

In "The Condemned", Austin plays one of ten death row inmates who get a shot at freedom if they participate in a deadly game on an isolated island. The rules are fairly simple: the contestants are wired with explosives and must battle each other to death; last man standing wins.

The concept of the game was developed by a ruthless millionaire (Robert Mammone), who after being turned down by all major TV networks, decides to broadcast the brutal spectacle live on the web. His goal is to top the Super Bowl and attract more than 40 million subscribers.

Undoubtedly the worst of the films released by World Wide Entertainment yet, "The Condemned" borrows most of its ideas from Kinji Fukasaku's smash hit Battle Royale, a bloody thriller in which a group of Japanese ninth-graders selected by the government are given three days to kill each other on an island.

But whereas the original comprises an ingenious message and is set in a time when civilization is deteriorating, "The Condemned" makes the inexcusable mistake of denouncing violence while glorifying it at the same time.

Director Scott Wiper and screenwriter Rob Hedden wallow in brutal scenes of rape and torture that are extremely painful to watch. One horrific scene toward the end of the movie involves one of the players execute at least a dozen TV crewmembers. Sadly, the sole purpose of this sequence is to provoke unforgivable disgust.

The plot is primitive and predictable, and a close look at the movie's official poster makes it easy to guess who will walk out of the game alive. The fast-paced action and edgy editing are too repetitive, thus not counting as potential sources for suspense.

Fighting each other to death does not require any acting skills, and in "The Condemned", there are none. Steven Austin may be a great wrestler, and in that case the only one who does his job right.

Ultimately, "The Condemned" is a perfect example of dreadful filmmaking. A journalist in the movie says she feels sorry for all those who log on to the website of the game and pay a fee to watch it. In that case, I guess we are to be condemned as well, since we paid for an admission ticket for the same purpose.

Grade: D