Cross Mission

(It's been a while, screenshots and videos to follow shortly once I get on a computer that can do those two things)

Cross Mission is a sorry excuse for an action film that plods along as if it doesn't even want to; lambast various other B-grade directors such as Lamberto Bava, Mattei and Fragasso all you want, at least they weren't Al Bresica, who cut so many corners his films were just a few milimetres away from being totally one-dimensional. Taking place in an ambiguous Latin American country (in this film's favour, it makes a change to the painfully similar setting of Filipino jungles), Cross Mission focuses on General Romero's corrupt business as a politician; to the UN he is removing his country's marijuana crops, in secret he is still growing them and shipping them off. His right hand man William is turned to the good side by an investigative reporter called Helen who he finds himself overwhelmingly attracted to after knowing each other for such a short amount of time, and soon the two are waging war alongside rebel forces against Romero's oppressive and sly rule. The relatively confused and standstill plot is spiced up just a bit by the classically exploitative inclusion of Ratman star Nelson de la Rosa (famed for his extremely small height) as a supernatually-powered dwarf called Astaroth, but his presence is simply to make stand out what is unfortunately a very non-daring expedition into familiar territory.

While indeed slick-looking in some instances, with semi-decent acting and a catchy synth score, Cross Mission's flair is limited and its action sequences are neither exciting or explosive, consisting mostly of very still scenes of simple machinegun spraying and some small explosions. The nadir of which is a final beach battle that is shot in day-for-night and consists of not a lot going on (the film slips up and shows the beach at day time when shown one of Romero's monitors, even though it's meant to be at night). Of course, much of the entertainment is going to come from picking this one apart, but don't expect anything to throw itself at you like many other titles will, this one is very reserved and even goes so far to culling footage from Umberto Lenzi stinker Bridge to Hell. The romance subplot in this one deserves a footnote in how appalling it is, only here could the hero declare his love for the woman he wants to save and then promptly dive at another woman he's been talking to. That, and the many little snippets of sexism make for unusual laughs, otherwise, the majority of the dialogue is unnoticeable.

What could have been an exciting and slightly original little title of heated battles in untouched land for Italian filmmakers and a fight against a voodoo dictator and his magical midget (Nelson de la Rosa is woefully underused) is really something for completionists of this sort of thing only. Mildly interesting, but General Romero and his sparkling telekinetic lie detector is not going to win fans easily for this title.

• Midgetsploitation: 2/5
• Music: 3/5
• Being a wasted opportunity: 5/5

-James

Review source: Japanese VHS

Title information

• Production company: AM Trading International SRL
• Year of release: 1988

Alternative titles:

• Missão Mortífera <Lethal Mission> (Brazil)
• Mafia Power (France)
• Combat Attack (West Germany)
• 追跡大陸グレート・ミッション "Tsuiseki tairiku gureeto misshon" <Continent track: Great Mission> (Japan)

Final Score

With the vigilante film genre established, exploitation directors now had another genre to railroad with their celluloid mixtures of action movie set pieces and typical revenge subplots. Of course, they completely dodged whatever artistic merit the likes of Death Wish, Dirty Harry and possibly even Taxi Driver had, and simply showcased a lot of people dying, usually against the backdrop of the then-still-mentally-fresh Vietnam war. One such movie that is arguably a cut above the rest of exploitation titles is The Exterminator, which was about a Vietnam vet who took out bloody revenge against street punks and corrupt individuals alike after a race attack was committed on his best friend. The Exterminator received notoriety after it was lashed with a scathing review from Roger Ebert for its extreme violence and harsh scenarios, it was technically better made than most exploitation movies, but received a less-notable sequel that was ultimately something more exploitative.

With that in mind, this 1986 Indonesian flick is probably a closer sequel to the original Exterminator than its real sequel ever was, especially if you wanna go by the exploitation standard of branding a sequel; if a movie has come out and has more than a few themes similar to a previous low-budget movie (Mattei's Terminator 2 not being counted), then it can be considered a sequel. The plot to Final Score follows Richard Brown (Christopher Mitchum), a Vietnam war veteran (seeing the similarities already?) living peacefully in Indonesia with his family, having made his wealth from being involved in a computer business. On the day of his son's eighth birthday though, just as Richard goes out to buy him a toy gun of all things(!), his home is invaded, and his son and servants are murdered while his wife is gangraped and then added to the bodycount. Utterly distraught, Brown takes the law into his hands as he brings back his skills as a soldier to track down each of the men who ruined his life (taking out of all their gangs too). He learns that their leader is a corrupt business rival called Mr. Hawk (Mike Abbott with eyes that stare bullets into you), who has enough evil in his mustache and range of suits to make Mr. White, of similarly-excessive wacko Indonesian revenge adventure The Intruder, to quake in his shoes. With Hawk in his sights, Brown is joined by Julia, a woman also seeking revenge for what Hawk has done to her, as their fight becomes ever-more personal.

This is a cocktail of bad taste that just has to be enjoyed, Brown's assortment of different ways of killing people is just too fun. With a child death and gangrape no less than ten minutes into the movie, this is overkill from start to finish in such a classically shameless exploitative fashion. Granted, in terms of technical structure, it leaves the similar Intruder in the dust, but also similarly its wooden acting, silly dialogue and dub work are not going to make the rape of Brown's wife particularly horrifying, just slightly uncomfortable to watch. Mitchum blankly gets himself through some pretty insane situations while spouting monotone dialogue, while Abbott just gets to widen his eyes a lot. With Mitchum's slight resemblance to Exterminator star Robert Ginty, this very well could have been sequel in some part of the world, all it's missing is a lead character name change. Of course though, you're not watching something like Final Score for acting, you're watching this to see Mitchum build himself a body pile to heaven, with lots of black humour sprinkled in between. Oh, he does alright; there's plenty of stealth kills to go around, along with a baddie getting a piece of hot iron shoved up his ass, and some insane car chases with a passenger ultimately getting impaled on a branch! As always, explosions top off most of Brown's killing sprees, with the best bang being saved for last (you best believe rocket-firing motorbikes can fly). With everything else on explicit display, the only consensual sex scene is somewhat tastefully left private.

Dialogue is incredibly cheesy, with much of the nameless goon chatter really making you feel like this is some sort of head-shaking comedy. As for the music, it's all fairly unmemorable. Directed by the singularly-named Arizal, who quite impressively worked from the 70s right up until 2000; he competently gets the action filmed well. On the other hand, the script is by, shock of shocks (almost), Deddy Armand, the same writer behind The Intruder (final name drop)! This is super-violent, super-stupid and absolutely unabashed, Final Score is a blast. This really is one of the most brainless flicks ever, one that is simply overflowing with entertainment.

• Action: 5/5
• Convincing me 'explosion' is a second Indonesian language: 4/5
• Bodycount: 7/5

-James, 20 August 2010 (original date)

Review source: Japanese VHS
Screenshot source: Japanese VHS

Title information

• Production company: Rapi Films
• Year of release: 1986

Alternate titles:

• Strike Commando (West Germany)
• 皆殺しの挽歌 "Minagoroshi no banka" <Funeral song massacre> (Japan)

Fireback

One country in particular that pumped the VHS market the world over in the past with appallingly cheap exploitative Vietnam trips was the Philippines, the local backlot to many Italian action films then. Filipino action and warsploitation flicks were typically shoddier than their Italian counterparts though, often having lower budgets, worse actors, worse music, worse dubbing and murkier production histories, if you're lucky enough to find out some of them. Teddy Page's Fireback fits the above bill nicely, but does that mean it's not enjoyable? Opening the movie is Richard Harrison as American colonel Jack Kaplan, stationed in Vietnam. Harrison, who in total straight-facedness to hide his complete reluctancy at being in such a role, is introducing his men to the most re-cock-ulous gun prop ever; the Omega, the most impractical fictional gun to exist before the gunblade of Final Fantasy VIII (though the gunblde is not even a third as cool). The Americans however are ambushed by Vietcong and all captured (no the gun does not actually do much in the way of holding them off). Meanwhile, in a place the film wants us to believe is America, a man by the name of Duffy Collins (Bruce Baron) complains to a girl called Eve (Gwendolyn Hung) about how Jack Kaplan's wife Diane ignores his advances and he wants something done about it (Duffy, for whatever reason, always has his face obscured throughout the movie). After a rescue operation is launched, Jack is returned back home only to find Diane is missing, and goes on a search for her, being led from distraction to distraction, who all come in the form of nameless characters that have no real dialogue (such as a man with a golden claw for a hand, a guy who looks like a French freedom fighter who lives with a cat, and a ninja).

Kaplan is eventually led to Diane's location, only to find her dead (not much of a big shocker, especially when the UK VHS box actually has "they thought he was dead and killed his wife, but he came home for revenge" in the tagline!), Nameless Police Chief (Mike Monty with bleach-blond hair) puts a hunt out for Kaplan because of all the murders (apparently what sets him off though is how Kaplan is blamed for a murder he did not commit) and the battle is taken to the jungle (this is meant to take place in America still, by the way), in which Kaplan customises a car and even makes his own shotgun/crossbow/bazooka hybrid-gun (this sequence is actually very cool). A second encounter with the ninja sees Kaplan mysteriously kill him off (then again, it's to be expected from a man who can apparently "turn an ordinary soft drink straw into a weapon", too bad we don't actually see that) and he dons his outfit to infiltrate Duffy's headquarters, here Duffy tells him that the reason he killed Diane was because if he can't have her, nobody can (of course, the bad writing means that comes out a bit more prolixiously and awkwardly than it has to be, and as to be expected, Duffy doesn't have a real reason for liking Diane at all). Kaplan slashes Duffy to death and then the film freezeframes and ends incompletely, dismally delivering a caption saying that Kaplan was shortly imprisoned and then died of a disease after release. What. A. Washout. Though to be frank, it's a hilarious example of terrible filmmaking.

The script, apparently written by Richard Harrison under a pseudonym, was evidently cobbled together overnight for the production company to have enough reason to make another film for the video market; characters spring up left and right like barely-cooked toast and stay that way. The super-impractical multi-calibre weapon that the film proudly carries about on its cover artwork is featured only long enough to be an insignificant point, at most it makes way to show off Kaplan's weaponry mastery (the only tiny smidge of actual character development in the whole movie, but really, I've no reason to complain about that aspect) in which he makes his own almost-streamlined, lesser-due-to-poorer version from car parts (yes), but even that does not feature for very long. Kaplan himself is only ridiculously likable because he's played by the aforementioned Richard Harrison, a man who seems to inject every scene with the boredom or pain he is feeling as an actor now working in this armpit of the film world. Music cues for the drab synth score are laughably schizophrenic while the risible action is, as always in these sorts of films, satisfying in a way.

An almost polarizing piece of bad movie fare, fans of the genre will either find this to be laugh-a-minute material like the average Bruno Mattei flick (in comparison, this easily makes one of his films look so much more spectacular) or will find it to be a drag because of its relatively drab atmosphere. Lovers of bad Filipino movies will no doubt already have this nestled among their collections, proud of its reprehensible cinematic qualities. An insightful read is an interview with Rihard Harrison's son, who appears in it as an extra, the interview can be found at Bamboo Gods and Bionic Boys. The film is excessively poor, needless to say, it would have gotten a greater marking in terms of entertainment if it was Richard Harrison killing people with an adapted Nerf gun and showing half the skills he is made out to have. On, the other hand, the trailer succeeds at making it seem like a serious movie, all the while making it even more funny.

A stoner's movie at best.

• Convincing me this took place in America: 0/5
• False advertisement: 4/5
• God I wish I had that gun

-James, 02 July 2010 (original date)

Review source: UK VHS
Screenshot source: UK VHS

Title information

• Production company: Silver Star Film Company
• Year of release: 1983

Alternate titles:

• 復讐! 炎のコマンドー "Fukushou! Honoo no komando" <Vengeance! Commando of Fire> (Japan)

Cop Game

With the action craze in the 80s, it's as if Bruno Mattei and his contemporaries all holidayed in the Philippines to see what they could all film in the same jungle while borrowing footage off each other. It must have been one big happy film-making, idea-chucking festival at the cost of the Philippines' jungles. Sticking to the tradition of ripping off what was hot at the time, Mattei (under his "Bob Hunter" alias here) went for something he could do while in his Filipino hot spot, and that was make a cop film set in the final days of the Vietnam war. The film going through the Italian filter was Off Limits, starring William DaFoe, a film I have admittedly not seen.

Manning the star roles are Brent Huff (Strike Commando 2) and Max Laurel (Quang from Robowar), with appearances by Romano Puppo (Cory from Robowar too) who appears to have an Italian accent here, as Captain Kirk (oh you read that right, writer Rossella Drudi must have been having a funny day), Werner Pochath, who had something of an acting career, as Col. Kasler, Candice Daly as Annie, and as always, Massimo Vani making a cameo as background filler. Most surprising of all though, is Brett Halsey as General Morris. Huff plays Morgan, a typically tough-as-nails American cop with a dangly earring while Laurel plays Hawk, a Vietnamese cop with the thin underlining of being a family man, they're an unlikely pairing but they've got each other's backs.

They've been called in by Captain Kirk, reluctantly known as "Skipper" by Morgan, to investigate a recent murder carried out on an American officer called Col. Watts by the Cobra Force, an American army unit. All signs point to the murder being orchestrated by one Major Shooman, the leader of the Cobra Force. The area where the shooting took place is in the control of Col. Kasler; Kasler tells Morgan and Hawk that Shooman definitely wants him and another officer dead, but isn't really saying why for reasons of national security (to quote Kasler directly, "it's not a pretty picture"). Kasler resides with his boy-ish bodyguard called Lodge, who does a great job at body-guarding when a drug-abusing Vietnamese street urchin knocks him out and then tries to assassinate Kasler (a bullet wound to the shoulder, something Kasler considers to be just a scratch, while his acting certainly makes it to be that way). After a good five minutes or so of the cop duo chasing the amateur assassin (and Huff spewing out unintelligible swearing while out of breath), the Cobra Force appear again to kill the assassin.

After that unsuccessful tirade, Morgan makes a call to Skipper about the current situation (Hawk has seemingly disappeared for now, "one of his kids is sick", either Drudi and Mattei REALLY wanted to emphasise the fact this guy is a family man, or Max Laurel wasn't on the set). While on the phone, a blond woman called Annie writes something I really can't read on the mirror opposite of Morgan in lipstick (if I could read the Japanese subtitles, it'd help), but he follows her and she tells him the room number of one of the Cobra Force murderers; Morgan ends up killing him before he can interrogate him (the killer gets hold of a giant machinegun but completely fails to just walk up to Morgan and spray him and instead destroys the fucking bar in his room!). Morgan and Hawk then corner Kasler to get some info out of him, who tells them that he, Col. Watts and the other one in danger witnessed Major Shooman order his men to slaughter a village of innocent Vietnamese citizens, but the American military want to keep it quiet to save face. The other officer in danger is a guy called Pierce, who is spending his night in a strip club, but uh-oh! Morgan and Hawk get there too late, the other two Cobra Force killers have done away with their next victim, so Morgan and Hawk kill the Cobra Force guys out of self-defence (Hawk punches one to death because he nearly knocked out his tooth, in Hawk's defence "I thought I was hitting him lightly!"), all this after an extremely hokey car chase!
Skipper gets pissed at how the two have kinda fucked up their mission (who in the middle of all this serious business and shouting, still reaffirms that he hates being called Skipper), General Morris orders Morgan and Hawk to go to the front to meet up with Shooman and get some answers. Shooman being Shooman, more or less kidnaps them after a brief encounter with some Vietcong troops (movie stock footage of Vietcong troops), and lives up to his reputation; he snorts coke while telling his helicopters to start bombing Vietnamese villages, all the while barking "FUCKING BEAUTIFUL", this scene enables Mattei the one-two punch of ripping off the same scene from Off-Limits, as well as the re-use of footage from his own films! Shooman tells them that Col. Watts and Col. Pierce were working for him while the Cobra Force guys doing the murders must have been traitors, Morgan takes a bullet to the arm whilst gunning and Shooman tells him to get patched up while he and Hawk will go to Saigon to meet up with General Morris. However, Shooman and Hawk are killed the next day by guys who have presumably been impersonating the Cobra Force, who have also killed General Morris. It's now up to Hawk to get to the bottom of things.

The plot is confusing, and it essentially boils down to "THE COMMIES DID IT!", which is as satisfying as any conclusion can get for trash cinema like this, in which brains come last. As per usual with Mattei, stock footage is a norm, but the abundance of the material is unprecedented here. This time, not only do we get footage snatched from the public domain of the Vietnam War, we even get a helping of clips from Strike Commando 1 & 2 and Double Target! There's probably some others in there, as this is one Mattei flick that feels really under-budgeted, as if they had a total of four locations (a hotel, a marketplace outside the hotel, a nearby jungle and a fake chopper interior). Mike Monty even makes an appearance through the magic of re-using film (note how the type of helicopter constantly changes in the Shooman scenes).

That's not all though, the car chase scene has been completely pulled from another exploitation flick, Ark of the Sun God! Which used miniatures quite impressively! Too bad the most inventive piece of film work in this is the first murder scene with the gas masks being put on the camera lenses to make it look like it's from the point of view of the killers. These inclusions easily make this feel like one of Mattei’s most incomplete and lowest budgeted works. The production values are simply inept; locations feel more limited than usual with Philippines-based actionsploitation schlock, camera shots are primarily static and many lines are very hard to make out clearly, as if they didn't use boom mics for many shoots. The biggest aesthetic offender would be how the film is so murky, with one too many scenes taking place in the dark with obscured action. That's not to say this isn't worth a view at least once, the Drudi-penned script feels just like any Fragasso screenplay with the outrageous dialogue (well, she is his wife!), there's simply too many golden lines to count ("If I want any shit from you, I'll squeeze your head!", "Gook COPS?! SHIT! This war sucks more and more!"). Brent Huff cruises on through with his baritone suaveness, though there's plenty of times in which he just shouts everything, making him awful pretty easily. Also, count the times Pochath changes facial expression. This review can't be completed without mention being made of the music; Cop Game has its own theme song! It's a deliriously 80s-centric Rock piece and it sounds awesome, even though no one is exactly credited for it other than Al Festa. The incidental music is repetitive but not bad in itself, even though the obnoxious synthesizer really numbs your brain, one piece would even later end up in Robowar it seems (or vice versa), acquiring it wasn't from a previous film already. There's two other obscure 80s songs that appear in the strip club scenes that drag themselves out a bit (this being exploitation and all, and perhaps Mattei was having a nostalgic moment for his mondo movie days). Cop Game may be one of Bruno Mattei’s worst movies, which in itself makes it a very recommended watch for lovers of trash, but its dismal action set pieces mean it stands only on how bad it is; the mildly competent Double Target and even Strike Commando at least had something holstering them up. That's not to say I could ever hate this, it's good riffing material all round.

• Action: 2.5/5
• Music: 4/5
• Stock footage: 7/5  

-James, 27 March 2010 (original date)

Review source: Japanese VHS

Screenshot source: Japanese VHS

Title information

• Production company: Flora Films
• Year of release: 1988

Alternative titles:

• G.I. Killer (West Germany)
• サイゴン野獣刑事, "Saigon yajou keiji" <Saigon Beast Investigator> (This title is a tricky one, but it seems to be saying that the investigator(s) featured in the film are hardasses) (Japan)

The Intruder

You know you've got a winner on your hands when a film opens with a driving, plastic-jazz synth beat only to be cut off the moment an overweight Tommy Chong knocks down an old lady (gracefully called "Lady hit by car" in the credits) with his reckless driving, and follows it all with a spouting of misogyny.

You also know you've got a real winner when your hero is a poodle-haired bum with a gravity-defying bouncy ball, who announces that he is "RAMBU", just in time for the title card to declare him "THE INTRUDER" just as the plastic-jazz synth melody kicks back in. Words fail me simply at the opening of this review, I could go on about how the success of First Blood and the second Rambo movie spawned countless foreign knock-offs that were somehow trying to leech off their successes, but that wouldn't exactly cover The Intruder. This Indonesian effort is definitely modeled after First Blood, but this thing is really in a league of its own. 'Unbelievable' is a fitting way of summing the whole movie up in one word, if we were to break it down? 'Hilarious' might just about fit too.

  

Rambu (full name Alex Turambuan, yes I guess they had to come up with something to justify his name sounding similar to "Rambo") laments the risible job market of his location (welcome to the recession, sonny boy) and lives with his girlfriend. Meanwhile, overweight-Tommy Chong-lookalike Charlie kidnaps the daughter of someone who has failed paid to pay a ransom and forces her to dance on stage to an audience. They couldn't sound any more joyfully delighted at how a girl has been kidnapped and is being threatened with rape on stage. Lucky for her though, the sturdy arm of Rambu thrusts its way into shot to stop Charlie's evil amusement. Whatever the reason he had for being in such a smutty hive we'll never know, he must have sensed it needed his justice. After a bar room brawl, Rambu pins up Charlie and calls over the girl to deliver punishment: "I-I can't hurt him..." she bleats, "what do you mean you can't hurt him? He was ready to hurt you, go on and show him what it feels like! Slap him!", and so Charlie's punishment for attempted violation is a series of out-of-sync slaps to the face. Justice is served.

The girl's name is Ella and she, Rambu and his friend Bobby hightail it out there while a still-conscious Charlie just seems to give up on the floor. Charlie is just one of the many footmen of crime boss John White, a connoiseur of cocaine and curator of strange guns (shotguns with the butts of submachine guns?), who makes sure to contrast Rambu's tender moments with his girlfriend with scenes of him getting it on with his own girlfriend, complete with a funk-tastic porn groove anchoring his scenes. Meanwhile, a guy called Andre has taken a lot of interest in Rambu, because "he sounds like a real crime fighter", and so sends out one of his friends called Steven to interview him. Steven opens up with this goldie when Rambu asks how does he know him; "well we have a lot in common, we both love justice and hate crime", sorry Steven, but mutual interests in justice and crime-fighting make Rambu and the likes of showa-era Kamen Riders good friends, not schmucks like you.

RIDER RAMBU KICK!

However, things take a very personal turn when Charlie and his men brutally rape Rambu's girlfriend, and he's going to deliver a bit more than just slaps to the face...

This is an outrageous, over-the-top affair filtered through the no-budget lens of Indonesian exploitation. With Mr White's constant meddlings in drugs, rape and the way his women are even advertised to him as if they're prizes in gameshows, villains don't get much slimier. Similarly, heroes don't get much more super-powered than Rambu; a man who is able to beat up a gang of hoodlums while blinded and not even reel much from the blows of metal bars are the very least of his feats. To discuss this film's more insane aspects may be spoiling it, but needless to say, scenes of a three-wheeler van cavalry going head-to-head with roves of bikers have to be seen to be believed. Add to the greasy mix some very choppy editing, side-splittingly horrendous dubbing, impossible guns, non-existant muzzle fire and a score that seesaws between sounding cheap and pornoraphic and sounding like it belongs in Eraserhead, you have... a film beyond films. Its minimalistic locations and sets make the entirety of it look so barren and unusual, almost unintentionally surreal (couple this with the film's many other crazy elements, and you certainly have a recipe for something borderline surreal).

Star Peter O'brian has to be one of the most peculiar-looking Stallone imitators around, seemingly appearing muscular and undernourished all in one, and at other times looking as if he belongs to an AC/DC tribute band. Even with all the First Blood knock-offs out there, this one is without comparison, and I don't think there will ever be a finer action hero who is jobless to boot. To everyone who worked on The Intruder so many years ago, under what ungodly conditions, we salute you for turning out one of the most euphoric films in existance, it's a film that deserves its audience.

• Music: 1/5
• Editing: -2/5
• Being one of the wackiest experiences in film: 4/5 

-James, 31 May 2011

Review source: Japanese VHS

Screenshout source: Unsubtitled VHS

Title information

• Production company: Parkit Films
• Year of release: 1986

Alternative titles:

• "Pembalasan rambu", <Retaliation beacon> (Indonesia)
• 超人ランブー, "Choujin ranbu" <Superhuman Rambu> (Japan)

Double Target

Strike Commando would not be the first (and certainly not the last) time Bruno Mattei and Claudio Fragasso would rip-off Rambo: First Blood Part II; Double Target is slightly outgunned by the more famous Strike Commando, but is a more tightly put-together movie, with just enough plagiarism. With Strike Commando and similar Rambo-styled movies much loved around these parts, how does Double Target hold up?

Taking up the helm as the bulletproof force of American strength this time around is Miles O’Keeffe; O’Keeffe plays Robert Ross (less impressively known as “Bob Ross” throughout the film, though he's an artist with the bazooka here), a Vietnam veteran (what else?) who had a short relationship with a Vietnamese woman before her death and now wants to bring his son back to the States, but is unable to due to official circumstances. His attempt to persuade a councilor to get his son back invariably leads to an encounter with one Russian colonel Galckin (Bo Svenson) before being rescued by American forces. Ross is dropped in front of Senator Blaster (Donald Pleasance) and is given the mission of going into Vietnam to confirm their suspicions of Russian activity, Ross takes this opportunity to also get his son back, but Blaster has given him the limit of getting the mission done in a number of days counted on one hand, and of course, is a complete dick about things. There is an opening scene concerning suicide squads attacking various British and American military personnel, but it really does have no bearing on the story.

It’s a Rambo copy through and through, any scenes Strike Commando did not rip off get their treatment here but with slightly more dignified executions, as far as can be for an unoriginal reproduction (the movie models itself more after Rambo, rather than outright repeat what that film did). The stoic action is interspersed with plenty of cheap acting (watch out for the many instances of extras throwing themselves before a bomb blast actually happens) and oddly-inserted comedic moments that seem to welcome themselves on in. Junkies for things that explode will get their money’s worth; action scenes are delectably filled with screen-filling fireballs the way only Mattei could do them. Keep an eye out for how Robert Ross destroys an entire warehouse with a infinite grenade launcher alone, as well as how the rescue operation of a village involves the destruction of every last hut; Claudio Fragasso, your logic is boundless! Not to mention, the helicopter climax from Rambo resulting in a fistfight between O’Keeffe and Svenson aboard a chopper. Feeling higher-budgeted than most of Mattei’s other flicks, the film has actual helicopters instead of stock footage with the model of chopper constantly changing, as well as some well-masked miniature setpieces. In fact, so lacking in stock footage it is (aside from some footage that may or may not be from Strike Commando, it’s actually difficult to tell as both of these were seemingly made the same year), the only instance of actual recycled film is absolutely gratuitous; it’s a mix of shark documentary footage as well as model shark footage taken from The Last Shark, to make a laughable scene of Robert Ross blowing up one of the predators. It really brings home the film’s B-Movie quality, almost needlessly too, but it seems they had to have something to put a spin on the departure scene from Rambo.

Music, possibly recycled from a few sources, is of higher quality than Strike Commando’s synth medley and lends itself to some well-shot scenes with decent success, rendering some instances in the film quite beautiful (shocking for a film of this calibre, right? Let’s not doubt Mattei’s cinematic eye too much), while the end credits song, a love piece, inappropriately fits itself in but is welcomed thanks to all the other B-grade antics before it. While Miles O’Keeffe is lacking the transcendent exuberance of Reb Brown’s Mike Ransom, he has enough charm to carry the film on his husky-toned sharpness, making up for his wooden style fairly well. Donald Pleasance, no alien to B-Movies despite his major actor status, only ever appears in one set in the entire film, giving the impression all his scenes were shot first so he could get out early, and given O’Keeffe’s performance’s similarity to Snake Plisken (not to mention, not looking a hell of a lot different), he probably felt he was still on the set for Escape from New York. Bo Svenson lazily gets by with an evil grin throughout and an accent that can’t quite decide whether it’s fake Russian or not, he has quite the cold look at least. Other actors include stalwarts and extras of Italian exploitation, such as Mike Monty reprising the exact same role as he did in Strike Commando as the Col. Trautman rip-off, Massimo Vanni rocks his Chuck Norris look as a Russian battling his friend Ottaviano Dell’Acqua, who appears in this as a Belgian aid to Ross. Let’s not forget the pseudonymous Edison Navarro as Ross’ son, acting just as awfully as he did in Strike Commando too. There are plenty of ineptly shot scenes that punch up the questionably unintentional comic factor (the amount of opportunities Ross should be easily gunned down, such as Galckin having his gun right next to his head during a bizarre escape scene), balanced out with some impressive aesthetics, with Miles O’Keeffe smugging his way through the action. It’s an instant recommendation for fans of B-grade cheese and 80s action, Double Target hits everything right.

-James, 22 July 2010 (original date)

• Explosions: 4/5
• "FUCK YEAH": 5/5
• Gratuitous shark: 3/5

Review source: Japanese VHS
Screenshot source: Japanese VHS

Title information

• Production company: Flora Films
• Year of release: 1987/88

Alternative titles:

• Los Heroes Jamas Se Rinden <The Heroes Never Surrender> (Argentinia)  
• Double Target - Cibles à abattre <Double Target - Targets to Kill> (France)
• Der Kampfgigant <The Giant Fight> (West Germany)
• ダブル・ターゲット, "Dabaru taageto" <Double Target> (Japan)

Rolf: The Last Mercenary

There's nothing like another chapter in the long history of Italian exploitation, and Rolf is one of the muddier and the grittier ones; coming out in 1983 as fast as possibly can in the wake of First Blood, this revenge tale (of course) borrows heavily from the Stallone vehicle, while the speed of its production really shows in the overall product. Written and directed by Mario Siciliano, a man better known for his prior pornos, that surely says a lot about what we're in for.

Opening to a flashback (which you'd only ever learn later), a group of soldiers violently gun down fleeing villagers as everything burns, they are the former mercenary buddies of our titular hero, Rolf. Rolf now lives a peaceful life as a commercial pilot while seeing his girlfriend Joanna (he says something to the extent of "if I knew you were coming I would have showered" when we first meet her!). When a dead body turns up in Rolf's (mostly unnamed Middle Eastern town), the police blame Rolf for it, seemingly they don't like his past as a mercenary; is the film presenting a nationalistic friction between a caucasian ex-soldier and the people of a race he may have previously killed as some sort of social critique? Or is it just playing the police up to be assholes? They let him off, but not after they've stuck his hand into an unflushed toilet!

When one of Rolf's old war buddies, John (one of the slimiest looking guys since before Clarence Boddicker... woops, just spoiled who the villain is), turns up, he offers him a chance to make $50,000 exporting hard drugs. Rolf declines, but when John makes a crack about his dead mother he has none of it and bashes John's head against a wall before kicking him out! When Joanna hears about him passing up such a sum, he tells her a painful memory of how his prostitute mother was given a drug overdose in front of him by her pimp, along with a bit of expository dialogue on how he was the most athletic in college, but yeah, Rolf's a good clean guy. After spending a good time with his girlfriend, Rolf is caught by his the entire group of his former friends, and they're a colourful bunch of horrid-looking bastards; they beat him up, dislocate his knee and leave him for dead in a bush full of leeches (even after he's reset his own knee!). Police bias prevents them from putting a search out for Rolf, leaving Joanna to look for him on her own, the police do end up being nice enough to stop two rapists following her though! After she finds him, Rolf learns he has been fired from his job, so he gets together with a friend and hijacks a plane loaded with John's drugs, only to piss all over them and hurl them out!

For this, John and his boys break into Joanna's home, and in one of the most uncomfortable sequences ever filmed for a low-budget piece of cash-in trash, take turns raping her; nothing new for this sort of crap, but the ugliness of the men and the incredibly inappropriate porn-like theme in the background blur the line between it being unintentionally hilarious and accidentally offensive. Put it this way, if you imagine someone got off to this scene back when the film came out, that's where it gets worrying, but that can really be said about a lot of things. After discovering the love of his life violated and murdered, Rolf goes to visit his friend Pedro, the survivor of a village massacre committed by the mercenaries, to retrieve some hidden weapons. Rolf invites his new enemies to a forest where the filmmakers can finally rip off First Blood as Rolf devises traps to pick off each of them. He doesn't get to have all the pickings to himself though, as the mercenaries are so horrible they even end up backstabbing each other! When only John and another mecenary are left remaining, John escapes, while the other nameless bastard gets his moment of glory and riddles Rolf's hands with bullets! Rolf, not ready to be defeated by the emotional weight of his girlfriend's death and now his hands being made useless, batters his opponent to death! Hands bloodied and holed, Rolf raises his arms to the sky and proclaims "god help me!"!

From here on out, things get very personal as the police put on an all-out search to find Rolf, Pedro distracts them with a tale that illustrates just how awful his mercenary friends were and how heroic he was in comparison and in his final conquest of revenge Rolf shows that he can still do some amazing things with useless hands! The ending is bleak though, but if it has anything to say, it's that clearly Rolf is the caucasian Jesus incarnate who pays for our sins.

This is a dirty, dirty movie, one that would no doubt be praised higher if its appallingly low production values did not render it such a sigh instead of the bang it's trying to be, but whose to say exploitation movies exactly tried? It has to be said though, some genuine attempts are made at characterization (I say that loosely, Rolf and Joana tell themselves things longtime lovers should probably already know, oh poorly-done exposition), and the villains truly are the biggest bunch of hideous, unlikable sonsuvbitches ever, even if they're presented as having pretty much no reason to be. One of them is so scummy he even steals his fallen comrade's watch and wallet, and then uses his blood as make-up to play dead! Heck, their canteens are even loaded up with cocaine instead of water! If a bit more time was spent on them, it would have been fun seeing their social degradation during the forest in which they all hate each other. The antics of the particularly venomous-looking John are interesting to say the least, he randomly beats up a woman in the street, then randomly forces a bottle down the mouth of another without anyone batting an eye, and then shoves away a woman trying to kiss him! She and her friend bizarrely don't stop though, and seem to pamper him in fondles. Hell, he's just a lonely, tortured soul, just listen to the pain in his voice when the police ask him about friends and he responds with "what friends? I don't know what you're talking about".

Don't misunderstand though and think that these villains are the type to make the acid in your stomach boil at how atrocious they are, the presentation is so bad they just come off as being bluntly bad. In fact, brutality is delivered in spades, but the lack of polish means the effect is never fully illustrated, making many scenes come off as just badly directed with goofy sound effects, no one suffering from the injuries they're receiving and just generally looking very stiffly-done. It doesn't help that there's no subtlety either, and that the violence just keeps on coming. If you want to go by the ideas at play alone, this film is as violent as 2008's Rambo, but without any of the 'oomph'.

Worming out probably unintended symbolism in some of the scenes is very amusing, such as the aforementioned arms-raised-to-heaven scene and how after all his killings Rolf is shown cleaning himself under a waterfall, cleaning himself of all his sons of course. 95% of the scenes have no background foley, making them feel very hollow and taking away and naturalism they could have, it's a definite sign of rushed filmmaking. Admittedly, it is bad that a repeat viewing is what it took to make me like this film (in my defence I was falling asleep when I first watched it), the acting is pretty unnoticeable but it has to be said the dubbing is lifeless and at times incoherent, mainly because the actors barely open their mouths more than a little. At times, it seems they don't even twitch their lips, and in one only other instance, Rolf opens his mouth fully to yell and the dubber's dialogue hilariously doesn't match up.

That said, the music by the great Fabio Frizzi also isn't very up to scratch, with only a  few notable background themes lingering in your head after, the most notable piece of music is however, Rolf's theme song! Yes, Rolf gets this soothing synth-rock melody play at some of the wrong times in the film, but the lyrics are irresistable, and it's the only thing credited in the end titles! As a bit of trivia, some poster art for the film shows Rolf holding a gun he never uses in the film, along with a blonde-haired Joanna clinging to his leg in that objectifying way to make the men seem more manly like posters did back then, but that's not it, the drawing of the woman has been stolen from the poster for Clint Eastwood's The Gauntlet!

This is probably one of the earliest examples of Italy ripping off First Blood, and while it completely blows the likes of Fireback out of the water yet doesn't hold a candle to later Italian movies like Blastfighter, it's watchable in its own right, but only when you've had quite a bit of experience with these films. It's like a grimier prototype for The Intruder. Totally shameless and lacking any serious amount of punch in today's world, Rolf: The Last Mercenary is a rare curiosity, it's definitely in need of a remastered DVD release that bigs up its ridiculous and violent content. In the immortal words of Rolf's theme song... Rolf, your vengeance can't die! The fire in your eyes, says it all!  

• Action: 3/5
• Brutality: The outline of it all is there
• Natural lighting: 5/5 (Godfather it ain't though)

-James, 14 November 2010 (original date)

Title information

• Production company: Metheus Film
• Year of release: 1983

Alternate titles:

• Der Tag des Söldners, "The Day of the Mercenary" (West Germany)
• Viimeinen taistelija, "The Last Fighter" (Finland)
• Rolf: ワイルド・アウトサイダー (Rolf: wairudo autosaidaa) "Rolf: Wild Outsider" (Japan)

Review source: Japanese VHS
Screenshot source: Japanese VHS 

Strike Commando

For a long time I considered Full Metal Jacket my favourite film, for how much I had spent analysing it, as well as how it was virtually perfect in every way. I've had other films that I've shared the same enjoyment with, but all of those have had to be pushed aside for one rogue title, one that's so unoriginal and at the same time so original, one that's not even so-bad-it's-good but instead so utterly transcendent that it is immediately elevated to the highest level of cinematic genius. This title is the 1987 Bruno Mattei epic, Strike Commando.
Before I go on, I have to say that I am almost having trouble thinking of how I want to review this, as this movie is so out-of-this-world, that it deserves not a single spoiler, and that you should make it your job to find a bootleg copy immediately. Find it and revel in one of the most insane experiences that shouldn't be legal to enjoy. For everyone else, read on.  

If you know Mattei, you'll know that this movie steals quite shamelessly from bigger Hollywood titles, and getting knocked off this time around is Rambo: First Blood Part 2 (as well as a bit of Mad Max 3). The Strike Commandos, led by Michael Ransom as played by the blond juggernaut Reb Brown, are trying to get rid of a camp in Vietnam. Unfortunately, the operation goes belly-up when commanding officer Col. Radek (Christopher Connelly) sets off the detonators too quickly because he just wants results, so the Commandos die, save for Ransom, who at the last minute was blown into a lake. Ransom gets washed up at a Vietnamese village led by a French man named Le Due (Luciano Pegozzi, who has played alongside Reb before, most notably in Yor: The Hunter from the Future). There, Ransom befriends a Vietnamese boy called Lao, who has dreams of seeing the wonderland that is America, where ice cream and pop corn grow on trees (if Reb Brown says it, it must be true, Micahael Ransom could never be cold enough to build up a child's hopes). The only thing is, these Vietnamese are beset by the communists, so Ransom volunteers to off them all until he can get back to America, while promising to take the Vietnamese with him. Le Due is killed by an ENORMOUS Russian meathead named Jakoda (Alex Vitale) during the scuffle though, and his body is found by Ransom.

From here it enters into Rambo 2 territory (though that's not to say half the action in this isn't already from Rambo 2, just get sight of Ransom hiding camouflaged against a tree to knife someone); Radek tells Ransom to go back into Vietnam with proof of the communists there (even though Ransom has just dropped a communist badge into his hand that Le Due stole from Jadoka just before he died) and is given a camera, in exchange Ransom wants Radek to liberate the Vietnamese who helped him. Much of this though is immediately tossed aside as Radek is revealed to be in league with the communists and is just trying to off Ramson, what follows is a blood-pumping spectacle of Reb Brown going batshit insane and killing communists left and right for how they murdered Lao and his dream. Ransom's fury is interspersed with drama told through unforgettably funny performances, and some stock footage of helicopters here and there.

Strike Commando is definitive schlock material, but it actually feels like it knows it is. This movie is almost a parody of the many "remakesploitation" movies that so many directors like Mattei were notorious for, especially with villains like Jakoda speaking with a stereotypical Russian accent and spitting "Americanski" at puny red, white and blue-blooded Michael Ransom. Reb gratuitously stabs, blows up and breaks the necks of every commie he comes across, while riddling the rest with bullets and popping one-liners like crazy. Reb is also fucking superhuman in this, being able to swim away from boats a second before they've exploded, not to mention, yelling like a beast after bashing in communist skull. As if the buckets of action weren't enough, the movie ends on an unashamedly funny climax; enjoy a split second of an action man doll being blown up for someone's death before Reb walks off into the sunset, basically laughing at the ridiculousness you've just seen. You can't help but feel everyone walked away from this with a smile on their faces.

While Christopher Connolley's acting skills are the only ones worth a damn, the likes of Reb, Vitale and various others are GOLDEN; you have never seen anguish as handled by a cuddly brick shithouse who is scrunching his face up while holding a dying boy in his hands who is smiling, while telling him about Disneyland. Claudio Fragasso's script is rich with hilarious lines and other dialogue that no one in their right mind should find entertaining. Neither Reb, Vitale or any of the blank-round-firing extras have lines in which the delivery of them fail to amuse. Also, Ransom using a pair of infrared goggles that appear to do nothing but still let him see where the enemy is, bizarre, of course it just leads to him riddling a load of huts with bullets while screaming. You've also got to love him saying goodbye in German when he thinks it's Russian, intentional or not? Who knows.

Production values are fairly middle-of-the-road for Mattei here, there's some decent cinematography but a definite overcharge of stock footage, especially when it seems they were able to get a real helicopter, it's cheap without being too cheap though (see Robowar). Speaking of which, several lines in this re-appear in Robowar, as if part of some running gag, there's also no scarcity of explosions in this, be them huts, miniatures, pools of water or people blowing up.

This is first-hand proof of the entertainment Mattei and his crew were capable of, what's certain is that there is nothing else quite like it. Be sure to check it out, it's an unforgettable ride.

• Explosions: 5/5
• Italy being nice enough to show the world America kicks ass: 5/5
• Reb Brown: Oh god it's off the scale 

-James, 17 October 2009 (original date)

Robowar

Robowar/Robot da Guerra is the most shamelessly unoriginal and near incoherent rip-off of Predator that exists, and for that, I love it dearly. Directed under Bruno Mattei's Vincent Dawn alias, Robowar stars cuddly brick shithouse Reb Brown as Major Murphy Black (better known as "Killzone" according to an unnamed officer in the beginning) and his squad of Vietnam vets, 'BAM', short for "Big Ass Motherfuckers". It mightn't make much sense but these guys pretty much all are shoot-and-ask-questions-next-month anyway; the Motherfuckers include  Cpl. Neil Corey, Alfred "Papa Doc" Bray, Chuck Norris-lookalike Larry "Diddy Bopp" Guarino, Sonny "Blood" Peel and Quang. As you might expect, they're carbon copy clones of the men from Predator, though they are transcendentally likable in their own right.

BAM have been dispatched to a non-descript island on a non-descript mission, coupled with a fairly tubby soldier named Mascher, who is in on the details of their mission, he's just not telling. For that, BAM are pretty much out to kill anything that moves, including corpses (how dead people make a bush rustle is anyone's guess). Preceding all this though is a sequence involving two guys in a helicopter yelling into their radio about something going wrong, down below, a series of first person perspective shots filtered through an amber pixellated screen show people and buildings being blown up while electronic jibberish rambles on. As you would have probably guessed, this chaos is all being caused by the most singularly impressive robot to consist of just a guy in biker clothes with various pieces of plastic painted black glued on. This robot is Omega 1, designed to be the most indestructible and unbeatable weapon in existence, and is armed with some heavy laser weaponry. Quite hilariously, Omega 1 speaks in nothing but unintelligible drivel with only fragments of its utterances making a bit of sense, however, if you can read the language of the subtitles this film was released in (Japanese and Greek to my knowledge, others probably exist), you'll be able to understand the smack it spouts.

There is a subplot involving Murphy and the boys of BAM wiping up the guerillas they discover on the island and rescuing a woman who is about to be tortured (this woman is only named in the credits, revealed to be called "Virgin"), but the main focus is that Mascher was involved in the creation of Omega 1 and is now trying to get it back without revealing info on what it is exactly (and there is a reason for this, but we'll get into it later), a bit of a haphazard tactic, especially if the robot is supposed to be invincible. Omega 1 takes out all of Murphy's men including Mascher, who tries to disable his creation by getting in close with a remote detonator. Before it boils down to Murphy's fight with it, he learns from a tape Mascher left with him that Omega 1 is actually an old friend of his, Lt. Woodring, who was badly wounded in Vietnam, so he was grafted into a cyborg. The final showdown involves Omega 1 being rugby tackled by Reb Brown (breaking from character names for a moment because a robot being rugby tackled by that man is awesome alone), dowsed in napalm and then exploded with its own laser weapon, Murphy and Virgin now need to get off the island.

But wait! Omega 1 somehow survives the explosion (indestructible is right, Mascher would be proud) and chases Murphy as Virgin swims to the boat they've signalled. Eventually, Murphy is confronted at the top of a waterfall, but Omega 1 hands him Mascher's remote device and in a (surprisingly) slightly touching scene, begs a teary-eyed Murphy to destroy him after revealing Woodring's charred face beneath the helmet. It's true that this film is devoid of artistic merit (not exactly a bad thing as it's entertaining as all hell), this scene is actually done fairly well for its focus on Murphy's face and for not using any music. Anything resembling a bit of depth though is immediately flushed away when Reb roars as he jumps down the waterfall and into the pool below, but this film isn't exactly meant to be 'good'.  

Being released in 1989, Robowar is as cheap and as unoriginal as many of these films came; a lot of scenes are direct copies of what was seen in Predator, right down to Reb hurling a knife into an enemy's stomach and delivering a cheap one-liner while winking; the audacity alone puts Arnie to shame. Much of the dialogue is usually nonsensical and mostly hilarious, it sometimes feels like the actors were not working along with the script properly or as if the script was asking for things they didn't have. No one in this movie is a real actor, but for what it's worth, they do a serviceable job, making it more entertaining, not that there's much drama to be had, even if the characters are faced with their friends dying (the quality becomes quite laughable in the few times drama does rear its head though, save for Murphy's brief moment atop the waterfall).

The character of Mascher though is fairly likable as he's both a scientist and a soldier, so the idea of him going after his own work rather than sending someone else is appealing, that and he seems to be played by the only moderately decent actor in the movie (too bad though he was played by Mel Davidson, someone who was notorious for being an asshole and a paedophile on Filipino film sets). The trigger for Lt. Woodring being involved is quite poorly done; Corey finds Guarino's arm and Quang picks up a dogtag from his hand, which is revealed to be Woodring's; was Guarino holding on to it for whatever reason or did the robot leave it there? Either way it's a basic excuse to make mention of the character. The film revels in its redundancies and inconsistencies through Omega 1; the robot wields a whopping big laser gun around even though it has three wrist-mounted guns that all seem to do the same thing, it also carries a knife at one point. Toward the end of the film, Omega 1 loses its gun only for it to magically reappear in its holster, which it struggles to pull out due to malfunctioning, why couldn't it have just used the wrist lasers at that point?

The action is plentiful and even if little of it is constructed very well, it's funnily satisfying; BAM have no sense of ammo conservation but they seem to have an infinite amount of bullets as they unload into everything they see, even if their tried-and-true method fails against Omega 1. The highlight is when they storm an enemy base; shit gets shot up and shit gets blown up, among other brawny action, it's simplistic but it delivers.

The synth score tends to be repetitive but some pieces actually sound quite good, there's even a decent rock song in the credits (in the Japanese version, it appears twice, once in the credits and once in the middle of the film), however, its name or performers aren't listed at all. A soundtrack apparently was released, but I'll be damned if I can find anything on it. As with most productions involving something mechanical when being released in Japan, there is a small schematic diagram, either included on the box or released in promotional material, if you didn't guess already, Robowar somehow has one on a promotional flyer as if it's really supposed to interest people in its genius mechanical design.

It should be noted that the end credits get Peel and Guarino's names mixed-up, and calls Reb Brown's character "Marthy" as well as calling Papa Doc "Arthur", instead of Alfred. Robowar also seems to be damned with some hideous poster art; the one most used in Europe features a robot that just barely resembles Omega 1, with an out-of-proportion head that is sometimes cut off by the blades of a helicopter in the distance. Not only that, but it wields a crossbow that doesn't appear in the film and holds it at an angle that shouldn't be possible with the way the fist is balled. Only the Japanese VHS cover looks somewhat attractive, though there is one that goes all out and even rips off the Predator font.

Taking place in a jungle that is far from exotic with gun-nut characters and a plot that steals liberally from Predator as well as pinching a bit from RoboCop, bad movie lovers can't go wrong with Bruno Mattei and his one-robot Robowar. I would probably pick this any day over the many charmless action movies produced nowadays.

• Gibberish: 5/5
• Tactical ability and stealth of BAM: 1/5
• Blank round usage: 5/5 

-James, 09 September 2009 (original date)