Oh man, YES!
Oh, I'm sorry did you want an actual review of this movie? Sigh. Fine. This is Commando: John Matrix (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is a retired special forces officer and single dad living in a secluded rustic cabin with his preteen daughter Jenny (Alyssa Milano). When she's kidnapped by the would-be dictator (Dan Hedaya) of an ambiguous South American country and his cronie Bennett (Vernon Wells), a former soldier-in-arms, Matrix is blackmailed into assassinating the country's current leader so a military coup can be enacted. Matrix doesn't really like this plan, and teams up with stewardess Cindy (Rae Dawn Chong) to get his daughter back with as many dead bodies and explosions left in his wake as he can muster.
So this is basically a buffed-up prequel to Taken, and it's definitely one of the most enjoyable, satisfying action films I've seen recently. The plot wastes absolutely no time, giving us a 2-minute montage of "Arnold loves his daughter" moments and then BAM shit goes down. The whole political coup storyline is completely unnecessary and I didn't really follow it (there's like a 1-minute expository conversation during which I zoned out), but it didn't even matter. There are clearly defined good guys and clearly defined bad guys, and a very focused objective of reclaiming Arnold's daughter. The rest is just a pumping soundtrack, big hair, excellent one-liners, a wide range of weaponry, badass action scenes, and alllllll muscle.
I have to give a shout out to Rae Dawn Chong for her noticeably un-grating performance as the requisite regular-lady sidekick. She's unfamiliar with guns and violence, sure, but Cindy The Stewardess keeps her wits about her and learns really fast, plus she's resourceful and proactive, all of which I appreciated. She and Arnold make a fun team, with a cute dynamic and unexpected heart. Alyssa Milano is pretty cool in this movie too. And Arnold is, well, amazing, obviously. There is no other way for him to be. (Guess what appearance I'm looking forward to the most in The Expendables?)
Commando offers everything anyone could ever want in an action movie, plus it's from the 80's which means it's automatically more entertaining than most other films. The end.
4.5/5
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Commando (1985)
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Such a classic of 1980's action movies, I have seen this so many times as a kid. Today, it would be considered incredibly cheesy and poorly acted but this is just AWESOME!
ReplyDeleteIf Arnie released this today I'd probably hate it. I'd say it was mindless action. But, no, this is an 80s classic. Definitely a product of its time, but one you can return to for that action-man fix.
ReplyDeleteOh man this movie is a riot. So many classic lines one of my favourite being when he crashes the car and instantly turns to the black girl and is like "are you all right."
ReplyDeleteDan Hedaya is the least imposing villain ever! He was scarier in The First Wives Club. Still, you gotta love Commando, which I watched pretty much every weekend as a 13 y/o action junkie. I think I snuck into the theater to see it too. I was probably supposed to go see something else and somehow found myself chilling with Arnold and Rae Dawn for a couple of hours. Excellent action film.
ReplyDeletelol @ Snarky's. I think Hedaya was scariest in Clueless...
ReplyDeleteLove that you loved this, Alex. It's pretty no bullshit about it's over-the-topness, and for that I appreciate it. The one-liners are fantastic(ally bad). It's not probably even in the top five of Ahnuld flicks for me, but it's a great quintessential 80s flick.
The best part about this movie is the fact that he fires most of those guns on one clip for five minutes, and kills the same 5 guys over and over again, my be gluttons for punishment. After reading this I'm going to have to rent every 80's Arnie action movie and watch them all again. I agree @Fletch The one-liners are fantastic(ally bad), but where else do you get to here someone say I lied and drop someone odd a cliff? Or how the Porsche magically loses all the damage in one scene and has it return in another. I mean that is all movie magic man, 80's style. I guess I will put my Blockbuster movie pass to work for me in the coming weeks, at least I will get my 10.00 out of this month. Maybe I can find my boss at DISH some new one liners to use as well, he has been saying I'll be back in a bad accent for way to long.
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