'Doing a thesis of a Bruno Mattei movie is difficult. I think it should be a law to drink alcohol while watching his movies. If you're a teetotaler you're totally missing out. This is essentially Rambo: First Blood Part II with an estranged father and son subplot thrown in. So, Braddock: Missing In Action III, totally ripped this movie off. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade ripped off the chase with a passenger seated motorcycle. This is another case of Italian ripoffs actually doing things before other films did. Now apart from that this movie features: asthmatic Donald Pleasence playing the same character Charles Napier played in Rambo 2, gratuitous shooting of an M60 in slow motion, exploding huts, shark stock footage, killing a shark with an exploding spear gun, laughable attempts at father and son intimacy, lines and scenes copied from Rambo 2, miniature explosions, giant bazookas, grenade launchers, and Bo Svenson pulling a Steven Berkoff playing a Russian when he isn't one. This is so fun, but as usual with Mattei there's a lot of fat in the non-action scenes. So it is like Burger King compared to Rambo's filet mignon but you what sometimes I'm in a hurry and Burger King hits the spot.
The movie starts with several different attacks in Hong Kong, the Philippines, and the Malaysian-American embassy. Bob Ross (Miles O'Keeffe) is drinking some Bud and watching the news and he gets a phone call. He goes to a Vietnamese embassy of some kind trying to find his son. The official there says his marriage to a Vietnamese woman wasn't legal and that she died in a concentration camp, something the official calls a "Re-education camp." As Ross he leaves he is kidnapped by Russian Colonel Galckin (Bo Svenson) but he gets into a fight with his right hand man. Meanwhile suits from outside the embassy rescue him. He goes to an American base and meets Senator Blaster (Donald Pleasence) who sends him to a region where the two Russians are leading a terrorist group.
Donald Plesence in yet another late 80s Italian movie as Senator Blaster
After facing off with some more Vietcong and blowing up a shark...more on that later...Ross meets his contact, Toro (Ottaviano Dell'Acqua). Ross is introduced to his son Jan (Edison Navarro) at a local village. He gives him a picture of him and his mother together but Jan rips the side of the picture with him in it. Jan blames Ross for the death of his mother. After going into the Russian base they escape on a motorcycle. Galckin leads his men to the village where Jan is who eventually gives himself up. Ross and Toro show up to get Jan back. While escaping Toro hits a landmine and stays behind to sacrifice himself while Ross and Jan meet up with more contacts including McDougall (Luciano Pigozzi) and his daughter Mary (Kristine Erlandson). McDougall's men are actually bad guys and Ross sends Jan and Mary away as he sees what is going on. Unfortunately McDougall is killed in a shootout. They go stay with some friends of Mary's. There is some substance here as Mary starts to come on to Ross and he invites her to go back to America with him and Jan. Jan can't seem to forgive his father. While going through the jungle after escaping the friend's house they captured. Galckin wants Jan to kill his father on a broadcast but refuses to do so. While his father is caged Jan shows up to kill the guard and sets Bob and Mary free. Bob gears up and uses a bazooka and grenade launcher to destroy much of the base. The next day they are pursued by helicopters which he destroys as well. Ross and Galckin have final showdown fighting on the outside of a helicopter. Ross wins and they leave to go to America. Everyone at the base except the Senator celebrates Ross's victory.
I didn't go through most of the things I loved in this movie while I talked about the plot because there are so many things. I enjoy how the soldiers in this are like stormtroopers and can't hit anything. Like when Toro and Ross get on the motorcycle they are inside a crate and come out surrounded by maybe 40 guys and no one shoots them right away and no one can hit them. There are some great slow motion scenes of shooting M60s and every hut just seems to have nitroglycerin in it because they explode on a few shots. The giant bazooka is an awesome movie weapon. Early on I love Ross's escape from the embassy as he just fights a bunch of dudes, but also gets surrounded in a warehouse and takes them out one by one. My favorite of which is when he tips a guy over who is climbing a ladder. I haven't even gotten to shark scene. Ross goes into Vietnam on an awesome miniature submarine and gets into a fight with a shark near a giant net. This has the most obvious stock footage. It does end though with him using an explosive spear gun to blow up the shark. Asthmatic Donald Pleasence and his typical late 80s scenery chewing is great. I enjoy his giant glasses that would make even Joe Gibbs say those are some big glasses. The final helicopter showdown is great too and you can tell there was real stunt work involved. Also Massimo Vanni plays one of the Russian soldiers and seeing him is always great. He's like the Where's Waldo of Mattei and Enzo G. Castellari's movies.
There are so many things copied from Rambo. The list of accomplishments Pleasence reads off for Bob Ross. A lot of action movies would go on to do that. The people in the briefing room. Mike Monty playing Colonel Waters basically playing Colonel Trautman. It has the scene of him playing dead before he blows up a helicopter. It even has the scene of the right hand man shooting at the main character to no avail and then the main character using an explosive projectile and waiting for them to turn back around and then blowing them up. Mattei was so shameless with his thievery but also made these movies fun and didn't just try to make a bad movie. I could see huts explode and people get riddled with blood squibs anytime so I loved this movie. Also the scene where he tricks the soldiers into cutting some fruit which he had laced with explosives is great too. Jan just all of the sudden loving his father is hilarious, I really think Missing in Action 3 copied that. I don't think it would have been above Cannon Films to have seen this movie somehow. Miles O'Keeffe is awesome too. I would highly recommend the Severin films blu-ray if you are interested. I'm sure you can find this movie in varying quality on Youtube or Archive.org.
English dubbing Cast:
- Larry Dolgin dubs Mike Monty as Colonel Waters
- Robert Spafford dubs Luciano Pigozzi as McDougall
Rating; 8/10
Trivia: Ottaviano Dell'Acqua is more known as a stunt performer than an actor and he played the zombie with the worms in its eyes on the famous poster of Zombie 2 AKA Zombie Flesh Eaters. Miles O' Keefe who is now reclusive was a dream guest for host Graham Norton, who did have him on his show.
No comments:
Post a Comment