Double Feature: Strike Commando I & II (1987/1988)

Movie Review:

It's a crying shame that most of Bruno Mattei's movies are not easily obtainable on DVD. Hell of the Living Dead would have to be the easiest to locate, and Rats: Night of Terror isn't hard to find either. Even Cruel Jaws got an Italian DVD release. I really don't understand however why his best (and by that I definitely mean most entertaining, not most accomplished) movies - Robowar, Born to Fight, Shocking Dark and the two Strike Commando films featured here - are not available on anything except hard to find VHS tapes.

That being said, the first Strike Commando VHS can be picked up on Amazon for a few dollars, but what I have here are the two Japanese tapes. I've recently started collecting these (Phantom Soldiers was the first) and they do tend to go for a bit of coin on eBay, but hey.. you have to collect something, right? Right? Right.

Strike Commando

"When I used to steal watermelon down in Alabama I only had to climb fences, not cut them."

Reb Brown as Sgt. Michael Ransom and his team of strike commandos are sent in to blow a munitions depot in Vietnam, their Major and Colonel waiting on the outskirts with a plunger to blow the planted demolitions. Reb Brown takes point, sneaks in and stealthily knives guards and fires crossbows while planting the explosives. With still a minute on the clock, Reb is noticed by one of the guards who fires at him and alerts the other guards. All hell breaks loose and the Colonel not waiting for the timer to run out, and not listening to the Major, orders the depot destroyed. The whole thing explodes and the commandos, except for Reb Brown, all perish. The Colonel mutters something about "The mission above all else."

Then next thing Reb Brown knows is waking up to the face of a ghostly figure in a wooden hut; he screams, falls out the side and hangs on a rope by his feet. It turns out he's been captured by a local Vietnamese tribe who a hiding from the Viet-cong who instead of killing him chant "A-merry-can! A-merry-can!" over and over. Their leader, a Frenchman named Le Due, begs for his help to lead the tribe to safety and he agrees. On the way they trip over a radio and a very pissed off Reb calls home, out for the Colonel's blood. The Major tells the Colonel that Reb is the best and he should watch out.

"The rest of strike commando demands vengeance! They all demand justice!"

The Major is sent in a chopper to retrieve Reb though of course it's not made easy for either of them with all the vietcong around. There's plenty of jungle warfare scenes, vietcong soldiers in pointy hats firing automatic weapons wildly at Reb and missing, grenades blowing up small sea craft etc. Out of nowhere a huge Russian goliath, Jakoda, strangles Le Due to death then he kicks a cobra (yes, really). Reb pulls a Russian badge torn from Jakoda's shirt out of Le Due's dead hands and pockets it. Eventually Reb makes a run for the chopper through rice patties being shelled with mortars, and gets picked up by the chopper.

It all ramps up a notch when after debriefing, Reb returns to get photographic evidence of the Russian influence in the area. Reb finds all the vietnamese tribe dead except for the child who in his dying throes tells Reb that the huge Russian goliath Jokda killed them all and asks about Disneyland. Reb loses his shit and M16's the huts to pieces. That's called 'showing emotion', but all it does is get Reb captured by Jakoda (who calls him an "Americanski" to prove he's Russian) then tortures him. Of course he eventually escapes his captors and decimates everything in his path.

"Disneyland! Popcorn and ice cream grow on trees! Anything you want can be granted to you by the genie in the lamp!"

This movie is hilarious and a real good time. That's why I decided to bold so many of the best lines, and believe me there are plenty more I'm leaving you to find for yourself. Some lines are obvious terrible attempts at humour and others, like Reb's sweet conversation with the Vietnamese child, are so cringeworthy you can't not laugh at them. The body count is also vast, almost up there with Phantom Soldiers, and there are plenty of exploding huts to look out for. Reb is great in his usual way but just not quite as awesome as he is in Predator-ripoff Robowar. He does play a pretty great Rambo-ripoff though.

"Amerrrriicannnskiiiiii!!!!!"

Strike Commando is a great 85 minute action-filled ride that gets better with each viewing. Yes, it's tragically bad, but that's what we're here for. Perfect for a loud, beer fuelled evening with mates. Hell it even has a cock fight, and by that I do mean chickens. Also, best going-apeshit ending to a film, ever. See this movie.

(Here's a great Reb Brown motage video!)

Strike Commando 2

"I've come to kill you."

Sgt. Michael Ransom is back, this time portrayed by Brent Huff (Born to Fight, Cop Game, Armed Response... some real pearler 80's trash and an actor I really need to get more DVDs of) who plays it less far less straight than Reb Brown did. Ransom wakes in his bed after a flashback-to-war nightmare played in slow motion to one of his ex-army buddies telling him his old commanding officer, Major Vic Jenkins (played by veteran actor Richard Harris), is being held captive by the CIA and to go talk to a guy called Peter Rogue to get information. So Ransom goes and beats the crap out of Rogue until he tells him where Jenkins is being held then sets out to rescue him. Upon arriving Ransom quickly learns that the obviously free Major Jenkins isn't being held captive but is hiding out for a secret operation. Seconds later a helicopter flies by, yells to Ransom that he isn't the one they are after and after a few scuffles on the ground with some Filipino's and a KGB guy in a white suit, take Jenkins hostage - for real this time.

A ransom video is sent, with Jenkins detailing the terrorist's demands for ten million dollars worth of diamonds to be dropped at a certain place. Ransom pissed off about the demand for, uh, ransom, volunteers to go and rescue his old Major from the KGB though it doesn't go easy for him. With the ransom diamonds on his possession, his own boat crew try to mug him, but they are easily dispatched with in Rambo-style ways.

"I've never been sure if women are courageous because they are stupid, or stupid because they are courageous."

Now is when it gets funny. Ransom arrives at a bar that is the same damn bar from Raiders of the Lost Ark, complete with similar female bar-owner playing drinking games with the local clients for cash. Her name is... Rosanna Boom. Baha! That's as good as Homer Simpsons' pseudonym Max Power. Anyway, she's a sassy woman just like Marion Ravenwood and gives Ransom shit, but before they can get into too much of a love/hate relationship, some evil music plays and the KGB guy in a white suit - flagged by ninjas of course - enters the bar, introduces himself as Kramet and demands the diamonds. Ransom hands them over but the Kramet is infuriated to discover they are fakes and crushes them in his KGB hands, then unleashes the ninjas in a hilarious display of backflips and "Hai! Hai! Hwah! HI-YAH!" During the fight a ninja is set alight and Rosanna Boom reveals that she is storing boxes of dynamite in the bar for some reason. The whole place explodes and everyone flees to the forest.

Whereas Strike Commando was a war action movie, Strike Commando 2 is definitely an action adventure. It's clear Mattei was trying to combine Indiana Jones with Rambo and the result I think is brilliant (for a B-movie of course). Mattei has managed to get some of the most memorable scenes and characters from Raiders of the Lost Ark and merge them with Rambo III and even a few lines from Predator for good measure and a torture scene from Lethal Weapon 2! It's definitely a more coherent movie than the first and feels like much more effort went in to making a better picture, but the rip-off lines are just shameless. "There's something in the trees", "Turn around".. all the Predator favourites are here.

"I have a shocking surprise for you."

Ransom and Boom (what a name for a partnership!) agree to work together to find the guy holding Jenkins ransom, Huan To. It all goes a bit jungle-warfare again here, but I don't want to say much else about the stuff that follows as it will ruin the HUGE and OBVIOUS twist. I will reveal that the movie does culminate in Rosanna dressing up as a Filipino hooker, a ninja getting shot in the back during a swordplay demonstration, an explosive escape in a stolen truck and a helicopter flyover resulting in total machine-gun destruction of some huts. Ransom also goes apeshit with his machine gun just like the first movie, screaming "RAARRRGHHHHH!!!!!".

Special mention must go to the music - it's brilliant. There are three distinct pieces of music: the suspenseful seg-way used when evil people are on the screen or Ransom is hiding behind a door, the Indiana Jones theme ripoff played when Ransom is swining from vines and kicking Ninja arse, and the Carry On style slapstick tune. The best part about it is the slapstick music is sometimes played over serious scenes.

In my opinion, as good as the first movie is, this one has the edge. The first was played entirely straight which made the funny scenes hilarious in a 'bad movie' kind of way. The sequel has genuine comedic moments which are funny, usually in their failed attempt at being funny. The best line by far would have to be this interchange between Rosanna Boom and Kramet:

Kramet: "I hate women."
Rosanna: "Yeah I have a lot of gay friends too."
Kramet: "I HATE QUEERS."
Rosanna: "You're hurting me!"

Just like the first Strike Commando, make sure you track down and watch the sequel. They run together well as a double feature as the second isn't just more of the same, but it's familiar enough to keep a theme going. I think the best way to end this double-feature review is with a line from the man Sgt. Michael Ransom himself:

"How do you say goodbye in Russian? Auf Wiedersehen!"

The Video:

Both pictures are on the soft side and washed out but unless a DVD ever comes out, these are definitely the best ways to watch the movies. The first Strike Commando is presented in 4:3 and there are scenes that are obviously trimmed to fit the screen. The sequel however is presented in roughly 1.78:1 letterbox and blows up quite nicely on a 16:9 display. The sound on both are fine with nice and clear explosions.

Sourced From:

Two separate eBay sellers for a pretty penny each. For a rough idea of what to expect, I paid AU$20 and AU$40 plus postage for each of these tapes and I think I got pretty lucky. Runtime about 90 minutes each.

Trailers:

More Screens:

Strike Commando:

Strike Commando 2:

Road House 2: Last Call (2006)

Tagline:

Take it outside.

Back of DVD:

From drunken fist-fights to all-out brawls, the Black Pelican is known for its rough and rowdy atmosphere. But for one local drug-trafficer, it's prime real estate. Determined to make the road house his personal office by any means necessary, Wild Bill (Busey) starts a war with the Pelican's owner Nate (Patton). But when things turn sour, Nate enlists help from his nephew, undercover DEA agent Shane Tanner (Schaech). Seeing the opportunity to make the biggest bust of his career - and exact a lethal dose of revenge along the way - Shane takes over the Pelican for his battered uncle... but he's about to discover this local drug ring is bigger than ever imagined.

Movie Review:

In the comments of a Michael Dudikoff movie Black Thunder over at the DTV Connoisseur, Matt and venom discussed briefly Road House 2. Venom was a fan of it but Matt thinks it's a "sack-of-asscrack DTV cashgrab". Now somehow I've managed to never seen the original Patrick Swayze movie, like many "classics" of 80's action that I am catching up on. The other week I was trawling for a non-bootleg bargain in Chinatown when I tripped over this DTV sequel for only a few bucks. Thinking back to Matt's hilarious comment and vow to never review the movie, I knew I had to take a gamble and give it a go.

After the old owner of the Black Pelican bar, Nate Tanner (Will Patton), turfs out some wannabe drug dealers who insist he sells his bar to the local drug lord (Wild Bill), he receives a strange phone call saying his staff aren't loyal and for the full details he should go meet this mysterious stranger. It of course turns out to be Wild Bill who sends his grunts in to fight and get their arse handed to them, impressively, by Patton. Wild Bill gets the upper hand and his Go-Go style sidekick girl throws knives at him, then throws him into the lake.

Elsewhere at a strip bar a drug deal is going down between Shane Tanner (Johnathon Schaech) and a token spanish guy. Just as the deal goes through, a busty barmaid busts out her weapon (by that I mean sidearm) and puts the two under arrest for trafficking. She cuffs Shane, takes him into the back room and straddles him. All the boys in the audience cheer (I assume). Shane is freed and we realise he is an undercover DEA agent. He get's chewed out by his boss (of course) and then receives a phone call about his uncle Nate Tanner in hospital. Deciding to find out what happened Shane travels to Louisiana to get revenge and run the Black Pelican bar. The first thing he does is throw out the trash at the bar and take over running the joint.

I'd never heard of Johnathon Schaech before this. He is in slasher Laid to Rest that I've been meaning to check out for ages now, and also in it's upcoming sequel. He did an all right job as Shane Tanner and kicked a fair bit of arse when it was called for, and helps pretty blonde girls change their car tyres as well (Ellen Hollman playing Beau). Beau is quite hot and quickly gets into Shane's pants. When she hears that Wild Bill is planning on killing him at the bar at night she keeps him away from the Black Pelican with sex. It only keeps him away so long though and in the end they both go. This is a good thing as Beau (a school teacher who is, you guessed it, ex military) gets into a full cat-fight with Wild Bill's crazy sidekick girl! That's what the punters want to see! There's also a pretty funny fight in the hospital between the still-injured Nate Tanner and Wild Bill's thugs.

The action dissipates a bit by the middle before the end movie climax, and normally this would really annoy me. Surprisingly I felt the story was strong enough to keep me interested when the action quotient was low. Also the overacting of Jake Busey kept the whole thing cracking along as well. It all ends in a big old fashion shoot-em-up and more bar room brawls as Shane cleans up this town.

The bar room fights were all quite good, though with the excessive back-of-the-head viewpoints shown I have to assume there was a lot of stunt double action going on. There was a bit of zooming in sometimes but mostly you could see the fights pretty clearly. I was also happy not to see any MTV-style ADD editing. Actually the whole movie, whilst looking like a standard Sony DTV movie (think Connor's War or any Seagal/Snipes of late) still felt quite old school, which was refreshing.

Jake Busey really is hilarious as Wild Bill, and yes, he is Gary Busey's son (that reminds me, I really need to do some Gary Busey movies here) and just like Machete he gets the ladies - a great lesbian spa scene is included for those who are interested (all of you). His deal in this is that for some reason the location of the bar would be perfect for hosting drug deals. That's all really, and he just wants the bar. I had wondered where I had seen this guy before and it dawned on me; he was the crazy religious nutter in Contact that blows himself up. He was frightening in that movie but is just ridiculous in Roadhouse 2. He reminded me a bit of the white kid in your street who wants to be a "gangsta" like his idols and spends his whole time overacting and holding a pretend gun sideways. He's never really frightening as a drug lord. In fact it feels like he has daddy issues. I could be reading into something that isn't there, but either way, Wild Bill is no Kill Bill.

Here's the bait-and-switch however. Richard Norton doesn't turn up till the half way point and then only has a few lines on an expensive boat. He does eventually land in Louisiana when Shane has made life tough for Norton's cronies - and yes there is a reasonable fight between him and Schaech - but still he doesn't do much else. His accent is all over the place too. If I hadn't known beforehand and you had told me afterwards that he was Australian, I wouldn't believe you. It's like an ungodly mix of American-South African-New Zealand.

So there you have it; it's not brilliant but in the end I was entertained. There were fights that weren't half bad, a few boobs and even an explosion (just a car smashing into two others). I'm sure that if I had see the first movie and was comparing the two, it would not come off so well, but that just isn't the case. Sorry Matt, it's two to one in favour for this now.

The Video:

Sharp, clear and vibrant like most modern DTV affairs. Clear, punchy surround audio. Runtime 83 minutes.

Sourced From:

Some random shop in Chinatown for $5.

Trailer:

More Screens:

Dragon Hunt aka Dragon Kickboxers (1990)

Tagline:

When the game turns deadly, the hunters become the hunted.

Back of VHS:

Mad man Jake and his People's Private Army set the captured twins loose on an island with three shifts of killers hot on their trail. Out-numbered and out-gunned, the twins are in trouble. But Mic and Martin, always the underdogs and always with a reputation to fight to their last breath, soon take the upper hand. The hunters become the hunted as the game takes a deadly turn.

Movie Review:

Oh wow. Wow wow wow. This is some inept film making right here. I haven't seen such bad overacting in a long while, but somehow this train-wreck of a movie is strangely alluring. I can't say I was laughing my arse off the whole time - I think some mates with beers would be required for that - but I did watch in complete amazement that this thing actually got made.

The plot is one any reader of this blog would be well aware of by now from countless similar movies. Brothers Michael and Martin McNamara (their real names, what a stretch for them) - collectively known in and out of this movie as The Dragon Twins - are out on a weekend date in the Canadian forest with two blondes, doing all the usual wholesome Canadian outdoor activities like shooting clay pigeons from the back of a runabout boat. When they return to their cabin a bloody arrowhead is embedded in the door, a message from the twins' sworn enemy Jake. Thinking nothing much of it the twins go inside to retire and each have a glass of wine provided by their date. Little do they know they were just drugged.

The best thing in this movie, by far, is the bad guy Jake played by some dude B. Bob. We are treated early on to a flashback of Jake's, perhaps to the first movie (yes, this is a sequel of sorts to "Twin Dragon Encounter") I am not sure, of him fighting the Dragon Twins in another forest. They get the upper hand and shoot an arrow into his hand. The injury must have been more severe than the atrocious special effects led on, as when the flashback is over Jake is shown with a steel glove for his left hand. When I say steel I obviously mean a bad styrofoam prop sprayed with silver paint.

The twins wake up in a cage being laughed at by Jake and all manner of mercenary types to which we are introduced. Firstly there is Jake's little gang, The People's Private Army, who consist of a handful of guys in camouflage with machine guns. Along with them are some ring-ins: "The Fat Man", "The Dumb Man", some Ninjas and an evil poodle called Apache. If you hadn't guessed yet, the name of the game is for these mercenary types to hunt down the Dragon Twins for prize money. No guns are allowed by anyone except the People's Private Army so the Dragon Twins have to contend with rednecks attacking them with chains, crossbows and the evil poodle. The movie plays out like the first Rambo mixed with the the later-released and infinitely superior Surviving the Game or JCVD flick Hard Target. Each group of mercenaries take on the twins, ultimately fail and are replaced by the next batch.

B. Bob is easily the best (worst) over-actor in the flick, truly hamming up the 'evil bad guy' role so much that he spends much of the movie touting lines such as "The twins think they are going on a Summer vacation... some vacation! MWA HA HA HA HA!" off screen, in voice overs declaring his overwhelming evilness. In fact, with that steel glove and that laugh you could mistake him for Dr. Claw from Inspector Gadget. If only he had an evil cat.

The 80's style pop music in this movie was written by a guy called Billy Butt. No joke.

The fights are pretty hilarious, though I guess we do get to see the skills that brothers McNamara actually have to some degree. They are apparently relatively famous martial arts instructors in Canada and run/ran their own training schools, even franchising them out to former students, so they must be good at what they do. Acting isn't one of their skills though. In fact it's no-one's skills in Dragon Hunt. If any movie was proof that you can get your friends to act as thick mercenaries and ninjas by paying them with beer, this is it. And B. Bob never stops with his terrible lines and sings children's nursery rhymes to torment the twins.

The cinematography in Dragon Hunt is just bad. A lot of the fights are so zoomed in you can only see limbs flailing. One scene started with a fade in from black with the actors just standing their looking around until the Director obviously yelled "aaand... action!", the scene then commencing. I did laugh my arse off when Apache the 'savage bear-like dog' was unleashed on the twins with repeated scenes of the loveable dog just running through the forest having a whale of a time, and with savage barking sounds laid over the soundtrack.

I thought I had seen these guys before and I have. Checking IMDB they are listed as 'stunt men' on the fantastic Billy Blanks / Roddy Piper action movie Back in Action. They were the twin henchmen in matching blue singlets, matching zebra pants and matching moustaches that get their arses handed to them by Blanks in a fight in his own house.

I can't recommend this movie as 'good' but if you and your drunken buddies enjoy some serious overacting and awful, awful moustaches on bare-chested kick-boxers, give it a shot. It could have been better if the run time was shaved to 72 minutes to get rid of some of the fluff. I noted in the end credits the first line "This movie was in no way assisted by the Ontario Film Development Corporation". That was blatantly obvious.

The Video:

Decent quality tape and the film was represented well enough. That's not saying much. Runtime 90 minutes.

Screenshots borrowed from this French review; there's a few more smaller photos there.

Sourced From:

In a bulk score of tapes, about 50c if you divide them up evenly.

Trailer:

More Screens: