I Just Want My Kids Back
Commando (1985)
directed by Mark L. Lester
rating: 3 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
I can just imagine the sort of high stakes technical jargon we'll be treated to in Zero Dark Thirty, but in Commando the only skills a decorated covert operative like Arnold Schwarzenegger needs to know are twenty-four ways to beat the daylights out of poorly trained mercenaries. He reads latitude and longitude on a map once, but lets Rae Dawn Chong pilot the seaplane out of San Pedro Bay. It's a buddy comedy that earns Arnold's daughter a new, much younger mom, without explanation of where the original went in the first place.
In some ways this might be the ultimate Schwarzenegger film, if far from his best. It includes a winning Bill Paxton cameo, plenty of steel drums on the soundtrack, and an opening credits montage with tame deer and ice cream cones. Arnold prefaces each scene by telling someone - usually Chong - exactly what he's about to do. He follows his plans to the letter, whether in a shopping mall, at San Simeon, or inside an army surplus store. The characters never leave the state.
Early on, the script dips its toes in some questionable political waters involving US intervention in South American coups d'etat. A military bigwig goes so far as to claim that the grateful residents of said country made Arnold - essentially a killing machine - "the hero of the revolution." But the onetime governor of California sets things right by bailing on his own 11-hour victory lap before the jet leaves the runway, focusing his attention instead on matters closer at hand. The man's a patriot, and home is where the heart is, after all.
directed by Mark L. Lester
rating: 3 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from Netflix
I can just imagine the sort of high stakes technical jargon we'll be treated to in Zero Dark Thirty, but in Commando the only skills a decorated covert operative like Arnold Schwarzenegger needs to know are twenty-four ways to beat the daylights out of poorly trained mercenaries. He reads latitude and longitude on a map once, but lets Rae Dawn Chong pilot the seaplane out of San Pedro Bay. It's a buddy comedy that earns Arnold's daughter a new, much younger mom, without explanation of where the original went in the first place.
In some ways this might be the ultimate Schwarzenegger film, if far from his best. It includes a winning Bill Paxton cameo, plenty of steel drums on the soundtrack, and an opening credits montage with tame deer and ice cream cones. Arnold prefaces each scene by telling someone - usually Chong - exactly what he's about to do. He follows his plans to the letter, whether in a shopping mall, at San Simeon, or inside an army surplus store. The characters never leave the state.
Early on, the script dips its toes in some questionable political waters involving US intervention in South American coups d'etat. A military bigwig goes so far as to claim that the grateful residents of said country made Arnold - essentially a killing machine - "the hero of the revolution." But the onetime governor of California sets things right by bailing on his own 11-hour victory lap before the jet leaves the runway, focusing his attention instead on matters closer at hand. The man's a patriot, and home is where the heart is, after all.
posted by NPK at 8:23 AM
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