Tag Archives: Chuck Norris

A Movie A Day #136: Missing in Action 2: The Beginning (1985, directed by Lance Hool)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Goddamn, dude.  Chuck Fucking Norris.  Even when the movie is terrible, Chuck is cool.

That is especially relevant when it comes to a movie like Missing In Action 2: The Beginning.  Produced by Cannon Films and shot back-to-back with the first Missing in Action, The Beginning was supposed to come out first.  However, Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus took a look at the two movies and realized that The Beginning would work better as the 2nd film in the series.  They were right though some post-production tinkering did lead to some serious errors in continuity.

(Not that anyone watching a Golan/Globus production would be worrying about continuity.)

Did you ever wonder how James Braddock (Chuck Norris) became a POW in the first place?  No?  Missing In Action 2 is going to show you how it happened anyway.  It turns out that he and his men were captured, in 1972, by the Viet Cong when their helicopter crashed into a lake.  At the start of the movie, Chuck only has a mustache.  If Chuck had been fully bearded, there is no way the VC could have captured him.  After Chuck and his men have spent ten years in a jungle prison, where they are forced to pick poppies for a French heroin drug lord, Chuck has grown a full beard and is finally strong enough to escape from the prison, rescue his men, and defeat the sadistic camp commandant (Soon-Tek Oh) in hand-to-hand combat.  None of it is surprising but there’s enough weird stuff, like the prostitutes that the French drug dealer flies into the camp and the Australian journalist who shows up out of nowhere and is executed ten minutes later, to keep it interesting.  Chuck is as stiff as always but he’s good in the action scenes and gets to show off some sweet karate moves towards the end of the movie.  Supposedly, Chuck viewed the Missing in Action films as a tribute to his brother, Wieland, who was killed in Vietnam.

The continuity error has to do with the amount of time that Braddock and his men spend in the camp.  After Chuck is captured in 1972, the film inserts some footage of Ronald Reagan giving a speech about the men who never returned from Vietnam.  A narrator says that the Americans are still wondering what happened to the thousands of soldiers who were reported as being MIA in Vietnam.  The implication is that Chuck and company spent ten years in the POW Camp, which means that they escaped in 1982.  Since it is said, in Missing in Action, that it has been ten years since Chuck escaped, that means that Missing in Action actually took place in 1992.  But if Chuck and the boys escaped and returned to America in 1982 then why, in 1992, was everyone so convinced that all the POWs were released immediately after the Vietnam War?

Fortunately, Chuck Norris is so cool that it doesn’t matter what year it is.

Chuck Norris, man.

Chuck Fucking Norris.

A Movie A Day #135: Missing in Action (1984, directed by Joseph Zito)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Chuck Fucking Norris, man.  Is there anything this man can not do?

In Missing in Action, he plays Colonel James Braddock, an army intelligence officer.  For a career military man, his long hair and his beard are definitely against regulations but who is going to tell Chuck Norris to get a haircut?  Ten years ago, Braddock escaped from a POW camp in North Vietnam.  Haunted by nightmares and still convinced that there are American POWs in Vietnam, Braddock is inspired by an episode of Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends (I am not joking!) to accompany a U.S. Senator on a fact-finding trip to Ho Chi Minh City.  It’s there that Braddock uncovers evidence that American soldiers are being held prisoner by the evil General Trau (James Hong).  With the government refusing to help him, Braddock is forced to go to Thailand, where he hooks up with an old friend, a former soldier turned black marketeer named Tuck (M.  Emmett Walsh).  Braddock and Tuck head into the jungle, to both rescue the POWs and to remind the world that, no matter what a bunch of pointy-headed lefties might say, Americans never lose a war!

A blatant rip-off of the Rambo films, Missing in Action was one of Cannon Films’ most financially successful movies.  Seen today, Missing in Action is borderline xenophobic and it takes forever for the action to really get started.  I was surprised by the number of scenes that were devoted to Braddock looking for evidence that the POWs were still in Vietnam, as if there was ever any real suspense about what Braddock would find.  (No POWs = no movie.)

On the positive side, once it finally starts, the action is exciting.  Joseph Zito was a veteran genre director and he know how to handle a battle scene.  Unfortunately, in this one, Chuck does most of his fighting with a machine gun instead of his hands.  This is also one of the first movies where Chuck Norris has the full beard going.  The beard serves to distract from what a stiff actor Chuck Norris usually was and it does its job in Missing in Action.  When it comes to picking a Chuck Norris film to watch, it’s a good idea to see how much facial hair will be featured.  If Chuck has a beard, definitely watch.  If Chuck only has a mustache, proceed with caution but, if there’s nothing else to watch, give the movie a chance.  If Chuck is clean-shaven and Bruce Lee is nowhere to be seen, throw the movie back and never speak of it again.

Missing in Action was shot back-to-back with what eventually became known as Missing in Action 2: The Beginning.  Originally, The Beginning was meant to be released first and Missing in Action was intended to be a sequel.  However, once the execs at Cannon saw the footage, they deemed The Beginning to be unreleasable and instead sent Missing in Action out to theaters.  (A movie so bad that even Cannon was hesitant to release it?  It boggles the mind.)  Missing in Action was such a box office success and The Beginning was subsequently released as a prequel.  However, when it comes to Norris/Cannon films, Invasion USA is the one to watch.  That one has a bearded Chuck and Richard Lynch!

A Movie A Day #42: Hero and The Terror (1988, directed by Steve Tannen)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

hero_and_the_terror_posterDanny O’Brien (Chuck Fucking Norris!) is a tough Los Angeles cop who has been nicknamed Hero.  Danny hates it when people call him “Hero.”  Maybe if Danny knew what people usually call cops, he would not complain so much about his nickname.  Three years ago, Danny captured Simon Moon (Jack O’Halloran), a neck-breaking serial killer nicknamed “The Terror.”  After he was captured, The Terror faked his own death and disappeared.  He ended up living in a deserted theater and not bothering anyone until the Mayor of Los Angeles (Ron O’Neal, Superfly himself!) decides to tear down his new home.  The Terror does not take kindly to urban renewal and goes on another killing spree.  Can Hero track down and beat the The Terror while also making it to the hospital in time to see his girlfriend give birth to their baby?

Not surprisingly, Hero and the Terror is one of the films that Chuck made for Cannon Films in the late 80s and, along with Chuck and Ron O’Neal, it features Cannon regulars Steve James and Billy Drago.  (Billy Drago actually plays a good guy, for a change.)  It’s obvious that Chuck was trying to broaden his horizons with Hero and the Terror: with the exception of the final confrontation between Hero and the Terror, there’s less kung fu action than in his previous films and a lot of the movie is dedicated to his relationship with his girlfriend and his struggle to handle her pregnancy.  That’s all good and well and the Chuck Norris of Hero and The Terror is a much better actor than the Chuck Norris who could barely deliver his lines in Breaker, Breaker but, ultimately, a Chuck Norris movie with more human interest and less roundhouse kicks just feels wrong.

(On Netflix, there’s a whole documentary about how Chuck Norris’s roundhouse kicks led to the collapse of Nicolae Ceaușescu’s communist dictatorship in Romania.  It’s called Chuck Norris vs. Communism.  Communism didn’t have a chance.  Hopefully, Chuck will never turn against capitalism because, if he does, it’ll probably lead to another stock market crash.)

I once read an interview with Gene Hackman, in which he was asked to name his least favorite of the movies that he had made.  Hackman selected March or Die.  “I can’t believe I was in something called March or Die,” Hackman said.  If he thought March or Die was a bad title, he should be happy that he didn’t end up in Hero and The Terror.  Give Chuck Norris credit.  Even if he’s not Gene Hackman and even if the movie does not really work, he is the only actor who could credibly star in something called Hero and the Terror.

A Movie A Day #18: Breaker! Breaker! (1977, directed by Don Hulette)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

breaker-breaker-lobby-card-2

Somewhere, in Southern California, there’s a small town called Texas City.  Texas City is run by a corrupt judge (George Murdock) and a sadistic cop (Don Gentry).  The residents of Texas City make their money by arresting truckers, forcing them to pay huge fines, and selling their rigs to the savage yard.  But they made a mistake when they arrested a trucker named Billy Dawes (Michael Augensten).  Billy has an older brother who is also a trucker.  His name is J.D. and he’s Chuck Norris!

After appearing as an “honorable” villain in Bruce Lee’s The Way of the Dragon and providing martial arts training to the Hollywood elite, Chuck Norris made his starring debut in Breaker!  Breaker!  This is one of those weird only in the 70s hybrid movies.  Mix in a little Deliverance, add a little Smokey and the Bandit, and then toss in Chuck Norris doing a roundhouse kick.  Shake it up and you get Breaker!  Breaker!

The main problem with Breaker!  Breaker! is that it does not really know what to do with Chuck Norris.  While he’s stil a step above someone like Steven Seagal, Chuck has never exactly been a great actor but, in Breaker!  Breaker!, his inexperience in front of the camera is especially noticeable.  Chuck is at his best when he’s fighting but he spends too much of Breaker!  Breaker! sitting behind the wheel of either his truck or his super groovy 70s van (check out the eagle painted on the side) and doing CB radio patter.  When he does fight, his opponents are all rednecks who, unlike Bruce Lee in Way of the Dragon, don’t stand a chance against him.

norris-van

I did like the movie’s ending, in which an army of big rigs descend on Texas City.  Don’t mess with truckers!

Two final notes: Breaker! Breaker! was edited by Steven Zaillian, who 16 years later, would win an Oscar for writing Schindler’s List.  Also, keep an eye out for Eraserhead himself, Jack Nance, as one of J.D.’s friends.

jack-nance

Guilty Pleasure No. 5: Invasion U.S.A.

Posted on by Arleigh

InvasionUSA

Time to put up a new guilty pleasure that goes way, way back for me. This flick came out a year after the ultra-violent, thus equally awesome Red Dawn. As a very impressionable young boy that film had me and my brother and a select group of friends coming up with ways to form our very own Wolverines. While our plans were really just an excuse to play war games in the playground it was the following year in 1985 when this latest “guilty pleasure” had my brother and I moving up to a new level doomsday prepping.

That film was the Chuck Norris classic bloodbath: Invasion U.S.A.

Instead of the Soviet military invading the U.S. mainland this time around it would be Latin American communist guerrillas led by a Rogue KGB agent who would be doing the invading. Well, invading the suburbs and malls of Florida at least. Just like in true exploitation fashion the film would use the fear Americans had of foreign terrorists (this was the era of the airline hijackings, hostage takings and cafe bombings) finally putting it in their heads to strike at the American heartland.

But who would stop them if none other than the poor man’s Sylvester Stallone. He was no Rambo, but his name has become even more feared in popular culture. He is Chuck Norris and he’s the country’s only savior against hundreds of well-armed terrorist guerrillas and the rogue Soviet leaders. For a pre-teen set this was a flick that opened up the imagination to new levels of violence (thus awesome playground wargaming afterwards) and epic action. It’s not a surprise that it would be the Cannon Films group led by Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus (proprietors of some of the 80’s best and most violent action films of the era).

This film has become a sort of cult classic amongst action film aficionados. It’s literally a film that puts on the action gas from the start and doesn’t let up. Even has grindhouse stalwarts like Richard Lynch and Billy Drago to give it some exploitation creds.

They sure don’t make action flicks like this anymore. Which really is a damn bloody shame.

On a side note: this is one flick I hope Lisa Marie, Leonard and these Snarkalecs they seem to be hanging about it to view one night if it ever airs on TV.

Lisa Marie’s Grindhouse Trailers: The Supersized Richard Lynch Edition!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

On June 20th, it was announced that the body of veteran character actor Richard Lynch had been found at his home.  Richard Lynch was never a household name but, if you’re a fan of exploitation and grindhouse cinema, you’ve probably seen him at least a few times.  He was the tall, blonde actor with the scarred face who was alway either killing people or having them killed.  Richard Lynch was one of those actors who, as soon as he showed up on-screen, you knew he was the bad guy. 

As an actor, Lynch always brought something special to even the simplest of his roles.  He was always the villain who you knew would probably easily kill the hero if the two of them ever met in the real world.  He was so good at being bad that you often couldn’t help but root for him. 

I first became aware of Richard Lynch when I bought a movie called Premonition on DVD.  This atmospheric 1976 film featured Richard Lynch in the role of a villainous yet oddly sympathetic carnival clown-turned-kidnapper.  When Lynch was on-screen, I literally could not look away.  Even better, the DVD included an interview with the now white-haired Richard Lynch in which he discussed his career.  Imagine my surprise to discover that this rather creepy and scary-looking actor was actually a very articulate and witty man.

A few days after I saw Premonition, I watched another 1976 film on DVD.  This one was Larry Cohen’s Gold Told Me To and, to my surprise, it also featured Richard Lynch. This time, he was cast as an alien messiah who inspired all sorts of mayhem in New York City.  From that moment on, Richard Lynch was one of my favorite of the old exploitation actors. 

After Richard Lynch’s body was found, there were several news stories that mentioned his passing.  Almost all of those stories repeated the story that Lynch’s distinctive facial scars were the result of him setting himself on fire as the result of bad LSD trip in 1967.  A few mentioned that he was a longtime friend of Al Pacino’s.  Most of them took a rather dismissive attitude towards the majority of Lynch’s films.

Over at the A.V. Club, a respectful article was posted and it was quickly followed by a bunch of snarky comments from the usual gang of toadsuckers, the majority of whom didn’t seem to know who Richard Lynch was (presumably because he never guest starred on Arrested Development).

In fact, it seemed like the only place that Richard Lynch got the proper amount of respect was on twitter.  And that’s a shame because an actor like Richard Lynch deserved a lot more.

The sad thing is that actors like Richard Lynch are rarely appreciated because elitist (and wannabe elitist) filmgoers and critics are rarely willing to admit that it does take a certain amount of talent to be an effective and memorable villain.  As an actor, Richard Lynch appeared in some good films and he also appeared in a lot of very bad films but he always gave a good performance.  Unlike so many other actors, he never used subpar material as an excuse to give a subpar performance.  Regardless of the films he found himself in, he always gave it his best and that’s why this super-sized edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Trailers is dedicated to Richard Lynch.

1) God Told Me To (1976)

Arguably, this film from director Larry Cohen was the best movie that Richard Lynch ever appeared in.  Though he doesn’t get a lot of screen time in either the film or the trailer, he easily dominates both, if just for the fact that Lynch plays the God of the title.

2) Deathsport (1978)

Richard Lynch vs. David Carradine.

3) The Sword and The Sorcerer (1982)

Though I haven’t seen it, this film is a favorite of many of my fellow contributors here at the Shattered Lens.

4) Cut and Run (1985)

This film was directed by Ruggero Deodato and apparently, it gained a certain amount of fame after it was banned in several countries.  I’ve seen it on DVD and all I can say is that this is one of the most misleading trailers ever made.  However, this film also features one of Richard Lynch’s most intimidating performances.

5) Savage Dawn (1985)

For some reason, I doubt that the character being played by Richard Lynch is a real priest.

6) Invasion USA (1985)

Judging from the response to Richard Lynch’s death on twitter, this Chuck Norris movie might be the film that he’s best known for.

7) The Barbarians (1987)

This film, which appears to feature Richard Lynch in full villain mode, was also directed by Ruggero Deodato.

8) Bad Dreams (1988)

Richard Lynch is all sorts of creepy in this trailer.  Knowing about his own true life story makes this trailer all the more odd to watch.

9) Trancers 2 (1992)

Helen Hunt’s in this?

10) Werewolf (1996)

This one looks like fun, to be honest.

11) Wedding Slashers (2006)

“Til death do us part…”

12) Mil Mascaras Vs. The Aztec Mummy (2006)

Finally, let’s finish things up with the trailer for this Mexican film in which Richard Lynch was cast as the President of the United States.

Richard Lynch, R.I.P.

6 Trailers In Celebration

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Okay, I am like supper giddy excited and dancing-around-my-house-in-my-underwear excited right now and that’s because a story I wrote has been accepted for publication  so let me just repeat what I said when I learned the news: “Oh. My. God.  YAY!”  And then I pushed off my jeans and tossed my camisole and I started dancing around the house in my underwear and that’s where you came in and…

Well, anyway — Hi!  How ya doing?  Having a good weekend?  Ready for another edition of Lisa Marie’s Favorite Grindhouse and Exploitation Trailers?  Let’s get started:

1) Explosion (1969)

This is appears to be yet another one of those “So You Say You Want A Revolution” films from the late 60s.  The 60s were a good time for freeze frames apparently.

2) The Green Slime (1968)

This is a classic example of a “Look How Excited The Narrator Is!” style of grindhouse trailer.

3) The Student Nurses (1970)

I love any trailer that claims that the movie being advertised is about “what’s happening now…”  It’s a line that just screams 1970s.  Anyway, this is The Student Nurses which was directed by Stephanie Rothman, one of the first of the true Grindhouse feminists.

4) The Student Teachers (1973)

Student Nurses was a huge success so the next few years so a whole lot of different “Student” films.  Hence, the Student Teachers.  That clown at the end of this trailer freaks me out.  By the way, Chuck Norris is apparently in this trailer.

5) The Two Faces Of Love (1972)

Of course, even as the grindhouse celebrated the strong women who became student nurses and student teachers, it was also celebrating the woman who found themselves trapped in rip-offs of Repulsion, like The Two Faces of Love.

6) Stacey (1973)

Finally, let’s close things out with Stacey.  Why?  Because she’s super, sexy, and sensational!

Quickie Review: Dodgeball – A True Underdog Story (dir. by Rawson Marshall Thurber)

Posted on by Arleigh

What is there to say about Dodgeball – A True Underdog Story other than it’s a no-brainer of a hilarious movie that doesn’t aspire to lofty heights. What it does do is come out firing with some of the funniest physical comedy and one-liners since The Farrelly Brothers’ Something About Mary. First time director Rawson Marshall Thurber does a good enough job to keep the laughs coming one right after the another to keep Dodgeball from becoming too repetitive.

The movie is a riff from the stock underdog sports genre with a Peter La Fleur (played by Vince Vaughn with his usual sardonic wit) having to find a way to save his Average Joe’s Gym from being foreclosed by his bank and turned by a rival hi-tech gym next door into a parking lot. Who else would be the perfect foil for Vince Vaughn’s Peter La Fleur but none other than Ben Stiller as the former-fatty turned workout fitness Nazi, White Goodman. Goodman’s Globo Gym is a state-of-the art, sterile and BALCO-like gym where insults and making its members feel ugly, fat and useless is the way to clean health and the perfect bod.

Already, within the first fifteen minutes, we know who to root for and who to boo. In one corner we have the Average Joe’s guys played with comedic timing by Justin Long, Stephen Root, Chris Williams, Alan Tudyk and Joel Moore. Stiller’s Goodman and his consigliere Me’Shell (Jamal Duff channeling Barry White) with a hand-picked ringer of a dodgeball team he calls the Purple Cobras. With the two sides set the dodgeball carnage begins as Average Joe’s must win the Las Vegas Dodgeball Invitational to earn the $50,000 needed to save the gym. To round out the Average Joe’s team will be the bank accountant who ends up sympathizing with the Joe’s, Kate Veatch (played by Stiller’s real-life wife, Christine Taylor) and Patches O’Houlihan (Rip Torn in a scene-stealing role).

Rip Torn is hilarious as the acerbic and insane former dodgeball great Patches O’Houlihan. He pretty much gets all the best one-liners in the movie the moment he appears on the screen. He coaches the Average Joe’s team by browbeating them, insulting them and, failing that, throwing wrenches at them to help them in learning the 5 D’s of dodgeball: Dodge, duck, dip, dive, dodge. In fact, I would say that if it wasn’t for Rip Torn’s character dominating the middle part of the movie, I think Dodgeball‘s constant ball to the groin shots would’ve gotten old. Instead Patches O’Houlihan constantly gave people watching a reason to laugh out loud.

Dodgeball – A True Underdog Story is a movie that the Academy voters will not go about showering with praises and awards, but I’m sure most of them will be watching it and laughing out loud like the rest of the general public. Dodgeball is one hilarious, one-liner after one-liner ball to the nuts funny and it doesn’t aspire to be anything else but that. This movie will never get old with each viewing and will continue to make people laugh out loud.

Sorry Sockmonkey, But This Is The Best Commercial Ever!

Posted on by Arleigh

My fellow resident writer Lisa Marie posted that the Kia commercial which aired around the time of the Super Bowl was the brest freakin’ commercial ever but I shall disagree and nominate what has to be the best one ever. It’s a series of Old Spice commercials for their line of Body Wash products.

If you’ve already clicked the YouTube video attached above then you can see that it has action, comedy, sci-fi, nature, and Godzilla-style city destruction. All of them delivered by actor Terry Crews who can and will destroy Chuck Norris and that’s without help from his human-eyed tiger.

It was a tough call for me to pick this as the best commercial since a past Old Spice commercial with God (Bruce Campbell) shilling their product was my previous pick for best and greatest ever. But God didn’t have a tiger or city destruction in his Old Spice commercials.