Miracle Mile (1988, Steve De Jarnatt)

Miracle Mile is an actors’ movie without any great performances. There are affable performances, good performances, (bad performances), but no great performances. Lead Anthony Edwards occasionally tries hard—it’s the end of the world, after all, he’s got to emote—but he’ll frequently hit a wall and start moving his mouth like a Jimmy Stewart impression will be enough.

It’s never enough.

Then at some point, Edwards gives up and lets co-star Mare Winningham do the work. Except Edwards isn’t just the protagonist, he’s also the narrator. And Winningham is his manic pixie dream girl—she’s the first girl thirty-year-old Edwards has ever gone for, as she’s the first girl who shares his big band interest. Edwards is in L.A. playing gigs with his big band. Winningham is a waitress. During the opening titles, they have a solid meet cute at the La Brea Tar Pits Museum. Given how important that location ends up being, it’d have been nice if the movie had spent some time on it instead of summarizing.

Though… as Edwards’s attention-grabbing approach is to hijack a school trip and talk to the kids while their teacher isn’t present and Winningham thinks it’s hot… maybe not.

They have a whirlwind romance—they’re to their third date by the present action, so maybe they cut something—including Edwards meeting Winningham’s grandparents, played by John Agar and Lou Hancock. Agar and Hancock haven’t spoken for fifteen years but live in the same apartment complex. That detail is mainly important to complicate Edwards’s mission and gin up a reasonably nice scene in the late second act.

Edwards is supposed to pick Winningham up after her shift, only he threw away a single-puffed cigarette, and a bird picked it up, brought it up to its rooftop nest on some power lines, set its nest on fire (presumably the bird’s okay), which knocked out the power, which knocked out Edwards’s manual alarm clock, so he naps through meeting Winningham. It’s their third date, so she tells him to get some rest. She’ll have just worked a six-hour shift at an L.A. diner, which seems unfair, energy-wise.

We get some quick scenes of Winningham being sad Edwards didn’t show, and his motel’s phone is out of service—the power outage—so she goes home and takes some Valium and conks out. Edwards wakes up at a quarter to four (in the morning; he was picking her up at midnight) and heads to the diner, expecting her to be waiting for him there.

The film’s a fascinating relic of many eighties-specific flexes, mostly male entitlement, but there’s also a bunch of racism and transphobia. Writer and director De Jarnatt goes out of his way to proclaim he’s not a homophobe, however. But it’s for a sitcom-level “comedy” beat.

Anyway.

In the diner, Edwards meets a variety of early-morning folks who have very little reason to be hanging out at the same diner. Especially when the film establishes they’re regulars. There’s stockbroker Denise Crosby who has the personal numbers of multiple U.S. senators yet likes to spend the opening bell being sexually harassed by Claude Earl Jones. Jones is a street cleaner on a break; Alan Rosenberg is his sidekick. O-Lan Jones is the waitress (who knows Edwards, which also implies cut scenes), and Robert DoQui is the cook. At first, it seems like it’ll be a good part for DoQui. It’s not.

While trying to call Winningham in the phone booth outside the diner, Edwards picks up a wrong number—it’s the end of the world, says the caller. The U.S. is firing the nukes; they’ll hit Russia in fifty minutes. The Soviet response will arrive in seventy. So Edwards tells the diner, causing a stir, which becomes a panic once Crosby can’t get ahold of her politician friends because they’re already headed to Antarctica.

The film’s initially Edwards’s quest to get to Winningham, but then becomes their quest to get to the airport and onto a flight to “safety.” Along the way, Edwards meets a handful of interesting characters. First, it’s Mykelti Williamson, one of the film’s few Black characters with lines. He sells stolen goods, of course, but at least he loves his sister, Kelly Jo Minter, enough not to let her get nuked. Minter’s not in it enough. Williamson’s better than the part deserves. Then we don’t meet anyone for a while because Edwards’ quest to get Winningham from her apartment doesn’t have many obstacles once he’s going.

Later, he meets Kurt Fuller—as a whacked-out yuppie who doesn’t believe the nuke hype—and powerlifter Brian Thompson. Thompson probably comes into Mile in the last twenty minutes and has maybe two minutes of screen time, but stands out. Both because he’s good, and De Jarnatt saddles him with a bunch.

Along the way, Mile has its ups and downs. De Jarnatt’s script only commits to six-minute subplot arcs, which keeps the movie busy without ever being full. Characters recur, but similarly without any significant arcs. Even when there’s something seemingly salient, its import evaporates. Both in De Jarnatt’s script and the performances.

Technically, the film’s low middling. De Jarnatt’s composition sometimes deserves better than cinematographer Theo van de Sande’s lighting; sometimes not. The Tangerine Dream score initially seems like it might bring something to the picture. It does not.

Both Edwards and Winningham are sufficiently sympathetic considering the circumstances, so Mile does stay engaging. It’s just way too obviously got De Jarnatt’s hand spinning the wheel to keep it going.

The Terminator (1988) #4

Even with the inexplicable cultural appropriation thread (yes, really) for the Terminator, this issue’s easily the best Terminator so far. Sure, they’re only on issue four—and on their third writer (Jack Herman takes over)—but it’s nearly okay. Until they decide to do “Terminator Meets Predator” only with Arnold as the bad guy… it’s got some real possibilities.

The issue begins with the Yanomami of the Amazon rainforest. In the NOW Comics Terminator timeline, the world stopped chopping down the rainforest in 1995 because it was bad for the environment–much better timeline, even with the whole Skynet thing.

Anyway.

Skynet realizes there are still people in the rainforest, which reminds it to burn down the rainforest to accelerate the extinction of the human race (and all the other animals reliant on oxygen, presumably). So it sends a Terminator down to kill the Yanomami.

The story follows three young men tasked with hunting wild boar for a peace feast between their village and a rival. It’s not great writing, but it’s better than it ought to be. Then the Terminator shows up, and there’s an action sequence. The young men return home, where no one believes their warnings of the flying craft and its dangerous pilot.

So while the villages have their feast, the Terminator proceeds to learn their language and strip down to cover himself in body paint, like the Yanomami people. Why does the Terminator need to know their language? To taunt them before slaughtering them. There’s no excuse for the body paint. Just to have a shirtless white dude running around with the shirtless brown dudes, only the shirtless white dude is a killer android.

But it’s far more inventive than it needs to be; Herman’s got actual ideas. They don’t always execute well, but ideas are more than the book’s really had going for it before.

Thomas Tenney and Jim Brozman’s art is improving. Tenney’s got some decent composition, though he still doesn’t know what to do with it.

The most unfortunate thing—besides Terminator-gone-native—is it having a cliffhanger. A done-in-one would’ve been preferable.

The Terminator (1988) #3

The Terminator 3 Tony Caputo once again gets the guest writer credit—but he’s written two of the three Terminator comics, so how’s he a guest (maybe because, if you read the indicia, you see the original characters are copyright the first artist)? He also completely shuts down the story arc he started last issue. I mean, there’s still little Tim Reese, brother of Kyle (Michael Biehn from the movie), and they go to the brainwashed human town… but Caputo seems to be cleaning house otherwise.

He also reveals there’s no Sarah in “The Sarah Slammers,” the name of the outfit Tim meets up with. I don’t know why I assumed there had to be a Sarah, maybe because it seems like they have a female commander in the previous issues. However, this issue makes it clear the commander’s a dude. A tough dude named Leahy. So I guess they’re named after Sarah Conner? Like homage?

Ooof.

The issue doesn’t need any extra strikes against it, either, not with the art. Thomas Tenney and Jim Brozman are back from last issue, pencils and inks, respectively, but the art’s much, much worse. The most polite description of Terminator #3’s art is amateurish; colorist Rich Powers changes people’s hair colors between pages, even the good robot—synthetic (guess Caputo saw Aliens too)—who’s the only one with a giant eighties mullet in the comic so it’s not like you could confuse him.

Speaking of confusion—someone, either Caputo or lettered Ken Holewczynski, went back to calling the ‘Nators ‘Gators again. I think there are only a couple of times this issue and only one character doing it; there’s a chance it could be a regional nickname for the Terminators. Unlikely, but I wanted to give the book the benefit of the doubt.

Because even though the art’s bad and the dialogue’s bad, Caputo’s got an okay plot and an incredible pace. While the story runs long—twenty-seven pages—and there’s some fluff at the beginning, it’s eventually compelling. Not with Tim and his little girlfriend, not with the humans’ inability to crack the Skynet computers, but when they’re on the run from the Terminators. All of a sudden Terminator clicks.

It’s not a good comic but it is effective by the end. If you make it through the art and the obnoxious kid.

Oh, right—it takes place three years after The Terminator. At least three years after the future part of Terminator (Reese going back in time). Will that detail be important? Doubt it.

The Terminator (1988) #2

The credits for this issue say Tony Caputo (also NOW Comics publisher) is the guest writer. Except we’re on Terminator #2; it’s not like there’s an established team. Plus, penciler Thomas Tenney is new too… but not a guest.

Tenney and inker Jim Brozman deliver possibly better art than the last issue, but it’s not more interesting. Instead, it’s all very blandly composed, with Tenney sure readers want to pour over the page to discover child soldiers early and so on.

The child soldiers belong to Johnnie-O and the Synth-Slashers. Johnnie-O doesn’t make it through the first action scene (he’s a grown-up leading child soldiers, boys and girls, but the boys are stronger). The rest of the issue is Tim trying to get his less capable comrade Ann away from the Terminators. Sometimes they’re called ‘Nators, sometimes they’re called ‘Gators. Whatever proofreading they had going at NOW wasn’t enough.

The issue juxtaposes Tim and Ann’s journey with last issue’s rag-tag unit, Sarah’s Slammers. Terminator needed a guest writer to come in and lean further into its worst details. Though when the characters discuss The Terminator: The Movie, the units just have numbers and don’t sound silly. Except they can only repeat the Kyle Reese line from the original. Apparently, no rights to anything else.

Reese just recently went back in time. Or at least, they thought he went back in time, but the place blew up. The resistance fighters are telling the moon humans about it. Also, in the need for proofreading department, one moon person tells them all the androids on the moon are cool and chill, then the android they brought with them immediately says he’s the only android on the moon.

The questionably action-packed finale brings Tim and Ann into the existing plot. The last line of dialogue reveals a “surprise” movie connection.

Hopefully next issue, they get some creative regularity on the book, but… there’s only so much anyone’s going to do with this comic.

The Terminator (1988) #1

If I knew there was a licensed Terminator monthly from the late eighties, I’d forgotten. I knew there was the Burning Earth limited (which concludes the NOW Comics license, with Terminator then headed to Dark Horse), but I didn’t remember there was a regular series. Though after one issue, it’s got squat to do with The Terminator. Outside the very obvious—the near future humans talk about Skynet all the time—the comic’s its own thing. I mean, its own thing meaning recycling other sci-fi bits, including moon colonists coming to Earth. But decently assembled.

However, just because writer Fred Schiller can fill a couple dozen pages and penciller Tony Akins can break out the scenes, it doesn’t mean it’s successful. With Jim Brozman inking, Akins has good comic timing, which doesn’t help for a Terminator comic. His action composition is confusing, and the characters rarely look the same from panel to panel; even the visual clues to identify someone change. Thank goodness the moon people wear special outfits.

They were on Earth in their spaceship, collecting kelp so they can feed themselves back on the moon. The moon people thing’s pretty neat. It offers an entirely new view into the seemingly rote future. Except, no, this future has humans working with the Terminators and, in turn, the Terminators trying to be nice to the humans.

There are also Terminator babies, which has potential.

Does the comic have potential, though?

It amuses as an oddity, but so far, there are way too many characters—Schiller seems inspired by Aliens for how he handles the team dynamics; there are fifteen people. Schiller skips establishing the human resistance soldiers and instead emphasizes the moon people’s origin. It’d be okay if the comic were the adventures of John Conner, but it’s original characters.

The Terminator could be a lot worse. There’s nothing to suggest it’s a hidden gem, but it could be much worse. And it’s not dull. Hopefully, Akins gets better at the action.

A Fish Called Wanda (1988, Charles Crichton)

A Fish Called Wanda introduces each of its main characters during the opening titles, cutting from one actor to another, starting with screenwriter John Cleese. He’s a barrister. Then it’s Jamie Lee Curtis; she’s a vivacious American. Then Kevin Kline is a deadly but dim-witted American. Finally, Michael Palin. He loves animals, including his fish (Wanda is named after a fish, but also Curtis’s character, who the fish is presumably named after).

Curtis, Kline, and Palin are pulling a jewel heist. Tom Georgeson is the mastermind. Curtis is the brainy moll, Kline’s the muscle, and Palin’s the utility man. Curtis and Georgeson are shacked up, but she’s really with Kline; to cover in front of Georgeson and Palin, Curtis and Kline pretend to be siblings. It gets some raised eyebrows until Kline—in one of the only intelligent things he does in the movie, but since it’s being shitty, he can figure it out—diverts attention in a very funny subplot.

Kline’s the breakout performance in the film. He’s got a mix of physical and verbal comedy, and he’s always better. It’s an exceptional, singular performance. Though, arguably, that description fits all four leads. But Kline gets the most laughs. He does dangerous and absurd in perfect balance.

When someone turns on the crew after the heist, Georgeson gets arrested. He’s moved the jewels, so when everyone else goes looking, they come up empty-handed. Worse, the prosecutors are offering a deal, provided Georgeson turns over the jewels and maybe his partners.

Curtis gets the idea to cozy up to his new barrister, Cleese, in hopes of getting some privileged information. Curtis flirting with Cleese drives Kline up a further wall, which just gets worse and worse for Cleese (and Curtis).

While Curtis and Kline are working Cleese for their own benefit, Palin’s trying to keep on mission; he just needs to take out a witness against Georgeson. A mean little old lady (a delightful Patricia Hayes) with three mean dogs. Except Palin can’t seem to find a way to kill the old lady without taking out her dogs, causing him quite the moral quandary.

It doesn’t help Kline’s annoying him most of the time. Palin’s character has a stutter, which Kline teases him about (first out of carelessness, then out of malice), and the assassination order just gives him more ammunition. Kline doesn’t think Palin can do it and tries to psych him out.

Meanwhile, Cleese is a successful barrister in a disagreeable marriage to Maria Aitken. His success doesn’t impress her (he married into money, which comes up later), and he doesn’t have any interest in her society goings on. They’ve got a daughter (Cynthia Cleese), who’s often around the house, but doesn’t really play in. She’s funny and good; she’s just very supporting.

Aitken’s awesome as Cleese’s wife, who’s got to be in the “unreasonable spouse” position, so Cleese’s flirtation with Curtis isn’t off-putting. Though Wanda initially plays Cleese as a rube, he ends up the protagonist, and he gets there through his infatuation with Curtis. He thinks she’s just an overeager American legal student who happens to be very sexy; she speaks his language and is interested in what he’s got to say.

Wanda is a heist comedy, not a heist spoof or noir spoof. The film doesn’t play around with twists and reveals in the third act. Instead, it establishes the characters pretty quickly in the first and second acts—with Cleese’s protagonist role being the last bit of establishing—and then the second act is all about Kline screwing up Curtis’s plans, complicating things with Cleese, and consequently his home life. Often hilariously. Maybe always hilariously.

Then Palin’s off mostly on his own, checking in with Curtis and Kline occasionally.

It’s an incredibly well-constructed plot. However, there’s nothing not incredible about Wanda. The dialogue’s not just fast and funny; Cleese’s script ties the character development to it. Curtis gives away insight into the femme behind the fatale as she has to react to unexpected, complicated situations. It’s obvious what all the men see in Curtis and what she sees in most of them, but when she and Cleese’s chemistry starts driving their scenes—mutually—instead of the plot machinations, she’s got to make it believable.

Phenomenal work from Curtis. She’s so good. The script gives her a Basil Fawlty rant at one point, and the way she channels it just informs her and Cleese’s chemistry; he’s almost entirely rant-free. Well, loud rant-free. Cleese isn’t just in an expired marriage; he’s also sick of being British. He’s done it all his life, and it sure looks like Americans have more fun.

Cleese is great. As a writer, he knows how to share. He and Kline have some great scenes together, and then there’s a wonderful one with Palin.

And Palin’s excellent, too, of course. For most of Wanda, he’s just in his own little movie amid the bigger story. When they bring him in it, it’s always great.

The film’s technicals are outstanding too. Crichton’s direction is breezy but never hurried. He knows how to showcase the actors. Excellent photography from Alan Hume and a fun score from John Du Prez.

And Hazel Pethig’s costumes are essential, particularly for Curtis and Kline.

A Fish Called Wanda is a masterpiece of comedy. Peerless comedy acting from Kline, Curtis, Cleese, and Palin, and Cleese’s script is superlative. Wanda’s wonderful.

Fright Night Part 2 (1988, Tommy Lee Wallace)

At first glance, it appears Fright Night Part 2 is the rare example of a film saved by a mullet. Lead William Ragsdale doesn’t have much more onscreen charisma than last time, but with his gloriously juvenile late eighties wavy mullet, his lack of appeal becomes charming. Or it may be another thing director Wallace fixed this time around; the horrific mullet, which would distract entirely in a lesser film, would still help a lot in that case.

The sequel picks up approximately three years after the first film; now twenty-seven-year-old Ragsdale (the mullet makes him look younger than in the first movie) is a nineteen-year-old college student. He’s been in therapy at the school, which appears to be provided. The film establishes, later on, they’re at a community college; Ragsdale’s got a single and a private bath, the student union has a bowling alley; it’s a very well-funded community college.

Ernie Sabella plays the psychiatrist, who convinces Ragsdale vampires aren’t real. The first movie was his brain protecting him from discovering a serial killer next door who kidnapped his girlfriend and apparently brainwashed his best friend into serial killing too. The sequel will end up being all about the first film in one way, but the continuity’s loose.

Sabella’s the only disappointing performance. It’s like they wanted Danny DeVito and got this guy instead but left the script for the disinterested DeVito. Sabella tries, and his scenes are sometimes really effective thanks to the other actors and Wallace’s direction… he’s just not very good.

Almost the entire rest of the cast is good. Leaving aside Ragsdale, Roddy McDowall’s good (he gets a full arc this time), and Traci Lind’s good (as Ragsdale’s new girlfriend but not the damsel in distress); the villains are all good, with one asterisk. But Jon Gries, Brian Thompson, and Russell Clark, all unqualified good turns as the new gang of creatures come to terrorize Ragsdale and McDowall. The asterisk is main villain Julie Carmen, who doesn’t just try to seduce Ragsdale away from Lind but also has her sights set on taking over McDowall’s horror movie hosting gig.

Since the fallout from the first movie (apparently, the film’s epilogue was a bad dream), Ragsdale has been avoiding McDowall. Sabella encouraging Ragsdale to get back in touch with McDowall is where the film’s main plot seems to start, except unrelatedly to Ragsdale’s therapy breakthrough, vampires are moving into the same building where McDowall lives. It’s a giant, gothic apartment building in L.A., even though the movie’s not set in L.A. (the street opposite the building, which is primarily a composite effects shot, is so L.A.). For a while, it seems like Part 2 is going to be a paint-by-the-numbers retread of the original, sticking to the home locations, but then Part 2 opens up, and then again, and then again. And it keeps opening up, only returning to the building for the excellent finale.

Wallace does a great job directing. His cinematographer, Mark Irwin, isn’t up to many of the shots, unfortunately, but there are still some great sequences in the film.

Now back to Carmen. When she’s a seductive vampire, she’s fantastic. With Brad Fiedel’s “wish I was Tangerine Dream” score and Ragsdale having to wear dark sunglasses for a long stretch of the film, Fright Night Part 2 feels like Risky Business with vampires, especially as it becomes a mystery for a while. Ragsdale and McDowall both investigate the vampires, sometimes to comedic results, usually to bloody.

Of course, Wallace is happy to use dream sequences—and it’s a vampire movie, so why not—which lets them get away with a bunch.

But when Carmen’s just got to drop exposition like a fanged Bond villain, she’s lacking. The first half of the movie, I wondered why she didn’t have a more successful career, then she started talking about something besides Ragsdale being yummy (if only she’d commented on the mullet), and her line reading’s so, so bad. She improves a little afterward, thanks to more seductive vamping, but it’s too bad she’s not better.

The script’s well-paced, the gore’s excellent (though it sometimes goes on just a little long), and Fiedel’s score’s… not without its own charms. The film definitely needs better cinematography, but even though the music’s too much, it might be just right.

Fright Night Part 2’s a surprising success; big kudos to Wallace, McDowall, Lind (who gets to play the real hero, without a jealousy subplot either), the effects people, and Ragsdale’s mullet.

Poltergeist III (1988, Gary Sherman)

Poltergeist III is about as thrilling as watching someone wash a window. Literally. Outside ostensible protagonist Heather O’Rourke and special guest star Zelda Rubinstein, no one from the previous films returns. The film opens with O’Rourke living in Chicago with aunt Nancy Allen, a yuppie recently married to Tom Skerritt, presumably a widower with a teenage daughter (Lara Flynn Boyle). There’s a lot of setup with the family, and it goes absolutely nowhere. It’s probably better it doesn’t, as the writing’s so bad. Allen’s whole arc for the movie—which takes place over a single day—involves her not loving her family enough. Except the first act shows the opposite. She, Boyle, and O’Rourke are downright pals, turning getting to the morning carpool into a veritable action set piece.

The family lives in a combination skyscraper shopping mall; the exteriors are the John Hancock Building, some interiors there, some interiors elsewhere. It’s not a bad idea for a setting (it’s a Judge Dredd tower block), except every time the characters go somewhere interesting, the scenes are either super-short or off-screen. Skeritt works for the building, so he’s got passkeys, which will be necessary for teenage shenanigans, and Allen’s got an unlikely art gallery in the high-class shopping mall.

Except Allen makes her assistant, E.J. Murray, do all her work, which is where Allen starts getting unlikable. She never gets much more unlikable because her performance becomes weird about halfway through, as she seems incredibly resentful she’s appearing in Poltergeist III. It should work with the plot as her character eventually wants to run away from the haunted skyscraper. Still, neither Allen nor director Sherman can make Allen’s disgust in the project carry through into the performance.

However, Allen is a trooper. She gets through Poltergeist III and all its absurdities and inanities. Just when the movie seems like it’s going to focus on O’Rourke and surrogate big sister Boyle (who low-key resents having a tween charge), it instead becomes Skerritt and Allen running around the skyscraper. Sometimes they’re on their own; sometimes, they’ve got asshole child psychologist Richard Fire with them. Fire is O’Rourke’s doctor, and he hates her and hates her ghost stories. Like much of Poltergeist III it ought to be campy bad; instead, it’s boring, inept bad.

The best thing in the movie, objectively, is Alex Nepomniaschy’s photography. He shoots the building interiors beautifully. And doesn’t do too bad with the competently executed but terribly designed supernatural sequences, which are sometimes too silly to work and sometimes just too poorly directed. Even though director Sherman designed all the physical effects himself, he didn’t know how to shoot them. Bummer.

But the most amusing thing about Poltergeist III is Skerritt’s performance. Allen, Boyle, and some other cast members survive the film and never let it defeat them, but Skerritt is enthusiastic and eager in this terrible movie. Allen occasionally looks mad he’s putting so much effort into it. It never ever pays off, but it’s an exceptionally professional turn from Skerritt. The movie doesn’t deserve most of its cast members—I mean, only Fire is so godawful he deserves it—but Skerritt’s a champ for getting through it.

Poltergeist III is one of those “must be seen to be believed” pictures, but it’s also one of those “there’s truly no reason to see this movie” movies. It’s insufferably dull too. Editor Ross Albert holds shots too long (presumably because otherwise, the film wouldn’t run more than ninety minutes), and there are numerous action sequences where Sherman confuses tension and boredom.

Don’t see Poltergeist III. Watch paint dry or window washing instead.

Red Scorpion (1988, Joseph Zito)

I wasn’t aware of Red Scorpion’s production history, which has original distributor Warner Bros. pulling out because it filmed in Namibia, under apartheid South African control at the time, as well as the investors and producers being pro-apartheid… you’d think Warner would’ve checked. You’d hoped Warner would’ve checked.

And, now, if we can “but anyway” away from that grossness, I’ll get back to saying Red Scorpion isn’t bad, actually. For a movie with a questionable script—it’s a white savior movie about Soviets special forces titan Dolph Lundgren going to Africa to kill a revolutionary only to discover the Soviets are the bad guys and he really should be helping the native people. There’s also a thing where the Cubans are the real bad guys and the Russians are still basically okay. A little.

Lots to unpack with Red Scorpion, even before you find out the production history.

Also there’s M. Emmet Walsh, whose entire schtick is screaming about how everyone needs to kill Russians, go America. He’s a reporter covering the native Africans fight against the Cubans and Soviets. His entire bit is swearing and being that most fictive of creatures… the non-racist Reagan Republican. Walsh isn’t good by any stretch, but he’s also not bad in any particularly egregious ways. He’s got chemistry with costar Al White, who’s the revolutionary Lundgren needs to buddy up with in order to get to the leader.

Ruben Nthodi is the leader. He’s bad. Not like, not good but not too bad like Walsh or White, he’s just bad. It’s unfortunate, because the script’s surprisingly sincere in his characterization and if they’d spent the M. Emmet Walsh money on the Nthodi role… probably would’ve worked out better.

Will Lundgren discover the native Africans aren’t actually enemies of the people? Will he go on the requisite white savior vision quest with magical African bushman Regopstaan? Will Regopstaan and Lundgren, despite neither of them having much in the way of acting skills, be sort of adorable together?

It helps everyone sort of knew what to do with Lundgren… what to expect of him. He can run around, he can punch things, he can kick things, he can play injured, he can play like he doesn’t understand the language, he can do pretty much everything but talk. He’s totally fine just playing a silent, gigantic, slow on the pickup hulk. The movie misses the chance to call him “Blondie” in the lost in the desert sequence but of course it does… Red Scorpion gets by on a strangely sincere flex in its exploitation, some surprisingly solid action editing from Daniel Loewenthal.

Well, not in the third act, which isn’t a complete misfire but is far from a success after the surprisingly solid second act. Red Scorpion gets a whole lot of mileage out of the Lundgren and Regopstaan material in that second act.

Plus the third act has Lundgren attacking the bad guys wearing Jack Tripper shorts? Like, I guess it makes sense in the second act when he loses all his clothes and his body seems to be excreting oil to protect against the sun, and leads to one of those adorable Regopstaan subplots… but for leading the assault? Pants, man, pants.

Or it’s like the one time cargo shorts would be okay.

There are some special effects gaffs (and also some rather good effects) and Zito doesn’t really shoot the interior action sequences well, but Red Scorpion’s… not bad given the litany of caveats.

Red Heat (1988, Walter Hill)

Walter Hill really likes to make movies about racist white cops (oxymoron, sorry, racist even for a movie) partnering with unlikely people and having big action sequences involving buses, huh?

The racist white cop in this case is Jim Belushi, who’s never overtly racist (just overtly transphobic in a homophobic way—it’s the eighties after all), but has a lot of dog whistles when referring to the Black street gang villains—the Cleanheads. They sometimes wear berets to remind you of the Black Panthers, those radical militants who wanted to feed unfed people, and they all shave their heads out of fealty to leader Brent Jennings. Jennings isn’t exactly good, but he’s a lot better than most of the performances in Red Heat and somehow his stereotype Black prison gang leader manages to come off less stereotypical than Laurence Fishburne’s police lieutenant, who is a by-the-books tight-ass who makes Belushi’s life miserable.

For being competent while Black, apparently.

Lot to unpack in Red Heat, if it weren’t so boring.

It’s not just the American side of it, there’s also how it’s 1988 and the Soviets are okay enough for Arnold to play one–Red Heat is very much of the era where Arnold didn’t need a last name—and instead it’s the Georgians who are the scumbags.

Ed O’Ross is a Georgian drug dealer who kills Arnold’s partner in Moscow and runs off to the United States. He starts doing business with Jennings’s gang (though not Jennings, who’s running it from Joliet—sadly no Blues Brothers homage, which would probably improve Heat) and eventually gets busted for something so Arnold flies over from Moscow to bring him back.

Police captain Peter Boyle—nothing like late eighties slumming in action pictures is there—assigns Richard Bright and Belushi to babysit Schwarzenegger while he collects O’Ross, but then, of course, everything goes to hell and O’Ross gets ahold of Belushi’s gun and Eddie Murphy’s got to… wait, wrong movie.

But this one ends with a bus chase too.

Only it’s rarely, barely funny, with everything between Schwarzenegger and Belushi falling flat. There are less than five okay jokes in the movie, maybe like one actual laugh and then three or four “not terrible considering.” The considering includes the acting, the script, and the direction.

Really bad music from James Horner, who seemingly shrugs off the assignment, and middling production values in general. Matthew F. Leonetti’s photography isn’t bad exactly, but it’s one of the worst shot Chicago movies ever? I mean. Just out of sheer, green lightning ineptness.

It’s also surprising it took three screenwriters—director Hill, Harry Kleiner, and Troy Kennedy-Martin—to create such hack work. John Vallone’s production design isn’t bad, but Dan Moore’s costumes are terrible. There’s a whole Belushi calling Arnold “Gumby” because of his suit and haircut thing and it’s both desperate and miserable.

Sort of like watching Red Heat.

Unless you want to be amazed at Hill’s boring composition for over an hour and forty minutes. It’s a “good for insomniacs” picture, though most of the cast gets some sympathy for being in such a lousy movie. And Richard Bright, Gina Gershon, and Pruitt Taylor Vince are at least trying.

It’s not their fault Hill and his cowriters but especially Hill are inept hacks on this one.