Commando (1985)

Commando (1985)

Dir. Mark L. Lester

I'd never watched Commando in its entirety before, so purposefully chose to do so. I took one for the team - except I'm the only member of the team, so the misery was all mine.

After a series of quick executions of men that seem to have no connection initially, we're subjected to an Arnie muscle montage as he carries half a tree back to his picture perfect cabin in the great outdoors. As introductions go, it's terrible. But what follows is worse.

Namely, a laughable montage of clumsy scenes in which Mr Schwarzenegger and his daughter (Phoebe Halliwell before she got her witchy powers) enjoy the peace and quiet, idealised by their feeding a young deer in a scene that would make Bambi retch. It's the kind of single parent utopia that only exists in bad fiction.

The hope seems to be that a few brief scenes of that ilk will be all an audience requires to cement the relationship between the ill-matched parent and child. Either way, that's all we get before we're expected to sympathise with Arnie after the child is snatched by evil men for use as a bargaining chip. Thus begins a murder/revenge spree in which stupidity reigns supreme.

It's clearly not meant to be taken seriously at all times, but even lighthearted action guff ought to strive for a level of basic credibility on which to build a connection to its audience. Commando lacks even that - for reference, see almost every action that Cindy (Rae Dawn Chong) takes, and bear witness to the retired US Army Special Forces Colonel who thinks it a wise idea to have live hand grenades on his person hanging by their pins! Was he absent that day in military school?

I've heard people of my age call it a paragon of the 80s action movie genre. I'm inclined to agree, but from the perspective of it being a perfect example of everything that was bad about the genre in that decade. Both the film and its characters are charmless and vapid, and about as much fun as having a hot-sauce enema while listening to drunken adults play Call of Doody.

The only positive comment I have is that it had less woeful  'Arnie' one-liners than I expected.

Note: it ought to be said that I viewed the 2001 UK DVD release, which is cut in several places. I therefore missed out on some violent death scenes, but the upshot is that the movie was over sooner than it would've been otherwise, and that's a trade off that I'm happy to take.