I agree with your earlier post that it’s absurd to say that this was the last of its genre. But I think what makes it significant is that it marked a turning point in Arnie’s career, in that it was the beginning of the end of his reign as a box office champ. In 1993 he was coming off a string of big hits - Total Recall, Kindergarten Cop, T2. Then all of a sudden he has this huge flop. Sure he had a few more hits, most notably True Lies, but his career never quite recovered and from that point on it seemed like he had more misses - like Batman and Robin, Junior and The Sixth Day - than successes.
So you could say that it marked the end of an era in that it signified the great action stars of the 80s were losing their Midas touch.
I should also mention that 1993 was the year of Stallone’s last big hit, Cliffhanger.
Obviously, you’ve never heard of a little art house flick called True Lies?
No, the end of the era of action flicks that were carried by one dynamic, larger-than-life, acting-challenged (?) movie stars.
and action films have never been as good since
By you, maybe.
There were some excellent action movies in the 80’s - Terminator, Aliens, Die Hard, the *Indiana Jones *films. *They’ll *be remembered forever, but cheese like Commando? Nobody who wasn’t 10 when it came out still cares about it.
I wasn’t even born when Commando came out and I still love it.
Commando is the best example of 80s action movies. killing people with no plot getting in the way
The Terminator is a better movie I think but not in the same genre as Commando
If you’re into that sort of thing…
Yeah, that LAH failed at the (gasp) Spanish market had disastrous, disastrous consequences, of course.
Another vote for “good movie”. I thought it was entertaining and fun. I think people pile on movies like that because it’s hip. Someone says it’s uncool, so everyone sheeples happily in behind. I’ve noticed that a lot with movies that people rag on. They have lots of hip things to say “this movie was Oh so wrong in OH so many ways” but they can’t articulate what those ways might be that make it “so wrong”.
I mean, it’s Schwarzenegger, what do you expect? It’s going to be “action hero camp”. And…???
Because you don’t get camp by acting campy, you get camp by acting straight.
It’s a matter of balance. To make the kind of movie they were aiming for, you have to make an affectionate parody of the genre while at the same time making a good genre movie. If it works, you get* Galaxy Quest*, still the best film of its kind. If it doesn’t, you get LAH.
I think the main problem with the film (beside the kid) was the fact that it seemd contemptful of the movies it was parodying and of the action genre in general. IMHO, it seemed to be implying that its viewers were idiots for enjoying them.
But they didn’t sustain those first fantastic scenes in New York very well. I wanted to see an army of movie villains brought out to play! I did not want more “magic ticket” scenes and “oh crap what will we do to tie up the plot?” It felt a little like the movie lost its nerve at the end.
It also features a severe lack of imagnination.
The bad guy has a magic ticket he can use to bring forth any movie villain in history, and he gets… some bald guy with an axe. Why not Godzilla?
I thought the mistake (well, aside from casting an obnoxious kid instead of, say, me) was going dark in the last half. On reflection, a better approach might have been something similar to a Star Trek:TNG episode called “The Royale”, in which three characters find themselves trapped in a simulation based on a badly-written novel and the solution is not to fight the situation, but to simply run with it, using its own goofy logic against itself.
Word.
And I say that despite being a huge Arnie fan.
IMO, though, the real '80s action fromage was most dutifully cranked out by one Mr. Sylvester Stallone. (Still gonna right there in line on opening day with everyone else to see The Expendables, though.)
Riiiight. Because plot’s always a bad thing. :rolleyes:
Word. Now let off some steeeem PSXer.
there is no room for plot in the action-packed explosion films of the 80s
Let me guess: You’re in your twenties?
Thought so.