BEFORE: Getting really close to Movie #900 now. Schwarzenegger carries over from last night's film - well, he did say that he'd be back...
THE PLOT: A retired elite commando has only a few hours to find and rescue his daughter from an exiled dictator.
AFTER: This is an appropriate movie to watch on a hot summer night - with action taking place on a tropical island, as Schwarzenegger acts as a one-man vigilante squad on a revenge mission. The movie's kind of like Arnold was at the time - big, muscle-bound and mostly brainless.
We take it as a given that this man has a long history of international covert ops, but he's retired from the game and just wants to live on a mountaintop in a quiet cabin with his daughter, splitting logs and flexing his enormous muscles. But someone starts killing off the members of his squad, and his former army boss arrives on the scene to (correctly) predict that he'll soon be a target himself.
NITPICK POINT #1: Why does a man who's given up the soldier-for-hire lifestyle have an entire shed full of weaponry on his property? I mean, sure it comes in handy, but I think he never really was as far out of the game as he claimed to be.
NITPICK POINT #2: The film's villain needs him to do one last covert op, so to motivate him, he kidnaps the hero's daughter. Were there no other operatives in the entire world willing to do the job for cash, you just had to get THAT guy? And did you really think he'd just roll over and do the operation, rather than target the men holding his daughter hostage? Idiots.
NITPICK POINT #3: You have to love the bunch of cops who catch Arnold's character robbing an army/navy store that has a hidden back room full of automatic weapons. (Why couldn't he just go back to his shed?) They completely ignore the woman in the parking lot who's watching the car packed full of guns and ammo - and it's an open-top convertible! Nor do they seem to have any interest in the cache of (presumably) illegal weapons behind the secret wall in the store. That's some quality police work, there.
NITPICK POINT #4: Arnold strips down to a speedo just to row a liferaft from a seaplane to the shore, then immediately suits up when he reaches the beach - umm, he realize its a time-sensitive mission right? So he stops to change his clothes TWICE?
NITPICK POINT #5: He reaches the compound, and immediately sets up explosives to take out two buildings - despite not knowing exactly where they're holding his daughter. He could have easily blown her up by mistake!
Jeez, I could do this all day long. Based on the list of goofs and inconsistencies on the film's IMDB page, I've just barely scratched the surface. This film is so ridiculous, it's pretty much a parody of itself. The scene with Arnold's character taking on 20 security guards in a mall while pursuing a terrorist is totally laughable.
Also starring Rae Dawn Chong, Dan Hedaya (last seen in "The First Wives Club"), Alyssa Milano, and David Patrick Kelly (last seen in "Flags of Our Fathers") with a cameo from Bill Paxton.
RATING: 3 out of 10 army helicopters
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