Category Archives: C is for…
C is for… Crank
After an unanticipated hiatus due to the library not supplying the DVD I requested, I am excited to finally present you with Crank. If Commando hadn’t been the supreme obvious choice for my first C movie, I would have done Crank in the first round of movies. I enjoyed it when I saw it when it came out, and enjoyed its sequel as well. It just…stood out, somehow, as a different sort of film–a serious (in an action movie kind of way) storyline with a heck of a lot of humor.
Crank, directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, stars Jason Statham as Chev Chelios, a professional hitman poisoned with “that Chinese shit” (aka the Beijing cocktail) by small time gang member Ricky Verona (Jose Pablo Cantillo). The poison is expected to kill Chelios within an hour, but he can postpone his death by keeping up his adrenaline level, thereby flushing the poison through his system so it doesn’t bind to his adrenal glands. This results in a chase around Los Angeles as Chelios tries to find Verona to enact his revenge.
As he hunts down Verona with the help of various acquaintances including his boss Carlito (Carlos Sanz) and his friend (?) Kaylo (Efren Ramirez), he gets tips on how to keep up his heart rate from his doctor, played by Dwight Yoakam. After he lengthens his life by stealing epinephrine from a hospital, he has a moment of clarity where he explains to his girlfriend Eve (Amy Smart) that he is a professional killer. She doesn’t believe him. For some reason.
Kaylo eventually calls Chelios to tell him he knows where Verona is, and Chelios goes to meet him, only to find Kaylo dead on orders of Carlito. Chelios realizes that Verona’s claim that he and Carlito “are boys” is factual, and decides to take both of them out at Carlito’s penthouse. Here, the man who Chelios supposedly killed (Don Kim, played by Keone Young), whose death was the reason for the hit put out on him, starts a gunfight.
Verona kills Carlito, and Chelios and Verona engage in a fistfight while hanging out of a helicopter. Chelios is able to kill Verona, and while he falls to to his death he leaves a peaceful message for Eve on her answering machine.
I don’t normally like movies where the main character dies at the end, but this one was so different and fun and, well, adrenaline-rush-inducing, that I can’t help it. I think it was the first time I had ever seen Jason Statham in anything, and considering he’s in every single scene, it’s a pretty good introduction. The film is simly different, and has a lot of good things going for it including its action, humor, and soundtrack.
On to the criteria!
A is for… Accents
Jason Statham of course has his British accent, but it’s not explained why he’s a Brit working as a hitman for a Spanish man and killing Chinese men in Los Angeles.
Verona and Carlito are Hispanic.
Don Kim only speaks a few lines, but has his Chinese accent.
B is for… Bad Guys
What’s interesting is that the film is told literally from Chelios’s point of view a lot of the time, and the other shots focus on him, so the viewer doesn’t really know much about the other characters other than Chelios’s relationship with them.
We know Verona poisoned him, and eventually learn Carlito ordered that hit.
Carlito is who Chelios worked for, and orders the hit on Kaylo once Chelios’s rampage through Los Angeles to find Verona gets too out of hand.
Don Kim is a Triad drug lord that Carlito wanted to get rid of.
C is for… Chases
The whole film can be viewed as a sort of chase, as Chelios tries to outrace his dying heart.
The police chase Chelios through a mall, which is hilarious because the viewer never really sees him enter the mall, just him being in it after speaking with his doctor and explaining that’s where he is.
Chelios gets chased by the cops through the hospital.
Chelios gets chased by thugs at Don Kim’s shirt factory, first on foot and then away from the factory by car.
D is for… Damsels
The only woman in the film other than the doctor’s answering service (Valarie Rae Miller) is Chelios’s girlfriend Eve. She seems very sweet, if a bit ditzy. Amazingly she has absolutely no idea that her boyfriend is a hitman; he told her he designed video games. Once she believes him, she becomes vocal about it, and is saddened by his impending death.
Of note is that Carlito’s penthouse is decorated by women sitting in clear plastic spheres, purely as decoration. It’s unclear if these women alternate with the ones who get to sit around the pool.
E is for… Explosions
The only sort of explosion is the police motorcycle that catches fire.
F is for… Flashbacks
No flashbacks, just rehashing the video Verona made.
Well, Kaylo has a flashback to the previous night in a drag club.
G is for… Guns
Not surprisingly, Chelios carries a handgun around with him.
When he confronts Orlando (Reno Wilson) in the bathroom of his club, Reno’s posse shows up, all of them with handguns pointed at Chelios.
Some of the thugs at Carlito’s penthouse have rifles.
Verona’s brother winds his way through a restaurant kitchen with his gun, and Chelios ultimately uses this gun to kill the brother.
It’s not clear where Chelios thought he’d hide his weapon when he changed into the hospital gown, and it’s actually pretty funny the way he has it tucked into his armpit.
He steals a motorcycle cop’s handgun as a distraction so he can steal the motorcycle.
There’s a shootout above Don Kim’s shirt factory between Chelios and Carlito’s thugs.
The climactic shootout of course between Chelios and Don Kim against Verona, Carlito, and his men.
Verona shoots Carlito point blank in the chest.
H is for… Helicopters
Carlito has a helicopter on the roof of his penthouse, and later on in the film it’s where Chelios makes his last stand against Verona.
I is for… Improvisation
Throughout the film Chelios must improvise ways to keep up his adrenaline level:
-speeding
-cocaine
-a gang fight
-headbanging to “Achy Breaky Heart,” of all things
-energy drinks and packets
-nasal spray with epinephrine in it
-he has a nurse shock him with a defibrillator
-the entire epinephrine syringe
-standing on a moving motorcycle
-burning his hand in a waffle iron
-public sex
-“Haitian shit”
-roadhead
-synthetic ephedrine through an insulin pump
In addition to these ways to keep himself alive, he must also do the usual action hero thing and use his environment to his advantage:
-steals a cab and distracts the crowd by yelling that the driver is part of Al-Qaeda
-uses a cleaver to chop off Verona’s brother’s hand
-steals the motorcycle cop’s gun, then throws it away to distract him
-spills the contents of Eve’s purse to distract her from him killing a thug
-shoves a thug’s hand through a sewing machine
-uses a wine bottle as a projectile
J is for… Jumping Through Solid Objects
When driving through the mall he crashes through various displays and kiosks.
He crashes his stolen motorcycle and smashes into the tables outside a cafe.
K is for… Kill Count
Verona’s brother.
The second thug at Eve’s apartment (and he seriously injured the first one).
The thug on the roof of the shirt factory. He clearly knew him.
At least two thugs at the shirt factory. After that, it’s hard to determine who he kills or just injures.
L is for… Limitations
Obviously Chelios has the mother of all distractions while he’s running around Los Angeles–he has to keep running or he’ll die.
His judgment is also clouded by his obvious and all encompassing need for revenge.
He has a very tight time limit, which means he’s not doing anything carefully and has the police looking for the guy rampaging through LA.
M is for… Motivation
Verona wants to get rid of Chelios for the hit he supposedly completed against Don Kim. After Chelios kills his brother, he wants to kill Chelios for revenge.
Chelios wants to stay alive, or at least prolong the inevitable until he can get revenge on Verona.
Carlito explains that Don Kim was supposed to get his bullets, and in return Hong Kong would get a goat (Chelios) to take the fall.
N is for… Negotiation
Chelios tells Orlando, “Tell me where he is, or I’ll blow your brains through the fucking toilet.”
Chelios tells Don Kim to disappear for 48 hours or he’ll complete the hit.
Chelios tells Verona to meet him in order to get his brother’s necklace back, or he’ll give it to a prostitute.
O is for… One Liners
The doctor’s answering service: Spell that for me.
Chelios: D-E-A-D, Chelios.
Kaylo: Where are we?
Chelios: I’m dead, and you’re simple.
Chelios: I’m going to get that fucker if it’s the last thing I do. …It might be the last thing I do.
Verona: We’re tight.
Chelios: You haven’t been tight since your brother fucked you in third grade.
Chelios: I’m looking for something that starts with an E.
Pharmacist: England?
Eve: Don’t talk to him like that–My boyfriend kills people!!
P is for… Profession
Chelios is a professional killer, and does work for Carlito specifically, and in general he “freelances for a major West Coast crime syndicate.” He was assigned to kill Don Kim, but the supposed hit brought too much attention from Hong Kong, so he had to die himself.
One of the funniest lines in the movie is when he tells Eve, “You know I told you I was a video game programmer. …That was a lie.”
Q is for… Quagmire
Throughout most of the movie Chelios can be considered to be in a quagmire, what with the time limit, mission he set for himself, the fact that he has to keep moving or die, and just the sheer amount he has to improvise and make things up as he singlemindedly goes to find Verona.
R is for… Reality, or Suspension of Disbelief
The basic idea is probably real enough, but the film plays fast and loose with how well each method of maintaining his adrenaline would work. This is one of those movies where the viewer has to “just go with it.”
S is for… Sidekicks
Kaylo’s relationship to Chelios is unclear–is he a friend? Partner? Coworker? All the viewer really knows about him is he enjoys drag and tacos. He dies needlessly and horribly.
The doctor is readily on the phone with Chelios, but it’s unclear what type of doctor he is, or if he’s a real doctor, or if he only works with the criminal element. He does his job, though, keeping Chelios alive long enough for him to kill Verona.
T is for… Technology
We’re finally getting to the point of technology where seeing a DVD in a film is distracting because of the antiquated tech.
The only way Chelios is able to accomplish anything is because he has a cellphone. He never would have been able to stay alive as long as he did either with his own limited knowledge, or by having to stop constantly to call people. He even makes a point, in his first message to Eve, that she needs a cellphone.
Verona is in the backseat of an SUV with TVs in the backs of the front seats, and his thug is playing a videogame on one.
U is for… Unexpected Romance
Unlike most of the films reviewed on this site, the main character has a girlfriend whom he seems to really love and care about, enough to run away with her, but not enough to leave her out of his torrid business.
V is for… Vehicles as Weapons
Chelios drives his car through a mall. He also crashes a motorcycle. He’s not really using the vehicles as weapons, but he does make a mess.
W is for… Winning
Chelios engages in a standoff with Carlito and Verona. He mimes shooting a thug with his finger, but the man is actually shot by Don Kim, who has teamed up with Chelios. There’s a massive shootout on the roof of the penthouse.
Carlito’s helicopter lands and he climbs in, only to be shot by Verona. Verona throws him out and takes his place, but Chelios is able to grab onto the railings as the helicopter lifts off the roof.
After an intense fistfight, considering Chelios is barely alive and Verona had shot off most of the fingers on his left hand, Chelios pulls Verona from the helicopter. As they fall, he breaks Verona’s neck.
Chelios continues to fall, and leaves a rather sweet message on Eve’s answering machine. The last shot of the film is him landing on a car in the street and bouncing off of it and out of frame, then landing facing the camera. He blinks, the film cuts to black, and there’s the sound of one heartbeat.
Roll credits.
It’s a bit of a downer ending until the viewer remembers there’s a sequel (one that was just as entertaining as the first film).
X is for… X-Rays, or Maybe You Should See A Doctor
Chelios probably should have sought medical attention from the second he realized Verona injected him with poison. But if he did that he wouldn’t have been able to hunt down Verona.
While his heart is alternately racing and stopping, Chelios is in a lot of fist- and gunfights, and does get banged up.
He crashes that police motorcycle while still wearing the hospital gown. He should be in a lot of pain and probably be bleeding.
There’s no way he’d be able to function well and fight the way he does after burning his hand in the waffle iron.
He is SHOT IN THE BUTT and keeps on running. The doc does give him meth later and likely stitches him up, but he’s got to be in some level of pain.
Y is for… Yesterday’s Problem Becomes Today’s Problem
Chelios was contracted to kill a guy he shouldn’t have been contracted to kill, which is why Verona poisoned him.
In an interesting turn of events, Chelios likely only lives to kill Verona because Don Kim is still alive and helps him at the penthouse.
Z is for… Zone, In The
Chelios is seemingly always in his element–The entire movie sort of plays out as a preparation montage seen in other action movies. He’s always a step in the right direction, planning where he’s going next or acting immediately on the information he’s given. There aren’t a lot of wasted minutes because he doesn’t have any.
It’s more helpful to point out when he isn’t in the Zone, because he’s hilarious awkward when he’s not trying to be the ass-kicking hitman, such as when he’s trying to be a regular boyfriend in Eve’s apartment (fixing the microwave), or when he standing in line at the hospital pharmacy. He looks much more comfortable rampaging through the convenience store in the beginning of the film, or using Kaylo’s body for a shield in the shirt factory, than he does being a normal guy. He even rocks the hospital gown covering his erection.
In Summation
I enjoyed this movie when it came out, and I enjoyed watching it again for this review. It’s surprisingly funny, has a lot of action, and even though he’s kind of a scumbag, you care about the main character.
Notes:
The soundtrack is great. There are a few outlier songs, including “Achy Breaky Heart” and “Let’s Get It On,” but the music really fits the action on the screen and gets the viewer revved up.
There’s a clear videogame feel to the film, from the 8-bit design credits, to the words occasionally put on the screen, to the post-credit scene that actually depicts Chelios as a videogame character. It’s a unique way to tell the story of an action movie that isn’t actually about video games.
I remember finding his name distracting the first time I saw it, and remembering that was distracting now. “Chev Chelios” is too similar to “Chris Chelios,” a professional hockey player around the time the film came out, or even before. Neither here nor there, just kind of distracting.
Some of the shaky camerawork is reminiscent of Saw, particularly the scenes in the latter where the victims are first discovering they’re in a trap, and also when James Wan and Leigh Whannel had to make it look like they were filming a sort of car race with two stationary cars. The plotline is reminiscent of the old film DOA, except instead of having a couple days to figure out who killed him, Chelios has an hour to figure out how to kill Verona. Other parts, specifically the running montage after he injects himself with the epinephrine, and when he’s walking around with the erection, are reminiscent of segments on Jackass. Watching the film is also like watching someone play Grand Theft Auto.
Snorting coke off the bathroom floor of a club? So incredibly gross. It’s unclear if Orlando is grossed out at that point because of the snorting it off the floor thing, or because he thinks Chelios’s hands are shaking and he spills it because he needs a hit so bad.
Chelios’s phone’s ringtone was incredibly annoying, but I can only surmise it was chosen to represent Chelios’s heart–it starts out strong, the fades away as it continues.
The many different uses of camera techniques and editing really add to the frenetic pace of the film, and always keep it visually interesting and different. There’s a lot of different sorts of camera angles, security footage, split screens, Google Maps establishing shots, text printed on the screen, and random screens and visuals throughout. A lot of work was put into having the visuals match the theme and the music match them both.
Crank is a very fun film, and definitely worth at least one viewing.
C is for… Commando
Commando.
What can I say about Commando that hasn’t yet been said? (especially by The Nostalgia Critic)
I’m not going to call it a cinematic masterpiece, because that would be silly. But I will say that it is wonderfully entertaining in all of its over-the-top glory. From cheesy ‘80s music, to Arnold’s strange almost-mullet, to so many guns you can’t count them all, watching Commando is simply an enjoyable experience, assuming the viewer isn’t expecting Oscar quality filmmaking.
Commando (directed by Mark L. Lester) stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as John Matrix (the first of many heroes in my sights named John). He’s an ex-Delta Force Operative, and lives in the mountains with his daughter Jenny (Alyssa Milano). She gets kidnapped by a former member of Matrix’s unit, Bennett (Vernon Wells), and Matrix is given the ultimatum to kill the current President of Val Verde or Bennett will kill Jenny. The goal is to get dictator Arius (Dan Hedaya) into power.
Of course Matrix doesn’t take this very well, and wages a one man war against Bennett and his men. Well, one man until he pairs up with Cindy (Rae Dawn Chong), a flight attendant who was in the wrong place at the wrong time and gets roped into helping him.
In order to find his daughter, Matrix:
- Kills in broad daylight the guard assigned to him, while on an airplane
- Exits the airplane in mid-take off, through the landing gear
- Takes a woman hostage
- Gets into a fight in a mall
- Chases a guy, makes him crash his car, then drops him off a cliff
- Gets in a fight and kills a guy in a motel room
- Steals a bunch of guns and other weapons
- Gets arrested
- Gets help from his hostage—now his sidekick—to escape the police
- Breaks into a warehouse
- Steals a plane
- Kills hundreds of men in what looks like half an hour
- Kills his daughters’ kidnappers
The film’s tagline, Somewhere… somehow… someone’s going to pay, is slightly misleading, because on the road between Matrix’s home and Val Verde, a lot of bad guys pay for helping Bennett and Arius with their crimes. They pay violently.
Rewatching Commando actually put me in a good mood after being exhausted, so it gets bonus points.
But without further ado, let’s dive into the criteria…
A is for… Accents
The beloved Arnold—or “Arnie” or “Ahnold” as he is affectionately known—of course has his Austrian accent.
The villain, Bennett, has an Australian accent.
The other villain, Arius, has a Spanish accent.
B is for… Bad Guys
Bennett used to be part of Matrix’s Delta Force unit, but got kicked out. Arius was the dictator of Val Verde but Matrix led a revolution against him. Bennett wants to get revenge on Matrix by helping Arius and making Matrix kill the President that replaced Arius. In order to throw off his trail Matrix’s former commanding officer Major General Kirby (James Olson), Bennett faked his own death when he had all of the other former members of Matrix’s unit killed.
Bennett feels nothing but hate for Matrix, and he’s rather creepy with it. Though not super evil, the fact that he kidnaps a girl and locks her in a room for 11 hours with seemingly no food or water is fairly mean. He also loses his mind at the end, and is so insanely focused on getting his revenge on Matrix and proving that he’s a better soldier than he is that he makes mistakes and ultimately is defeated. Oddly Bennett also admits to Arius that he’s afraid of Matrix. So why he then makes a point of taking him on in hand-to-hand combat isn’t understood, outside of the craziness.
Bennett gets bonus points for his ludicrous costume:
- Loosely knit vest that looks like chain mail, over a sleeveless black T-shirt
- Big black belt securing the vest
- Black leather pants
He looks like a rejected Sheriff of Nottingham, really. It’s actually quite hilarious, because combined with the porn ‘stache and the crazy look in his eyes, it’s really hard to figure out how capable a villain he is.
Arius seems to mostly just be present, and while obviously helping pull the strings he doesn’t seem to be Matrix’s real opponent.
C is for… Chases
There aren’t any super awesome chases in Commando, but there are a few chases in general.
In the beginning of the film, as Jenny is being kidnapped, Matrix tries to follow in his truck, but the bad guys damaged its engine. So he instead pushes the truck to the edge of the hill and hops in, rushing down the mountainside after the bad guys. I’m not sure if he’s trying to catch up or just slam into their vehicles, but he winds up doing neither and instead flips the truck and gets kidnapped himself.
Matrix hijacks Cindy’s car and makes her follow Sully (David Patrick Kelly), one of Bennett’s/Arius’ henchmen, to the mall. He’d previously been hitting on her and followed her to her car, which is why Matrix knew she knew what Sully looked like and that he was interested in her. Technically this sequence isn’t a “chase,” but there are cars and following involved.
It’s when Sully flees Matrix and the mall that there’s an actual chase, with Matrix driving Cindy’s car. He uses the car to push Sully’s and it eventually flips on its side, while Matrix and Cindy crash headfirst but with no bodily damage into a telephone pole. With Cindy’s car totaled, she and Matrix take Sully’s car, which is undamaged in the shot as they leave the scene of the crash. It’s a mentionable gaffe because the vehicle got smashed into and scraped on its side, and there was a lot of damage as it flipped over!
The last chase is also not really a chase, but it’s interesting because not only is Cindy willing to help Matrix by giving him her car, and stealing weapons, she’s also now willing to free him from police custody. That’s a heck of a lot of trust in him and distrust in the police to gain in a few hours. Especially considering the length she goes to: she blows up their paddy wagon. With a rocket launcher.
D is for… Damsels
The first damsel the viewer is introduced to in Commando is Jenny, Matrix’s daughter. She’s about eleven and is depicted as loving her father very much; truly it seems as if they share more hugs than seen in an episode of Full House. When bad guys show up at her home, she hides under her bed, and it seems strange that Matrix doesn’t have a panic room of some sort. Obviously hiding under the bed wasn’t a big help. Surely hiding in his private armory or a hidden room would have been better.
When Bennett kidnaps Jenny, Matrix is hell-bent on getting her back and will stop at nothing in order to do so, including holding a woman hostage (until she comes around to being his sidekick), killing hundreds of men, stealing an airplane, and robbing a store.
The film doesn’t cut to a lot of shots of Jenny being helpless and crying, which is nice. She also is resourceful and tries to escape by breaking the doorknob and using it to pry away a board from the wall of the room where she’s being held.
The second damsel is Cindy, a pretty flight attendant who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sully hits on her at the airport then follows her to her car, and to get close to Sully Matrix takes Cindy hostage and makes her follow Sully. Of course she’s angry and scared at first, but eventually realizes Matrix isn’t going to hurt her and is indeed the good guy. Overall she’s strong and brave and smart, and without her help Matrix never would have found Jenny. He’d be in jail after stealing from the gun store.
E is for… Explosions
There aren’t as many explosions as may be expected considering the DVD menu has explosions, but there are a few.
Bennett’s boat is blown up in the beginning, when he’s pretending he was killed.
When Matrix guides his truck down the mountain and misses the bad guys, his truck flips over and explodes, which is shown from three different angles. We get it, the truck exploded.
In Val Verde Matrix blows up the entire dock area and everyone in the vicinity.
At the palace Matrix uses many grenades. They’re like fireworks almost.
F is for… Flashbacks
The saccharine, ridiculous opening credit sequence is a series of flashbacks beating the viewer over the head with how much Matrix loves Jenny. They eat ice cream and feed deer and go fishing and go swimming and practice self-defense.
We get it.
But thank you, opening credit sequence, for truly cluing the viewer in to how over-the-top Commando will be. You are cheesy and wonderful.
G is for… Guns
Check out details at the IMFDB.
Matrix has his own private armory outside his home. It’s a shed locked with a passcode. The armory and the movie as a whole is filled with many handguns, rifles, and shotguns. There’s even a rocket launcher that Cindy uses to blow up the paddy wagon.
The villains don’t use their guns subtly, which seems to be a running theme so far on this site. They shoot the one man in his driveway, and there’s the shootout at the mall, and later a dock.
There’s a lot of shooting from the hip and one-handed shooting, and with that in mind it’s no wonder none of the bad guys hit Matrix. How he kills everyone is another question.
In order to conduct his assault on Val Verde, Matrix breaks into a gun store by using a bulldozer and steals a lot of weapons.
While no doubt not the only continuity error in the film, during the final assault on the palace Matrix has a rifle that seems to morph into a handgun between shots.
H is for… Helicopters
General Kirby arrives at Matrix’s mountain home in a helicopter. It almost seems as if the house was designed to look down into that valley to see helicopters approaching.
Kirby also brings his men to Val Verde in a helicopter at the end of the film.
I is for… Improvisation
An argument can be made that all of the movie is improvisation, from the second Matrix is able to escape from the airplane. He has no battle plan, no weapons, no direction, and no hope. But he’s able to piece together clues throughout the movie to get from the airport to the palace on Val Verde.
More concrete examples include using the ribbon banner in the mall as a Tarzan swing to quickly cut the distance to Sully. Matrix also makes use of the tools in a garden shed outside the palace: he smashes a pick into one guy’s chest, scalps a guy with a saw blade, axes another guy in the crotch, and machetes a guy’s arm clean off. Plenty of death and suffering with nary a bullet fired.
J is for… Jumping Through Solid Objects
One of the opening scenes in the movie has henchman Cooke (Bill Duke) driving through a plate glass window as he both kills someone and steals a car.
Cooke gets thrown through the adjoining door at the motel.
Matrix drives a bulldozer through the wall at the gun store.
Bennett smashes his way through the boarded up door through which Jenny escaped.
Matrix smashes a soldier face first through a glass table.
Matrix charges through a door of the palace. Yes, half the door is broken glass, but he shoulders his way through the wooden frame.
After Arius is shot, he falls through a window.
K is for… Kill Count
Matrix kills a handful of people before he reaches Val Verde, where it becomes impossible to keep track.
He breaks the nose and the neck of the goon guarding him on the plane.
He drops Sully from a cliff.
He (inadvertently) impales Cooke on a broken table or chair leg, but that fight was to the death no matter what.
He shoots the guys in the Jeep chasing him and Cindy on the dock.
He stabs soldiers, throws knives, and shoots the guy in the tower.
What’s interesting about his kills is that before the dock, Matrix doesn’t have a gun, so the kills are all more personal. He had to be in the person’s physical space in order to kill him.
L is for… Limitations
Other than being totally on his own when he reaches Val Verde and thus unable to rely on anyone for help, Matrix doesn’t seem to have any limitations. He has Cindy to help him piece together where Jenny is, and he seems to be virtually indestructible.
M is for… Motivation
Matrix’s motivation above all is to rescue Jenny. His secondary motivation is to take down Bennett. Thirdly he may want to ensure there is no further revolution in Val Verde, considering there are no more bad guys alive.
Bennett wants revenge against Matrix for being so much better at everything than he is, and helping Arius may be just a means to that end.
Arius wants to be dictator again.
N is for… Negotiation
Bennett captures Jenny so that Matrix will kill President Velazquez of Val Verde. Matrix was the one who helped Velasquez get into power in the first place by overthrowing Arius the Dictator. If Matrix kills the President, Jenny is set free.
Matrix doesn’t want anything to do with negotiations. Once Jenny is taken, Matrix just wants blood.
O is for… One Liners
Commando is full of one liners. Schwarzenegger adds an element of humor to his projects.
Terrorist in chair: You’ve got to cooperate. Right?
Matrix: Wrong.
Matrix: I’ll be back, Bennett.
(Arnie really can’t escape his Terminator roots. Even now we expect his movies to contain the line.)
Matrix, to Sully: I like you. That’s why I’m going to kill you last.
Matrix, about his deceased guard: Don’t disturb my friend. He’s dead tired.
Matrix: Follow him.
Cindy: I knew you were going to say that.
Matrix: A guy I trusted for years wants me dead.
Cindy: That’s understandable. I’ve only known you for five minutes and I want you dead too.
Matrix: Are you all right?
Cindy: I think I’m dead.
Matrix: You’re all right.
Matrix, to Sully, before dropping him off a cliff: Remember when I promised to kill you last? I lied.
Cindy: What’d you do to Sully?
Matrix: I let him go.
Matrix, to Cooke: I eat Green Berets for breakfast. And right now I’m very hungry.
Cooke: Fuck you, asshole.
Matrix: Fuck you, asshole!
Matrix: We’ll take Cooke’s car. He won’t be needing it.
Cindy: Where we going?
Matrix: Shopping.
Bennett: Welcome back, John. So glad you could make it.
Matrix: Let off some steam, Bennett.
Kirby: Until next time.
Matrix: No chance.
(I think he should say “I won’t be back” to invert the usual, expected, “I’ll be back” line.)
I’m sure there are other lines that other people consider to be “one liners” but these are my picks.
P is for… Profession
Matrix is an ex-Delta Force Operative, and a hero of the Val Verde revolution. He is more than prepared to take on his former teammate in Bennett.
A lot of his fighting technique uses his sheer brute strength, which is illustrated in his opening shots by the way he casually carries a tree on his shoulder. No doubt he was trained to use his strength by the army. To win fights he:
Breaks his guard’s nose and neck without much leverage, and without attracting attention.
Rips the passenger seat out of Cindy’s car. (Why, no one seems to know. It certainly doesn’t hide him from view.)
Rips the phone booth containing Sully out of the wall/floor.
Fights off a gang of mall cops, scattering them like they’re Care Bears.
Gets up immediately after being hit by Sully’s car.
Rips a chain and padlock apart.
Rips a pipe off the wall and throws it hard enough to penetrate all of Bennett’s abdomen and the water heater thing behind him.
When prepping to take on the soldiers at Val Verde, Matrix suits up, knowing what equipment he needs and how he can carry it on his person. He is ridiculously decked out, or maybe it only seems that way because his one man ambush isn’t apparent at first.
At the very end of the film Kirby asks Matrix to start up his unit again.
Q is for… Quagmire
The airplane situation—forced to board a plane, under the watch of a large muscular guy, threat of death on any move to escape, looking at eleven hours of wondering if your daughter is alive—would likely be a very difficult situation for anyone else. Matrix simply takes out the guy with an elbow to the face and a snapping of his neck. That must require a ridiculous amount of strength in that position, so surely few people other than Matrix could have accomplished his escape. He also had to know how to get to the landing gear, and get there quickly enough so it doesn’t close on him or the plane get too high for him to jump.
R is for… Reality/Suspension of Disbelief
Basically the entire movie forces the viewer to check his disbelief at the door. From escaping the plane to escaping the police to happening to take as a hostage a woman who knows how to read fuel receipts and fly a plane, to the way none of Bennett’s/Arius’s soldiers can hit Matrix with their guns, Commando makes no pretense of being a somewhat plausible experience.
But that’s part of what makes it so wonderful.
S is for… Sidekicks
Cindy is a flight attendant and is also practicing for her pilot exam, a fact that becomes necessary for Matrix to find Jenny.
Cindy gives Matrix a ride to the mall so he can track Sully; Matrix wants her to come on to Sully to lure him into Matrix’s trap. Instead she goes to the police, but after Sully tries to shoot Matrix Cindy is on Matrix’s side. She even pushes a mall guard who’s about to shoot Matrix so his bullet goes wide. As Matrix chases Sully in Cindy’s car, she runs up to the car and begs him to stop so she can hop in and join him. Matrix apologizes for involving her.
Cindy wants to help get Jenny back. She goes into the motel room Sully had, and even pretends to be a hooker when Cooke comes a -knocking. She helps Matrix steal guns from the store, and when Matrix is arrested she fires a rocket launcher at the paddy wagon so he can escape.
Cindy helps search Cooke’s car and finds the receipt for (and recognizes) the fuel bill for the airplane to get to Val Verde. She is able to fly the plane, and when threatened by the Intercept Officer (Bill Paxton) that she needs to leave the air space, she flies low, knowing the waves will camouflage their signal on the radar.
T is for… Technology
Commando may have simply been too early for the “technology is its own category of villainy” theme that permeates so many action/thriller movies nowadays. To figure out where Val Verde is so they can fly there Matrix and Cindy use a paper map and coordinates and measure them with a ruler. Cindy even comments that the airplane is older than she is and she can’t read the dials.
Amusingly, Matrix’s digital watch, once he sets the 11 hour countdown, beeps every time there’s a close up of it. It only doesn’t beep once, outside the motel. One would think that if it’s actually beeping it would be driving him nuts, but if the beeping is only for the benefit of the viewer, are there really people who wouldn’t understand it’s a countdown?
U is for… Unexpected Romance
Onscreen there isn’t any surprise romance. There’s a gratuitous naked people scene at the motel, but Matrix doesn’t approach Cindy as anything other than a partner. The ending of the film is left open, as if Matrix and Cindy may be interested in each other, but there’s nothing overt. They don’t even seem to really look at each other, though Cindy introduces herself to Jenny.
V is for… Vehicles as Weapons
Cooke uses the vehicle he’s stealing to run over the dealer, and break through the window.
Matrix guides his truck down the mountain in an attempt to crash into the bad guys.
Matrix slams Cindy’s car into Sully’s.
A bulldozer is used to break through the wall of the gun store.
W is for… Winning
Matrix tells Cindy she’ll know when he gets to the palace because “all fucking hell is going to break loose.”
He’s not wrong.
He kills everyone. The grounds are a bloodbath. There must be spent gun shells two inches deep all over that place.
He shoots Arius, who then falls out the window.
He electrocutes Bennett, which barely slows him down, then rips a pipe off the wall and throws it hard enough to punch through Bennett’s abdomen and the water heater thing behind him.
Matrix is then able to carry Jenny to safety, just as Kirby and his men show up.
And, if you want to look at it that way, Matrix gets the girl in the end.
X is for… X-rays, Or Maybe You Should See A Doctor
Assuming it’s morning when Jenny is kidnapped, Matrix hasn’t gotten any sleep in more than 24-hours. He’s also in multiple fist fights throughout the film. During the massacre he gets wounded in the side. Bennett shoots him in the shoulder, in the middle of beating the snot out of him.
How he’s walking at all by the end is a mystery.
Y is for… Yesterday’s Problem Becomes Today’s Problem
Bennet was a member of Matrix’s unit but got kicked out. He harbored and nurtured a hatred of Matrix that ultimately led to his demise. Had he been dealt with earlier, Jenny never would have been taken.
Z is for… Zone, In The
There’s a lovely montage of Matrix suiting up for his attack. He knew what he needed and how to get it on his person. He is ready to take on Bennet, Arius, and anyone else he comes across in Val Verde.
And to reiterate: he. kills. everyone. There is no more “in the zone” than being able to shoot everyone and barely get wounded.
So that’s Commando. It’s ridiculous and campy, but deliciously fun, too. By design it’s simple yet has everything needed for action entertainment: popular star, guns, explosions, fight scenes, hot yet capable woman. It also doesn’t have some of the action film elements that slow things down, like annoying characters or technobabble.
The one thing that dampens the enjoyment is that Matrix is essentially unstoppable. If he weren’t Austrian he could be Superman (which isn’t to say Superman can’t be Austrian, just that everyone knows Superman grew up in Kansas). As the trailer says, “If it’s a mission no man can survive, he’s the man for the job.” Matrix shouldn’t have been able to get off the plane, let alone get to Val Verde and kill everyone without getting killed himself. There is no stopping him at all, and while the viewer expects Matrix to be successful and rescue Jenny, there’s a lot to be said for a hero that shows some human weakness.
A couple questions do come to mind throughout the film:
Do motel room keys have the room number on them?
Why does Matrix strip to a speedo for the raft ride between the plane and Val Verde? If the answer is “fan service,” I’m not sure which fans the service is for. I don’t honestly know how big the female audience is for Arnold. Maybe it was part of his contracts then that he had to have a scene to show off his body.
The end credits of older films are always interesting—in the first half or so of the twentieth century, credits lasted for a handful of static screens and listed maybe a hundred people.
Later decades have credits that last for a few minutes of rolling text.
It seems like anything made in the last decade or so has insanely long credits listing hundreds and hundreds of people for every conceivable thing and it takes forever.
Commando’s credits list 54 stunt people. (that’s it?)
And 6 helicopter pilots.
The special visual effects are attributed merely to a company.
To sum up, Commando is great for action and for laughs, but if you’re in the mood for realism, go check out something else.
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