Worsemovies

Lee Marvin (Cannon nicked him from the open casket funeral) stars as a grizzled veteran leader of the Delta force.Delta Force is an elite units of commandos, elite mostly because Chuck Norris is in it. Also, Steve James(American Ninja) is in it too. Norris almost doesn’t make it alive because he is saving his army buddy but all is good. Some time later bunch of people (mostly Jewish) innocently board the plane from Athens to Rome to New York blind to the fact that there are terrorist lurking really, really close.

Shocking! This man is a terrorist!

Finally they threaten with a hand grenade and the panic spreads like a wildfire. In the meantime Chuck Norris is eating his breakfast. He doesn’t seem very pleased.

They interrupted Norris’s breakfast, no one interrupts Norris’s breakfast.

Terrorists find some American Navy officers, and they lose their mind over it. They also manage to punch the random priest in the process of catching them. Next thing on the list- round out all the Jews (that also somehow includes the random Russian fellow, there terrorist are not really bright. We also have a blond, German stewardess who freaks over the capturing of the Jews in the typical “we are not Nazis anymore” style that seems popular ’till this day.

Chuck Norris finishes his meal and then gets a call from his (really) old mate Lee Marvin. His country (and Delta Force) needs him again. Emotionless as always Chuck Norris excepts. Terrorists menage to be evil but show their not that evil- by being kind to the kids. They also steal the jewelry from women like common tugs In the meantime the fabled Delta Force is waiting for them in Israel. The rescue operation doesn’t really go as planed (although a lot of the people did menage to get out) and the main terrorist dude blows the brains out of the American Navy officer (I believe played by Chuck’s oldest son NASCAR driver Eric Norris). Delta’s and Israelis are forced to retreat- but not for long.

Plane takes off for Beirut and that’s where the fun actually begins.With a help of an unassuming Orthodox Priest (or is he?) they locate the base of terrorists and open the can of whup ass.

Deltas also menage to show a bit of old school American brutality but this movie wasn’t made for Arabs anyway. Chuck gets the info on the final terrorist cell and proceeds to use his magical bike with missiles (they really need to make this sort of stuff in the real life). We also learn that the terrorist suck in Karate, Chuck tried to remedy that by learning them a move or a two but I don’t thing they lived long enough for that to take effect.

Verdict: Here we have several interesting (seemingly unrelated) elements. Chuck Norris, an old school actor Lee Marvin, evil Islamic terrorists, airplane hijack- all that combined with mindless jingoistic propaganda. Partially Based on a true event when TWA Flight 847 was hijacked by Lebanese Shia Extremists, later identified as members of Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad. Now If real hijack really had happened the way as the movie shows it then I must say that personal in US airline companies are the most incompetent bunch that ever walked the God’s green Earth since terrorist from this movie wouldn’t be able even to hijack a tricycle from 4 years old girl.

Menahem Golan interestingly decides to make two very different movies at the same time. One is a serious political thriller inspired by live events but than he seemingly gets bored and the movie shifts into Ramboesque shoot em up. This movie also highlight Norris’s shift  from the Martial Art actor to the more new age Schwarzenegger/ Stallone type (probably a conscious effort by Cannon Inc.) while also utilizing Martial Arts in climactic final duel.

Anywa,y even thou the movie is beyond ridiculous Golan did somewhat decent job by not having Chuck do anything in the first half of the movie and then utilizing him almost exclusively for action scene and non of the drama. By being smart enough to play to his star’s strengths he got a lot more convincing and entertaining film. It can even be argued that this is one of the highlights of Norris’s career, certainly of his Cannon period.