Invasion USA
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VHS Movie Reviews of Invasion USA
Movie Review: IT'S TIME TO DIE!!!
Summary: 4 Stars
Boy I really loved the 1980's. It was a time when you could have films that were totally unapologetic in their over-the-top patriotism. Just try to get a movie like this made today...the lefties would never let it fly. This was when Chuck Norris was at his peak with movies like this, "Delta Force" "Missing in Action" and "Code of Silence". The plot is utterly ridiculous but that's really what makes it so fun. It was the 1980's. The time of excess. Logical plots need not apply. it was a Cannon film so enough said.
The premise has a rogue soviet agent named Rostov, played by preeminent screen baddie Richard Lynch, leading a terrorst invasion in South Florida. The mixed bag of European, Asian, and Middle-Eastern terrorists start by blowing up residential homes with bazookas, and just as the family had been decorating the tree for Christmas. Later they impersonate police officers and shoot up a Latino street party. When the real cops arrive the party guests pelt them with rocks and bottles. The terrorist goal is to spread panic in America. Totally outrageous!
Norris is Matt Hunter, a former CIA agent. He is asked to go after Rostov but refuses since he could have killed the agent several years ago but his superiors had ordered him to capture him alive. Rostov now has nighmares about Hunter and wants nothing more than to see him dead. They try blowing up his home in the swamp but Hunter escapes and finally goes after the terrorists with full force.
There are really some classic scenes such as Hunter plowing into a crowded mall filled with holiday shoppers, Uzi's blazing as he takes out the terrorists without a single civilian getting hurt. Later the terrorists attach a bomb to a school bus loaded with kids. Hunter grabs the bomb off the side, races after the terrorists, pulls up next to them and says "Did you lose this?" and tosses the bomb in their car...Boom! Just classic, cheesy action of the highest order. This all leads to the inevitable climax. The Army finally arrives and surrounds the terrorists after they've set a trap for them. The streets are filled with those big steel girders blocking the road, just like on the beaches of Normandy in a surrealistic scene. And finally Hunter has his showdown with Rostov in the (literally) explosive final moments.
Oh this is artful camp at its most skilled but this really is one fun movie. Chuck says little, which is probably a good thing and lets his feet and guns do the talking. Great actioneer!
Movie Review: Chucko kills the baddies
Summary: 3 Stars
The 1980s were a tough time to live through. First, Cold War hysteria reached new heights when Ronald Reagan talked trash with the commies as wife Nancy consulted astrology charts in the White House. Second, those crazy cranks in Cuba and the Soviet Union attempted to establish footholds in Grenada and El Salvador while running the show in Nicaragua. Third, the Medellin and Cali cartels shipped a few million boatloads of cocaine into the United States. Fourth, Islamic terrorists made headlines when they hijacked an ocean liner, several airplanes, and set off a car bomb that killed over 200 U.S. Marines in Beirut. Fifth, at least once a week the television set blared out a noxious series of audio tones otherwise referred to as the theme song from "Growing Pains," a sound that still haunts me to this day. Sixth, I not only went to but also survived that adolescent experience we call high school. All of these events--and a million others--gave most of us sweaty palms for roughly ten years. Fortunately, the 1980s also saw a plethora of action films released under the Cannon Films banner. If not for Michael Dudikoff, Charles Bronson, and Chuck Norris it is unlikely any of us would have survived the decade.
The same director who brought us "The Prowler" and a "Friday the 13th" sequel, Joseph Zito, lensed the Chuck Norris vehicle "Invasion U.S.A." It's a chilling story about a vicious KGB agent named Rostov (Richard Lynch) and his plans to undermine our country. The idea is simplicity itself: take a few hundred Latin American communists badly in need of a shower and shave, land them on the beaches of Florida, and drive around wiping out symbols of American domesticity. Rostov and his goons drive into a quiet American neighborhood, pull out a rocket launcher, and start leveling houses. These redski thugs plant bombs on school buses, pose as cops to attack ethnic minority street parties, launch assaults on shopping malls, break speed limits, jaywalk, and on occasion resort to littering all in an effort to turn us against each other. The nerve of these guys! Just in case you aren't aware that these terrorists are really, really bad guys, the movie shows Rostov killing the guy responsible for selling his troops weapons, a sweaty miscreant named Mickey (Billy Drago), and his tacky girlfriend. Our affable KGB agent even throws Mickey's gal out the window after perforating her nose with a coke straw! Blow his head off, I say!
We don't have a chance against this force until Matt Hunter (Chuck Norris) arrives on the scene. Billions of dollars spent on intelligence, arms, and hundreds of thousands of highly trained soldiers can't compare to one ex-CIA operative clad in tight jeans with two machine gun pistols draped across his shoulders. The government approaches our hero with a request to rejoin the fight against his old enemy Rostov, but Hunter is too busy roping in alligators out in the Florida swamps to bother with such trivialities. Until Rostov shows up to murder Matt's best friend and level his home, that is. A now angry Hunter zooms around Florida in a pickup truck impervious to all weapons up to and including nuclear bombs, thwarting the terrorists at every turn. Plan on attacking a church with a satchel of explosives? Matt Hunter doesn't take kindly to that sort of rude behavior. Got a hankering for spraying bullets at a crowded grocery store? Matt Hunter will tell you in no uncertain terms to go hit the showers. Magnetic bomb on a school bus? Not when Matt Hunter's patrolling the highways and byways of America, you don't! By the time the government finally gets around to fielding some troops, our protagonist has it all figured out. And Rostov's hatred for his old nemesis Matt Hunter so blinds him to rational thought that he and his men walk right into a deadly trap. Matt Hunter one, terrorists zero.
"Invasion U.S.A." ranks as one of the most ridiculous action films of the 1980s as well as one of the most ridiculous Cannon releases, and that's saying something when one considers Bronson's "Death Wish 3." Every character in the film is a one-dimensional stereotype, from the good guys to the bad guys to the indigent female reporter McGuire (Melissa Prophet). I can't remember a film where so many cast members exist only to die in violent ways. And it's a rare action film that contains so many unintentional laughs. For instance, one guy who perishes early on reappears later as a background extra. I'm not kidding. He's right there for the whole world to see. Then there is Matt Hunter's ability to roar out of nowhere in his supertruck just in time to stop the latest terrorist shenanigans. How does Hunter know when and where the commies are about to strike? The script told him. Amazing that the police and military can't pull the same trick, isn't it? Lest you think I'm unduly picking on the film, one sequence does require us to think. Hunter drives into the city only to witness scene after of scene of poor Americans acting up in the slums. A message that America isn't worth saving unless we get our act together, perhaps? Who knows? Who cares, for that matter.
MGM apparently bought the rights to many of Cannon's old action films and has been releasing them to DVD over the last year or two. The roaring lion doesn't really respect most of these movies, however, since nearly all of them come with a fullscreen picture transfer and only a trailer as an extra. Yet we must admire MGM for distributing these boilerplates for a new generation of film fans. These pictures were the bread and butter of cable television back in the 1980s, and as bad as most of them are in a technical sense it's still fun to watch them now.
Movie Review: "18 hours from now, America will be a different place."
Summary: 4 Stars
Written by the guy (James Bruner) who wrote THE DELTA FORCE and MISSING IN ACTION and directed by the guy (Joseph Zito) who brought us MISSING IN ACTION, FRIDAY THE 13TH THE FINAL CHAPTER and the gruesome 1981 slasher THE PROWLER, INVASION U.S.A. is the true story of how one guy managed to defeat a terrorist army with nothing but two Uzi's, his beard, a old beat up truck and a couple of snappy lines like "I'm gonna hit you with so many rights, you're gonna beg for a left."
When I was a kid, this along with ALIENS and Hitchcock's PSYCHO was one of my absolute favorite movies. I easily watched it over 50 times. Why don't they make action movies like this or COMMANDO anymore?
Chuck Norris doesn't want a lot of trouble. He just wants to live in peace in the stinky ol' swamp and play with his pet armadillo. He's so cute! But when the bad guys blow up his house and start killing innocent people around town Chuck ain't got no choice but to kick ass.
And kick ass he does! With almost supernatural like ability Chuck somehow manages to keep one step ahead of the terrorist: plan on shooting some people outside a grocery store? Better watch out for Chuck coming around the corner at 88 m.p.h. with his Uzi's blazing! Think your gonna blow up a church? Think again sinner. Chuck's done relocated the bomb to blow you up! Ah-ha!
Bouncer: "Hold it! Where are you going, I don't think I know you pal!"
Chuck Norris: "That makes us even, I don't know you either."
Chuck Norris: "Nikko was easy. Now it's your turn. One night you'll close your eyes, and when they open I'll be there. It'll be time to die."
Movie Review: Chuck: Defender of America
Summary: 5 Stars
Oh man Invasion U.S.A. You know I love the scene when the girl gets her head pounded down on her cocaine straw and is then thrown out a window. That was just brutal.
OK here's the plot. America is a nation of fat, lazy slobs, and are a ripe fruit for the invading Russian renegades. What they didn't count on was ninja master Chuck Norris with twin Uzis strapped under his jacket. The final fight in the office building with machine guns is so over the top, it's mind-boggling.
For those that don't know, when firing fully automatic weapons, espescially inside, IT IS VERY LOUD!!!!! But, everyone shoots and talks in normal tones as if they were shooting NERF guns. You wouldn't be able to hear a thing after it was over and your head would be ringing. I'm not over-analyzing, I'm just making a point. You have to watch movies like this with the mindset that it is not to be taken seriously. People like action movies and Chuck could deliver the goods. He still has the facial expressions of a rock, but now and then he speaks two whole sentences in a row.
Movie Review: One of my greatest guilty pleasures.
Summary: 5 Stars
When a group of terrorists invade America, only Matt Hunter (Chuck Norris) can stop them. Pretty simple stuff, not an ounce of plot to get in the way of the story, but what a story it is. Invasion U.S.A. was one of the million or so b-movie thrill rides put out by the now, sadly, defunct Cannon Pictures. I was fearful that changing times (and fashions) would date Invasion U.S.A. some, and, to be honest, they have. But it still retains enough of its bad movie charms to entertain in a brainlessly high octane way. Stuffed with enough action for two Cannon Pictures, this is an essential for both Cannon and Chuck Norris fans - though the 'good' movies The Chuckster did for the studio are, in my opinion, the first Missing in Action and The Hero and The Terror. But this is my favorite of the bunch and I give it my highest recommendation.