Where has he been? What has he been doing? And is that a freshly dug grave over there in the yard? Who knows! All of these questions are now somehow irrelevant as DwC is back with another Masterpiece Theater. And what an edition it is, as it tackles a movie that may, in fact, be a gift from a higher power – Commando (1985).
Join DwC as he explores the hidden depths of another movie that just might be a masterpiece, if only you believed him.
Commando
Commando is directed by Mark L. Lester, written by Steven De Souza and Joseph Loeb. It stars Arnold Schwarzenegger and Rae Dawn Chong. Warning – this article will contain spoilers.
A retired special forces operative is forced back into action after the members of his former unit are assassinated and his daughter is kidnapped for ransom. In return for her life, he is given eleven hours to travel to the South American country of Val Verde to assassinate the president and aid in staging a coup that will restore power to the brutal dictator his unit helped depose.
With the clock ticking, he must battle through countless mercenaries to rescue his daughter before she is murdered by her captors.
The evolution of the American action film is fascinating. Throughout the 1950s, the genre consisted solely of war movies and westerns before exploitation films like Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill! became a thing in the early to mid-60s. This changed forever in 1968, however, with the release of Bullitt, starring Steve McQueen.
Audiences were left dumbstruck by that incredible ten-minute-long car chase, considered by many to be the best ever filmed, and as a result, action films instantly became more visceral and violent.
Bullitt also ushered in the era of the gritty cop drama, a genre that would be perfected in 1971 with the release of Dirty Harry, the greatest thing to happen to human beings since the discovery of fire. Action films would be produced in greater numbers throughout the 1970s, with budgets and profits increasing in lockstep with one another. Some incredible films were released in this period, but, like the decade itself, the genre was rooted firmly in grit, drama, and the stench of cigarette smoke; i.e., a lot of talk punctuated by the occasional car chase, fistfight, or shootout.
Then came the legendary summer of 1982, and Hell came with it. In May of that year, the United States saw the release of Australian maniac George Miller’s masterpiece and greatest action movie ever made, The Road Warrior. Unsuspecting audiences pulled into the drive-in for a fun night at the movies, but when they left 90 minutes later, the men were addicted to cocaine, and the women were pregnant with Mel Gibson’s baby.
Whereas previous action films were mostly dialogue and story punctuated by the occasional action scene, this film was nothing but action, punctuated by some talk and brief moments of character development. And what action there was! Cars destroyed, bodies crushed under the wheels of a semi, and stunt men mangled, bashed, and broken on a daily basis. It will never be topped, because it’s illegal now to even try.
The final chase still amazes: twenty uninterrupted minutes of unbridled chaos that culminates in that tractor roll, a stunt so dangerous that an entire medical team was on standby in the Australian outback, and a stunt driver who wasn’t allowed to eat for 24 hours in case he had to undergo emergency surgery.
Rumor has it he wasn’t a professional stuntman at all, and was paid in beer. A rumor I will accept as true until the day I die.
In these days of safe, weightless, CGI garbage that sees Vin Diesel jumping a Honda Civic off an open drawbridge in Boston and landing it on a street in London, it’s almost impossible to believe that shit like The Road Warrior was ever getting made. But get made it did, and with a worldwide gross of $36M against a budget of $3M, and briefly holding the title of most profitable Australian film ever made, American studios took notice.
In one weekend, the action genre evolved a thousand years, but the ingredients that make up the quintessential American action movie weren’t there just yet. Barry Diller, Joel Silver, Steven De Souza, and a bodybuilder from Austria, however, were about to discover the right spice for the soup.
In 1984, Barry Diller left Paramount Pictures to become the CEO of 20th Century Fox, and he was itching to make an immediate impact. On his first day in the office, he held a meeting with producer Joel Silver, also new to Fox, and told him that he was impressed with the guy who starred in Conan The Barbarian and The Terminator.
Convinced that this young freak of nature was poised to be the biggest star on the planet, Diller promised to greenlight any script that could be brought in for under $12M if he were the star.
Silver spent days poring over unfilmed spec scripts before he and Diller decided on one from Joseph Loeb, the guy who wrote, of all things, Teen Wolf. Loeb’s script was much more serious than what would eventually make it to the screen, as his film involved a retired Israeli soldier who had sworn off violence only to be forced to revert to his old ways to save his wife and daughter. He also wrote the screenplay with Gene Simmons in mind for the lead role. Yes, that Gene Simmons.
This plot wasn’t going to work if they landed the actor of their choice, so Silver called his old buddy Steven De Souza, whom he had previously worked with on the Eddie Murphy/Nick Nolte classic, 48Hrs., and had him rewrite the script to fit the attributes of their leading man.
He presented the revised draft to Diller, and, as promised, he had a go-picture. All he needed to do now was get the Austrian to agree, but the Austrian needed convincing. De Souza figured the best way to do this was to pitch him in person, so he drove out to the hills of LA, where he was greeted by the six-foot-two, two-hundred-and-fifty-pound behemoth, Arnold “The Austrian Oak” Schwarzenegger.
De Souza began to act out the script, realizing too late that he had inadvertently begun impersonating Arnold, who was glaring at De Souza as though his name was Sarah Connor and he was sitting in the Tech-Noir nightclub. De Souza de-escalated the situation by telling Arnold he also did a great Cary Grant, making Arnold laugh.
After De Souza changed his trousers, Arnold, intrigued at the thought of playing a loving, protective father, agreed to do the film. Action movies were once again about to evolve, as some of the key changes made to the original script were the drastic lightening of tone and the addition of abundant humor.
It also achieved a new level of violence, as evidenced in the opening minutes, during which we are treated to a series of assassinations, each one more preposterous than the last, and culminating with Bennett (Vernon Wells) getting blown up on his boat.
However, since this is Vernon Wells, I think it’s safe to say some chicanery is afoot. Going back to the first murder, though, I imagine the plan unfolding something like this:
Henchman #1: I’ve got it! We’ll steal a garbage truck, drive around the neighborhood for a few hours on the wrong garbage day, and hope the target runs outside with his trash. Then we’ll shoot him with machine guns!
Henchman #2: But what if he doesn’t come out, and what if some other neighbors think they’re going to miss garbage day and they run outside too? Since we know where the target lives, why not just sneak in at night and quietly kill him in his sleep?
Henchman #1:
We’re then introduced to John Matrix (Arnold Schwarzenegger) in the most American manner possible: walking through the forest with a chainsaw and carrying an entire redwood tree. I half expected a bald eagle to land on his shoulder. After almost murdering his daughter, Jenny (Alyssa Milano), for sneaking up behind him, they spend the rest of the day doing wholesome family things like swimming, fishing, eating ice cream, and making fun of Boy George.
That’s when the chopper shows up. General Kirby (James Olson) has news: the men killed at the beginning of the film were in Matrix’s special forces unit, and the killers will assuredly be coming for Matrix. Kirby took the chopper because apparently this ex-special forces guy, who is so valuable that the government keeps trying to convince him to unretire, can’t be reached by telephone or radio.
For security purposes, Kirby stations two men at the house, Jackson and Harris (Mike Adams and Bob Minor), and flies off. Whoever these assassins are, they’re good. They must be, as they followed the helicopter up into the mountains so closely that the instant it leaves, they spring out of the bushes and start shooting, killing Harris and wounding Jackson.
Luckily, Matrix could smell them, something they teach you in special forces school, and was able to take cover. A bad guy finds Jenny hiding under her bed while Matrix loads up the guns. He runs to her bedroom to find Diaz (Carlos Cervantes) calmly waiting for him as Jackson stumbles in with his throat cut and dies. Diaz tells Matrix to chill out:
“If you want to see your daughter again, you’re gonna want to cooperate, right?”
“Wrong.”
Matrix then shoots him in the face in one of the most crowd-pleasing moments in the history of cinema. He runs outside to his disabled vehicle, puts it in neutral, and shoves it over the hill, giving chase with no power steering or brakes.
After barreling down the mountain and taking out a car full of baddies, Matrix crashes the Bronco, which explodes because it’s the 80s and of course it does. He takes down some thugs before he’s subdued, then the guy we thought got blown up on the boat appears. Bennett faked his death, and he’s been waiting to get some payback for being thrown out of Matrix’s unit.
“And you know what today is? Payday.”
He then shoots Matrix with a tranquilizer.
When Matrix comes to, he’s in a room surrounded by about two dozen henchmen, and by the looks of them, there’s going to be some serious goddamned henching going on. There’s Cooke (Bill Duke), Sully (David Patrick Kelly), Henrique (Charles Meshack), Bennett, and many others. I’m pretty sure I recognize the rest of the guys from other movies, or they may just remind me of the dirtbags I used to buy shitty reefer from in McKeesport back in the 90s.
Calling the shots is Arius (Dan Hedaya, very convincing as a South American), the deposed dictator whose regime was toppled by Matrix and his team. He wants to regain power. His plan? Kidnap Matrix’s daughter and hold her hostage until Matrix flies to Val Verde and kills the president, thus placing Arius back in charge.
Matrix has eleven hours to accomplish this task, or they’re going to kill Jenny and mail disembodied pieces of her to his house.
As Kirby discovers the carnage at the Matrix residence, Matrix, Sully, and Henrique are dropped off at the airport by Bennett, giving Arnold a chance to repeat one of his most famous lines:
“I’ll be back, Bennett!”
But Bennett’s looking forward to it…
“John. I’ll be waiting, John.”
Sully is kind enough to give Matrix a few bucks for some beers on the plane, but ruins this gesture of goodwill by telling him it’ll give them more time with his daughter. Matrix, cool as fucking ice, drops the famous one liner:
“You’re a funny guy, Sully. I like you. That’s why I’m going to kill you last.”
Henrique finds no humor in this and ushers Matrix into the airport. Matrix annoys the man even further when the stewardess (Chelsea Field) asks if he has any carry-on luggage:
“Just him.”
Henrique has had enough of his sass:
“Open your mouth again, and I’ll nail it shut.”
Damn, this guy is on him like white on rice, I wonder how Matrix will… Elbow to the brain, snapped neck, and he’s dead. Matrix covers Henrique’s corpse and plots his escape. Before heading to the toilet, he implores the stewardess:
“Please don’t disturb my friend, he’s dead tired.”
Jesus. How in the hell did DeSouza not win an Oscar for best screenplay?
Matrix makes his way to the wheel of the plane and jumps from about 100 feet in the air into 3 feet of water without sustaining so much as a scratch. Special forces!
In the airport, Matrix spies on Sully as he harasses a stewardess, Cindy (Rae Dawn Chong). Seeing an opportunity here, Matrix kidnaps her in the parking garage, and they tail Sully to a mall where he buys some fake passports. When Matrix fails to convince Cindy to help him, a shootout ensues between Matrix, Sully, the passport seller, and mall security, who are strangely armed to the teeth.
Matrix fights, rips a phone booth out of the wall, dodges bullets, swings from a tapestry like a goddamned monkey, and escapes in hot pursuit of Sully, whom he runs off the road before dropping him off a cliff.
“Remember when I said I was going to kill you last? …I lied.”
While torturing Sully, he found out he was going to meet Cooke at a motel a few miles away, so he and Cindy are off. On the way, he fills her in about the kidnapping/murder plot he’s embroiled in.
As they search Sully’s room for clues to Jenny’s whereabouts, Cooke pulls up in a sweet Caddy. Within seconds, a donnybrook erupts. Cooke tries and fails to intimidate Matrix:
“Scared mothafucka? You should be, ‘cause this Green Beret is gonna kick your big ass!”
“I eat Green Berets for breakfast.”
Take that, Rambo.
They trade punches, crash through walls, and horrify Cindy with their “macho bullshit” before Cooke gets impaled on a broken lamp. A search of the Caddy reveals a receipt for airplane fuel, so they take the Caddy, Cooke won’t be needing it, and head to the fuel depot listed on the receipt. There, they find a small army preparing for Arius’ coup in Val Verde. More importantly, they find coordinates for the Pacific Island where Arius and Bennett are holding Jenny.
Time for some shopping.
This film convinced me that special forces training just teaches you to do really dumb shit and hope you get lucky, because when Matrix finds an Army Navy store, he breaks into the place in the dumbest manner possible: by driving a goddamned bulldozer right through the wall.
Now, for my friends overseas, this is exactly what every gun store in America looks like. There are machine guns, grenades, landmines, rocket launchers, etc., and there’s one on every block in every city. If you need help locating one, just follow the bald eagle carrying fireworks and a pack of hot dogs.
The cops finally show up and arrest Matrix, who implores them to contact General Kirby. As they laugh, Cindy comes to the rescue and fires a rocket launcher into the truck, figuring the best way to spring him is to almost blow him up. Matrix escapes from the burning wreckage without a scratch. Special forces!
Matrix and Cindy head back to the port and steal a plane, and it’s a damn good thing Matrix kidnapped a stewardess who also happens to be a pilot. They get spotted as they’re taking off, so Matrix kills a couple more guys as Kirby visits the aftermath of the paddy wagon explosion. He calls up all active-duty personnel, and when asked what he’s expecting, he replies:
“World War Three.”
Once in the air, Matrix contacts the Coast Guard with instructions to reach General Kirby, but this request is met with threats. Good thing Cindy knows that if they fly close to the water, they won’t show up on radar, perplexing the radar technician (Bill Paxton) when he loses them.
On the island, Jenny starts trying to escape her room, while some of Arius’ soldiers brown nose Bennett by comparing the cutting of warm butter to the slicing of little girls’ throats. Bennett is not impressed:
“Put the knife away… and shut your mouth.”
He makes sure to let Arius know how incompetent these fellas are, and that he and Matrix could kill every one of them. Arius tries to turn the tables by accusing Bennett of being afraid, but Bennett isn’t fazed by this either:
“Of course I’m afraid, I’m smart. But I have an edge: I have his daughter.”
Matrix and Cindy arrive at the island, and Matrix tells her to alert General Kirby as soon as Arius’ goons spot him. How will she know that he’s been spotted?
“Because all Hell is gonna break loose.”
We then get the now-cliché ‘gearing up’ scene as Matrix loads his guns, sheathes his knives, dons the tactical gear, and applies the camo paint.
It’s safe to say that the time to fuck shit up is nigh.
In Val Verde, the airline staff has finally realized that there’s been a corpse onboard for the entire flight. I guess no one thought to tap him on the shoulder and ask where in the hell his buddy went. Outside the plane, Arius’ boys see Henrique being carted off, so they make the call, and Arius orders Jenny’s murder while Matrix skulks about the compound planting explosives and laying low.
And by laying low, I mean he kills some guards who are clearly not white guys wearing brown face and fake mustaches.
Unfortunately, there’s a limit to how many throats you can cut before someone sees you. When a tower guard spots Matrix and starts shooting, Matrix hits the detonator and blows up the entire fuckin’ island. Bennett is on his way to kill Jenny, who has escaped her room, when he hears the ruckus. He’s not surprised.
“Welcome back, John. So glad you could make it.”
The carnage that ensues is glorious. Matrix shoots, stabs, and blows up everyone he crosses paths with while running across an open field and being fired upon by an entire fucking army. If you watch carefully, you can spot the moment Matrix uses his special forces training to spontaneously transform his pistol into a shotgun while running behind a hedge.
When he gets trapped in a small tool shed, the bad guys surround it and fire thousands of rounds through the walls. Upon opening the door to retrieve his body, he drops from the ceiling and impales a guy with a pitchfork, bisects the face of another by throwing a saw blade at him, cuts another dude’s arm off, and even chops a guy in the nuts with an axe.
Matrix dispatches the remaining soldiers and makes his way into the compound, while in the tunnels below, Bennet pursues Jenny. Arius loads up his Steyr Aug and gets in on the action for a bit before Matrix does away with him. Matrix then heads into the tunnels for the climactic showdown with Bennett, who is using Jenny as a human shield. He manages to shoot Matrix in the arm before taunting him:
“Stick your head out, John. I’ll kill you quick, for old time’s sake.”
Just when you think Bennett has Matrix precisely where he wants him, Matrix employs some psy-ops techniques and actually persuades Bennett to throw down his gun, release Jenny, and have a knife fight. Bennett, clearly insane, can’t resist Matrix’s powers of manipulation:
“Come on, Bennett. Let’s party.”
“I don’t need the girl, John. I don’t need the gun! I’M GONNA KILL YOU NOW!”
He probably could have talked Bennett into stabbing himself, but what fun would that be? The fight is brutal. They go round and round until Bennett gets knocked into an exposed high-voltage transformer, but this only serves to give him superpowers, and he starts pummeling Matrix.
Doesn’t last long, though; as soon as he picks up a gun, Matrix rips a pipe off the wall and throws it like a fuckin’ spear before Bennett can even get off a shot. He pins Bennett to a vat that releases hot vapor through the end of the pipe, and Matrix can’t resist one last sarcastic comment:
“Let off some steam, Bennett!”
Jenny is delighted to have just watched a man die.
Outside, Kirby and his men are cleaning up, and Kirby asks Matrix to rejoin the service. Matrix looks at Jenny and Cindy before giving his answer:
“No chance”
Feeling no need to debrief anyone or answer questions regarding how and why he just killed hundreds of people in what may be a foreign country, Matrix walks off with Jenny and Cindy. They board their stolen airplane and just… fly away, as the credits roll. This is precisely how America got shit done in the 1980s. Shoot first, kill second, answer never. I’ve never been so fucking proud.
Commando was released on October 4th, 1985, and was a smash, dethroning another masterpiece, Invasion U.S.A., to take the top spot at the box office. It would remain there for the next three weeks, going on to gross $58M worldwide against a budget of $9M.
After the disappointing returns for Red Sonya, in which he technically had a glorified cameo despite being the face of the marketing campaign, and the piss-poor Conan the Destroyer, this is exactly what Arnold’s career needed: a leading role in which he wasn’t a robot or half-nude savage.
Most importantly, however, it proved that he could lead a film and make bank in the process. That’s when the offers started pouring in. Arnold was now a bona fide movie star and would soon be the biggest action hero on the planet, much to the chagrin of his rival, Sylvester Stallone.
Schwarzenegger wasn’t the only one to reap the benefits of the film’s success, however. Commando was the 6th movie produced by Joel Silver, who would become Hollywood’s go-to producer of action films. His credits now number in the dozens, including Lethal Weapon, Predator, Road House, and The Matrix.
Steven De Souza would later get a call from producers who had a movie on deck that they felt could benefit from some added humor. He would rewrite the screenplay, adding his trademark sarcastic wit, for a rather small film from 1988 called Die Hard. Perhaps you’ve heard of it.
It wasn’t just career success that followed in the wake of Commando, however; the cultural impact was also enormous. Up until then, unless they were straight-up comedies like Beverly Hills Cop or Smokey and the Bandit, action films still took themselves pretty seriously.
With Commando, the unstoppable wrecking machine who spouted wisecracks and one-liners in the face of mortal danger was born. Just one year later, we would get Big Trouble in Little China and Cobra. A year after that came Predator, Lethal Weapon, and Robocop.
Then there’s the Death Wish franchise, which in 1897 would plunge headlong into comic book territory with Death Wish 4: The Crackdown, a film so preposterous that even the lunatic director of the first three films, Michael Winner, wanted no part of it. The ball was rolling, and nothing was going to stop it. For good or for ill, Commando created the template that is utilized to this very day.
It’s the rare film that has something for everyone: humor, romance, explosions, extreme violence, and a body count so high it could only be tabulated by the scientists at NASA. God bless America.
10 saw blades to the face out of 10
DwC
