Trained to Kill (1988)

User Rating:

4.0/10   

Director:

H. Kaye Dyal

Writers:

H. Kaye Dyal (writer)
Arthur Webb (writer)

Genre:

Action

Plot Keywords:

Kickboxing | Independent Film

Cast

Lisa Aliff	...	Jessie Revels
Chuck Connors	...	Ed Cooper
Harold Diamond	...	Loc Syn
Glen Eaton	...	Samnaug
Arlene Golonka	...	Martha Cooper
Kane Hodder
Ron O'Neal	...	George 'Cotton' Shorter
Henry Silva	...	Ace Duran
Marshall R. Teague	...	Felix Brenner
Lori Wagner	...	Ace Duran's Girl
Frank Zagarino	...	Matt Cooper
Robert Z'Dar	...	Walter Majyk

Runtime:

Brazil:90 min | USA:94 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Iceland:16 | Germany:BPjM Restricted

Typical 80's action-flick..

This movie promised "200 % Total ACTION" on the cover of the cassette, but it sorely lacked about 104% of it...

It begins with a ridiculous rescue-mission in Cambodia where a chopper is saving a young man (who tries to look like mini-Rambo), he is followed by another young man very poorly disguised as an old guy, his beard is clearly fake and he has no wrinkles at all.. the helicopter then saves the kid, and somebody kills all the enemies (without hitting them), very weird...it only goes downhill from there on..

The best things in this movie were Harold Diamond as the mentally disturbed war-veteran Loc Syn, who kind of looks like wrestling legend "The Undertaker", which was pretty cool.

Henry Silva was very good as Ace Duran, the evil bad guy who wants revenge or something..I didn't quite get the plot, because it seemed so stupid at the beginning.. but he is good as always, fun to see him in non-Italian movies!

Marshall R. Teague as Felix Brenner and Robert Z'Dar as Walter Majyk were also quite fun to watch, because they're so aggressive all the time and stupid-looking.. Majyk's death was specifically stupid, since he was driving a car, and one of the good guy's (the one looking like a clone between Dolph Lundgren and Jake Busey) throws a hand-grenade in it, and he has AT LEAST 15 seconds (seemed like a minute) to either grab the grenade and throw it out, or stop the car and run away, but instead he fumbles with it, looses it under the seat and drives in a ditch where the car explodes.. what an idiot! Made me laugh though.

I liked the small cameo by Kane Hodder (known as 'Jason Vorhees' from the 'Friday the 13th'-series) too, he didn't get much screen-time or speaking lines in it, maybe it was because he was just getting started in acting back then..

All in all, I give this movie 7/10 stars.

I've seen episodes of "The A-Team" more exiting than this, and I didn't really care for the good guys, they were too boring and humorless, even though they tried hard enough.. I liked the flamethrower-bit, that was good. And all Hail Bunki Z! He saved the movie! And Loc Syn jumping off a railing in a casino down on a players table several feet below him, and not even caring about it after wards! And there was also a poor mans Tom Selleck (from 'Magnum P.I.') in ultra-tight short-shorts running around the casino, made me laugh..! Good body-count in this movie too.