Iron Eagle II

What do you do when you're a young director with a hit on your hands? You go off and direct a flop like Superman IV. Then you get talked into doing a needless sequel to your big hit, only a few years ago. Well that's what happened to Sidney J. Furie. In an attempt to tell a more serious, or adult story Furie reject everything about the first film that made it work. Instead he chose to take all the fun out of the film with in the first few minutes of the picture. The first film was more of a Teen movie, it stood out because of that fact. It was fun and energetic, but this one is dry and slow. As a stand alone film, it's sort of boring. As part of the Iron Eagle franchise, it's down right depressing. First it's about the US and Russia teaming up on a mission to stop some terrorist from launching a nuclear bomb, but it never really is clear why one or the other can't just take on the mission by themselves. The characters seem either cardboard flat, or outright dumb. The biggest mistake they make is the under use of Louis Gossett Jr. His character doesn't seem to really have a place, except standing around and barking orders. He never seems to have the same energy as he did in the first film. The ending was fine, if not reminiscent of Star Wars. The contrived Love story didn't work at all for me, it felt like they were again trying to take the story into more adult territory and in that lost the point of what makes the first one so good...