End of an Era

Rating: 7/10 (16 August 2010)

Rambo, Rocky, Die Hard, Terminator 1&2, Universal Soldiers, etc... I could go on. For the past 30 years we have been privy too an awesome creation. The Super Action Hero. These men were not made of steel (though i guess the terminator could have been). They couldn't fly or shoot laser beams out of their eyes. They were testosterone incarnate. They used knives, bullets and their bodies as their weapons. They were resilient, determined, and good. We loved to watch, as their chiseled bodies got beaten, stabbed, tortured, shot, and yet live on. Their guns never seemed to run out of ammo. The explosions were larger than life and the bodies continued to rack up. I gave this film a 10, not because it was necessarily, in and of itself, worthy of a 10 but because it symbolizes the end of the era of such films and film stars as were present in this film. I can only think of Jean Claude Van Damme and Steven Segal who were absent. I give a 10 to the past 3 decades of grand action stars and "Super Action Heros." A 10 goes to the Jet Li's and the Bruce Willis' and Sylvester Stalone. Who can fill their enormous army boots? Who can give us the strong men from the 80's? Those men who boys idolize and practice their fighting moves on their friends. The time of the man who threw away what was P.C. and got dirty, tore up, beat up, needing stitches and stitched themselves. This movie even contained the typical militant central American drug runners and the corrupt business men and government agents. This film tells me that era is over. We're coming into the era of vampire loves stories and Harry Potters and the Matrix's. But instead of mourning, lets raise our once American brews, for they even seem now to have changed; owned by InBev, and toast to a time of GREAT American movies; a truly made in America classic!