Land Of The Free (1998)

Land Of The Free (1998)-* * *

Directed by: Jerry Jameson

Starring: Jeff Speakman, William Shatner, Charles Robinson, and Chris Lemmon












Politician extraordinaire Aidan Carvell (Shatner) is running for the U.S. Senate. His campaign manager, Frank Jennings (Speakman) is dedicatedly working to make sure Carvell achieves his goal. However, in the course of working on his election bid, Frank discovers that Carvell is the secret head of a militia group that wants to overthrow the government. 

Now he knows too much, and he goes on the run. Carvell’s people, including McCaster (Robinson), and Thornton (Lemmon) are spearheading the “let’s chase down and kill Frank Jennings” initiative, so he takes his wife and son and joins the witness protection program. But that’s not enough for the megalomaniacal Carvell, who wants Frank, a serious thorn in his side and sole blocker of his evil plans, dead. So who will come out victorious, and who will live in the LAND OF THE FREE?

Wait. You mean to tell me there’s an actual movie where Jeff Speakman and William Shatner co-star, they get into confrontations with each other, and eventually fight? Where do I sign up? In truth, Land Of The Free isn’t quite as awesome as the presence of the aforementioned power-duo might imply, but it’s still entertaining and worth seeing. Chalk it up to PM, they really have a winning formula and they stick to it. Plenty of car chases and exploding, flipping cars are the order of the day once again. But as we’ve said before, PM has turned it into an art.

As for Shatner, he’s looking quite robust and apple-cheeked here. His classic herky-jerky line reading delivery of course is on show. Be it Star Trek, Land Of The Free, TekWar, or any of his other projects, Shatner always speaks the same way. So it’s nice that, even in a DTV PM movie, he’ll say a line such as “I don’t believe it” like “I-don’t-believe...it.” Does anyone else find it amusing that in this movie he plays a supposedly pro-American guy, but he’s really Canadian? That truly is range. And yes, his name is Carvell, which will inevitably remind you of ice cream. Adding an extra “L” isn’t the cleverest way to cover that up. Judging by the pounds that both Speakman and Shatner put on, maybe Carvel sponsored this movie. Perhaps naming Shatner’s character that is just an homage to Cookie Puss and Fudgie the Whale.

Cleverly, the filmmakers never assign a political party to Carvell. You can read your own biases into him. He’s sort of a melange: they call him a “Maverick”, which will remind you of John McCain, but his enthusiasm is very Howard Dean-esque. His political stances seem to be in the Ron Paul camp. So he’s a little bit from every party, and even the name Carvell, after all, maybe isn’t from the ice cream, it’s a sly reference to James Carville? We may never know. 

Like the world in general, the movie needed more Shatner. There are large sections where he’s not even involved with the plot. But we know one thing for sure, he really loves his antiques.

So Frank Jennings, Speakman’s character, is constantly beating people up with his trademark Kenpo style, shooting people, and using renegade tactics like jumping off buildings and wild car chases to evade the baddies. Keep in mind he’s not Carvell’s bodyguard, he’s his campaign manager! That’s one badass campaign manager. He should run for a new political position: Speakman Of The House!  But he does wear a red shirt, blue jeans, and his skin is white, so we can only assume he is, without saying it, more “American” than the evil Carvell, at least based on his wardrobe choices. And that really is the best way to express your patriotism.

People shoot their guns sideways in true “gangsta” style, there’s a restaurant that sells something called “pastrami shrimp”, and the movie is more relevant today than ever before. It’s all underpinned by inappropriately patriotic musical stings, even during car chases. Are they supposed to be especially patriotic car chases? Again, we may never know.

Especially in this election year of 2012, more people should see Land Of The Free.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Best Of The Best 4: Without Warning (1998)

Best Of The Best 4: Without Warning (1998)-* * *

Directed by: Phillip Rhee

Starring: Phillip Rhee, Ernie Hudson, Jessica Huang, Chris Lemmon, Paul Gleason, Art LaFleur, Sven-Ole Thorsen, David "Shark" Fralick and Tobin Bell







Tommy Lee is back! Not the Motley Crue drummer of course (in the press he’s always Rocker Tommy Lee, and he’s called that so often he should just legally change his first name to Rocker) - It’s Phillip Rhee, and this time he teaches martial arts to police officers. He has a young daughter, Stephanie (Jessica Huang), and life seems good.  All this ends when a gang of Russian-type mobsters, working out of an abandoned warehouse (where else?), begins a large counterfeiting operation. The details of this illegal activity are on a disc, and Tommy inadvertently ends up with it.

Now on the bad side of criminal mastermind Slava (Bell), as well as his many goons, including Boris (Thorsen), he entrusts Stephanie to a priest (Gleason), so he can go off on his own and fight the baddies. But while he has some friends on the force, notably Jarvis (Lemmon), he also butts heads with the hard-line Detective Gresko (Hudson). Can Tommy Lee stop the counterfeiting agents, rescue his friends and daughter from imminent doom, and clear his own name in the process?

Some people might think about the Best of the Best series, “there are FOUR of them?” While it may seem puzzling and hard to justify, this fourth entry in the series was solid fun and worth seeing. Phillip Rhee is a very talented guy - he stars in the film, he directed it, co-wrote it, and he’s a gifted martial artist and worked on the choreography. He’s also likable. Rhee does seem to have well-rounded skills, and because of this, his name should be more well-known outside of die-hard action circles. He’s so badass, he doesn’t turn off his lights at night using a lightswitch like a sucker, he JUMPKICKS his lights off.

Supporting him is an impressive array of B-movie names. Tobin Bell puts in an understated, low-key villain performance, which was a welcome change from the frothing-at-the-mouth baddies we usually see. He pulls off a tricky balance - be subtle but not be boring. He does a great job, and, interestingly, there’s some pre-Saw torture he’s involved with. Coincidence? Or did the makers of the unending Saw franchise see this movie and picture him as the ultimate torturer? And speaking of people who probably saw this movie, there’s an American Beauty (1999)-like fantasy sequence one year before that film. Is it possible the American Beauty people saw this movie and thought, “If we rip this off, no one will know, because we don’t share any of the same audience”?

Hudson plays the BYD (instead of Black Yelling Chief, here he’s a detective) and there’s even a fight scene between him and Rhee where Hudson attempts some Hudson-Fu on him. Chris Lemmon’s not in it that much and resembles Joe Piscopo. It’s no Firehead (1991) for him. Paul Gleason, Art LaFleur and Sven-Ole Thorsen round out the cast of familiar faces, and someone who’s been turning up a lot lately, David “Shark” Fralick (Deadly Reckoning, 1998, Executive Target, 1997 Inside Edge, 1992) is on board as well.

A highlight of the movie is a combination stickfighting/fencing fight scene. We don’t believe we’ve ever seen that before. While the movie falls prey to a cliche we see often “We’ve got to get the disc!” - a movie about a disc - Best of the Best 4 has a lot to offer in the pure entertainment department. Regardless of how you feel about the other Best of the Best movies, you should see this one if you love that implausibly-plotted-but-who-cares-let’s-have-fun action style pioneered in the 80’s.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Firehead (1991)

Firehead (1991)-* * *

Directed by: Peter Yuval

Starring: Chris Lemmon, Gretchen Becker, Lauren Levy, Brett Porter, Christopher Plummer, and a Special Appearance by: Martin Landau




"The Power to Destroy the World...And the Will to Save It!"







Just when you thought AIP had run out of insane ideas...they really outdo themselves with Firehead, the story of an Estonian superdude who can shoot lasers out of his eyes and is pals with Chris Lemmon. We're not kidding.

At the height of the cold war, Ivan Tigor (Porter) leaves his communist homeland and escapes to America. He is going around blowing up military installations, so energetic but dopey research scientist Warren Hart(Lemmon) teams up with beautiful military officer and scientist Buchanan (Becker) to find the truth. This upsets Colonel Garland Vaughn (Plummer) who is a member of a secret, underground cult called the Upper Order who meet in secret and are planning World War III. Meanwhile, The President (Ed Kearney) and Secretary Fallbright (George Elliot) are all involved. 

Did we mention Tigor can shoot lasers out of his eyes and the origin of this is not really explained? So now Tigor and Hart are on the run with only Tigor's lasers and sometimes forcefields to help them.

This odd and zany AIP entry has some wacky humor thanks to Chris Lemmon. He's always yelling "Jesus Christ!" Most of his lines in the film either start or end with him exhorting the name of some people's Lord and Savior. His 12 year old daughter in the film, inexplicably named Smith (Levy), is a plucky genius who drives a car and seems to have some fun saying wordy, scientific dialogue. She has an ALF doll in her room. She practically steals the film, in much the same way Sarah Dampf did for Stealth Fighter (1999). Too bad the two tweens never starred together in a movie. They could team up and fight crime or something. Her energetic, loquacious performance contrasts completely with Brett Porter's monosyllabic, monotonous Arnold Schwarzenegger/Dolph Lundgren/Matthias Hues-style delivery. The film does borrow somewhat from Red Heat (1988). I guess we were running low on English-as-a-second-language action stars. Thank you Brett Porter.



Martin Landau puts in a "special appearance" as Pendleton. He mutters some exposition and looks bewildered. He seems to be thinking "What am I doing in Firehead?" Same thing goes for Christopher Plummer (who has either won or been nominated for every award under the sun) - a usually respectable actor who decided if he was gonna slum, he was really gonna SLUM. You kind of feel bad/embarrassed for him. But maybe he had fun. We don't know. Someone ask him and get back to us. 

Chris Lemmon looks like a cross between Joe Piscopo and Wings Hauser in this film. He seems to care a bit too much about every little thing that happens. Gretchen Becker is on hand as the eye candy but she's much more than that - she sings the powerful end credits theme song as well.

There is a lot of mumbo-jumbo in the film, such as some gobbledygook about the "special operations computer bank" (which has its own jaunty theme music), and our heroes and government agents trapped in a building before a deadly virus is released. Yet they never take any time to explain Ivan's superpowers.

Think of this movie as AIP's attempt at being topical. It is incredibly silly and Ivan's laser eyes are the main draw. But we think they held back on using the effect too much to save money.

"Fire" up the VCR for this classic tonight!

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett