Body Armor (1997)

 

Body Armor (1997)- * * *

AKA: Conway

Directed by: Jack Gill

Starring: Matt McColm, John Rhys-Davies, Morgan Brittany, Shauna O'Brien, Michael Paul Chan, Annabel Schofield, Carol Alt, Clint Howard, and Ron Perlman

Ken Conway (McColm) is The Best. What is he the best at, you ask? Apparently, Conway is a highly-trained professional toughguy, a sort of likable soldier of fortune, and if you have the money, you can hire him to protect you, beat people up, shoot them, or whatever you may want. Tiring of his latest assignment, protecting a bad guy named Rasheed (Rhys-Davies), Conway decides to do something more positive with his life and his skills. His accountant/sidekick 'Hutch' Hutcherson (Howard) wants him to help guard a Red Cross convoy in Sri Lanka, but Conway demurs, saying he "doesn't know what diseases he'll get". Conway doesn't realize how prescient his words are, as he then quickly goes on the case of a missing scientist, which leads to a sinister virologist named Ramsey Krago (Perlman).

Ostensibly, Krago and his partner Sloane Matthews (Brittany) are looking into the cure for a deadly, Ebola-like new disease inexplicably named Ferris. But something evil is going on, and Conway is going to find out what it is. But time is of the essence, because Conway becomes infected with Ferris and only has 48 hours to live. Joined on his mission by old flame Marisa (Schofield) and Agent Monica McBride (Alt), CONWAY is going to have to act quickly or the evil Krago will get away. Can he do it?

Body Armor is comic-booky good fun. It features exaggerated, larger-than-life heroes and villains, and the women that accompany them. If you're looking for something realistic and gritty, this isn't it. Similar to what The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984) is to the Sci-Fi genre, Body Armor is comparable to that in the realm of low-budget action. It's all done with a rather silly sense of humor. Clint Howard is the comic relief character, but a vein of humor goes throughout the whole film, including during some of the fight scenes. Of course, Howard and McColm are the Original Odd Couple. One of them looks a lot like Ben Affleck, and the other...doesn't.

The director, Jack Gill, has mainly worked in the field of stunts for his whole career, and Body Armor is nothing if not a stunt-fest. That would make sense, as it's Gill's only directorial credit to date. He pulls out the stops in that department, as you would think he would, as it's what he knows best. Besides the high-quality stunt work, Body Armor also has a noteworthy cast. 

Besides the aforementioned Howard and McColm, we also have Carol Alt, star of one of our favorites, Crackerjack 2 AKA Hostage Train (1997). With Body Armor, you really get the Alt you want. As much as we love it, in Crackerjack 2 she's a hostage of the baddies. Here, she gets in on the action and continually shoots people throughout the film. Finally, Carol Alt shooting people! It's what we've always wanted to see. Annabel Schofield and Shauna O'Brien provide even more backup in the beautiful woman department. John Rhys-Davies and Michael Paul Chan provide small but memorable supporting roles, and Ron Perlman and Morgan Brittany are an amusing team of baddies. As good as Perlman was in the role, it's also the type of thing Ron Silver excelled at during that time period.

As an antagonist named Krago - which is sort of hard to take seriously because other characters pronounce it like 'Eggo', but then again that was probably on purpose because of the goofy tone of the film - he has virologist goons. That's right, virologist goons. Even though, to the public at least, he is a venerable, white-coated doctor, when Conway starts going after him, he sends his goons to beat/kill him. You don't see that every day. 

Naturally, lots and lots of stunt people worked on the film, notably Kane Hodder and a guy named Mike Justus. Could he have been the inspiration behind the man of the same name from Street Corner Justice (1996)? We may never know, but it is comforting to know that there is a real guy out there named Mike Justus.

Before its final release on A-Pix VHS as Body Armor, the film was known variously as The Protector, Krago's Island, and simply Conway. We can see why they went with Body Armor, as there are a lot of other movies called The Protector, and you really don't want to mess with Ed Marinaro. Krago's Island was bound to be confused with The Secret of King Mahi's Island (1988) and/or McCinsey's Island (1998) - plus that's not a very accurate title to begin with. Conway is a bit plain and doesn't exactly scream "stunt-filled action!", so ultimately they went with the best choice.

While the tone is a bit goofball, and the pacing could perhaps have been a bit more ironed-out, the action, stunts, and lovable B-Movie cast raise Body Armor above many of its competitors.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Evasive Action (1998)

Evasive Action (1998)- * *1\2

AKA: Steel Train 

Directed by: Jerry P. Jacobs

Starring: Roy Scheider, Dorian Harewood, Clint Howard, Don Swayze, Ray Wise, Mallory Farrow, Ed O'Ross, and Dick Van Patten

When a group of dangerous criminals has to be transported, they’re corralled into a train car which is attached to a regular passenger train. Nothing good can come of this scenario, and, you guessed it, all hell breaks loose. When criminal mastermind Enzo Marcelli (Scheider) breaks his evil compadres out of their chains and commandeers the train, Sheriff Blaidek (Wise) is called in to handle the situation. The hapless and sympathetic prisoner Luke Sinclair (Harewood) is caught up in a situation he can’t control and must become the de facto hero. Will the train reach L.A. as it should…or will EVASIVE ACTION be needed?



Funny how these prisoner transports never go right. You’ve never seen in any movie a group of prisoners being shipped from one location – either by van, truck, train, plane, boat, or hovercraft – and then end up at their intended destination with everyone completely unscathed. They should really stop transporting prisoners altogether. Just leave them where they are. 

Anyway, it’s rather obvious that this is the DTV version of Con Air (1997), except it’s Con Train. As far as DTV train movies go, Evasive Action is better than Death Train (2003), Operation Delta Force (1997), and Derailed (2002), but not nearly as good as Hostage Train (1997). As far as Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995), it’s up to you to decide. Just why DTV filmmakers thought audiences would be so fascinated with trains remains unknown. It’s not exactly new technology. It’s not the 1800’s anymore. Presumably they thought countless people would see these train movies on video store shelves and shout “Coooooollll!!!” or “These people are on a TRAIN!! WOwwww!!” Surely there are some train fanatics out there, but how many could there be – and why did DTV filmmakers court them so heavily?



While Evasive Action itself is rather middling, at least the cast is here to help buoy it somewhat – of course there’s Roy Scheider, doing a standard baddie, Don Swayze doing a standard underling, Ray Wise is a standard Sheriff, and Ed O’Ross is a standard warden. Clint Howard isn’t exactly standard like the rest, but his character is really annoying, so I guess it’s for the wrong reason.



We were happy to see Dorian Harewood step out of the shadows of being a bit part or sideman-type actor. This has to be one of the few times he takes the lead, and we were glad for that. He’s rivaled only by one Mallory Farrow as Alex, one of the precocious little girls that these movies tend to have. Oh, and Dick Van Patten does a brief sit-down role as “Parole Officer”. It’s just like in A Dangerous Place (1994) where he played “Principal”. He deserves better – at least give his character a name.



Most of the funny stuff is saved for the end, and the end-credits song, “No Excuses”, is sung by Dorian Harewood himself. He did release an album in 1988 so it wasn’t his first rodeo behind the microphone. The song is one of the better things about Evasive Action.



It seems DTV producers around this time period had a “one-track” mind when it came to trains. Evasive Action is not the best, nor is it the worst, of this bunch. The cast helps keep it from going completely off the rails. But it’s not what we’d call a must-see.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty

Also check out write-ups from our buddies, Exploding Helicopter and Cool Target!

Forced To Kill (1994)

Forced To Kill (1994)- * *

Directed by: Russell Solberg

Starring: Corey Michael Eubanks, Kari Whitman, Michael Ironside, Rance Howard, Clint Howard, Mickey Jones, and Don Swayze

Johnny (Eubanks) is a dedicated repo man who looks a lot like a young Patrick Dempsey. He’s so into his repo’ing, he’s built a whole life for himself and his fiancé, Heather (Whitman) and they’re on the road to marriage. When Johnny’s boss tells him to drive a Jaguar from L.A. to Utah, Johnny hits the road without a care in the world.


Suddenly, he runs afoul of stereotypical rednecks Rance (Howard) and his sons Dwayne (Swayze) and Neil (Jones). This crazed family takes note of Johnny’s fighting skills, so naturally they put him in chains and force him to fight/train in local Punchfighting competitions. Sheriff Wilson (Ironside) is certainly aware of the situation…but what side is he on? All the locals, including higher-ups in the government come to these illegal Punchfighting matches. But when the sinister good-ol’ boys kidnap Heather, Johnny goes out for revenge, and this time he’s not just forced to fight, he just may be…FORCED TO KILL.


We’re all familiar with the classic Coreys of the 80’s. Those being, of course, Haim, Feldman, and Hart. But like one of the lost tribes of Judah, there was another Corey who is only being uncovered today: Corey Michael Eubanks.

Unusually for a PM film, Forced To Kill is just kind of lackluster. The filmmakers probably just assumed that they had an awesome ace in the hole by getting Bob Eubanks’s son to write, executive produce and star in the film. And while Corey Michael Eubanks (henceforth to be referred to as CME) is indeed a gem, this movie has some structural problems that even he can’t overcome. 

The simple plot is extremely repetitive and there are no real surprises. At about an hour in, we get into boring tournament sequences that just aren’t that interesting to watch. There’s no one, singular, charismatic, evil villain such as a Brakus to provide a foil to CME. On top of that, to have stereotype redneck characters as these baddies are is just played out. Although, to be fair, if you’re going to get some redneck baddies, it was smart to get Don Swayze and Mickey Jones, who specialized in that sort of thing.

In other cast news, we do get two Howards for the price of one – both Rance (playing a guy named…Rance) and Clint Howard are on board. One of the better scenes appears when a bunch of aging punks (not quite in their 40’s as is usually the case but they appear to be getting there fast) begin bullying Drifter (Clint Howard) and CME intervenes and beats up the bullies.

Director Solberg is primarily known as a stuntman but he doesn’t hold it together too well behind the camera. A lot of what we see is stodgy and the pacing is off. We don’t even get as many CME wisecracks as we should. On the bright side, we do get some classic PM car flips and blow-ups, this time done up in a country-fried style rather than of the usual urban variety. While we appreciate the difference, it just wasn’t enough to keep the movie afloat. 

In the end, Forced To Kill (not to be confused with Trained To Kill or Forced To Fight) is Punchfighting by numbers. That was disappointing because some of the talent on screen is capable of much better. On the whole, it’s not weird, wild, and wacky enough for our tastes. While the movie isn’t bad, it’s really just okay - we can only wholeheartedly recommend it for Punchfighting completists. Or Don Swayze completists. We know you’re out there.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett 

Also check out write-ups from our buddies, Bulletproof Action and The Unknown Movies!

B.O.R.N. (1988)

B.O.R.N. (1988)-* * *

Directed by: Ross Hagen

Starring: Ross Hagen, William Smith, P.J. Soles, Gregory Scott Cummins, Hoke Howell, Claire Hagen, Clint Howard, Rance Howard, and Russ Tamblyn












Buck Cassidy (Hagen) is a big-hearted cowboy who, with his wife Della (Claire Hagen) have, over the years, adopted seventeen foster children. When three of his adopted daughters are kidnapped and thrown into an unlicensed ambulance, the nightmare begins. It turns out innocent people are being taken from off the street, put into dingy operating rooms, and their organs are removed and sold to the highest bidder on the black market. 

Dr. Farley (Smith) is the sinister surgeon, Jerry (Clint Howard) is the creepy male nurse, Liz (Soles) is the secretary, and the super-evil Hugh (Tamblyn) is the agent that acts as the liaison between the desperate families that need the organs and the unwilling participants. So Buck contacts his old buddy Charlie (Howell), a retired LAPD cop, and the two of them search all over the L.A. area for the missing girls. But will they be too late?

The main reason we sought this movie out is because it contains most of the cast and a lot of the crew from one of our favorite movies, Action USA (1989). B.O.R.N. is almost like a dry run for their later masterwork. Ross Hagen, Claire Hagen, Gregory Scott Cummins, William Smith and Hoke Howell all reconvened the next year after B.O.R.N. to make the great Action USA, and the second unit director for B.O.R.N., John Stewart, became the director for Action USA, and later Cartel (1990). So when we heard that the Action USA team had tried their hand at a horror-themed film about a “Body Organ Replacement Network”, obviously our interest was piqued.

But you can tell they wanted to do an action movie all along, because there are shootouts, fisticuffs and car chases in B.O.R.N., making it less a straight-up horror movie and more a thriller with some action and horror elements.

William Smith is delightfully unintelligible as the main surgeon. Sure, it’s odd to see Smith as a surgeon, but that adds to the weirdness. PJ Soles is almost unrecognizable as the big-haired Liz. Russ Tamblyn stands out as one of the more evil baddies we’ve seen in a while. Clint Howard, playing, surprisingly, a creepy rapist, later reprised his role in Street Corner Justice (1996) (and probably a lot of his other roles as well). Rance Howard is also on board and he resembled Night Court’s Harry Anderson more than his brothers Ron or Clint.

At first it’s hard to tell who’s who in the movie, because everyone is inexplicably wearing cowboy hats in modern-day L.A., but eventually you can discern who the characters are. The editing is almost as choppy as Dr. Farley’s scalpel-work, but then there are some oddly funny moments to distract you from that, such as when Buck and a large group of people are at a large dance called “Adopt A Grandparent Day” and they’re all dancing in a circle singing “Beautiful Dreamer”.

 And sure, there’s a bit of what you might call “surgery gore”, but the main problem is that the movie needed to be tightened up. Most of the running time consists of Hoke and Hagen searching around town for the missing daughters. It’s almost like the B.O.R.N. concept couldn’t fill 90 minutes on its own. There should have been more going on plotwise. But there are enough silly/Un-P.C./worthwhile moments to keep the movie afloat.

In the music department, a band called Pigmy Love Circus plays at the aforementioned “Adopt A Grandparent Day” (good gig!) and Dawn Wildsmith is uncredited as the singer. Wildsmith was also in Cyclone (1987) with Russ Tamblyn and John Stewart, not to mention Armed Response (1986) with Ross Hagen. The end credits song (which also appears in one of the many scenes when Hagen is searching the city in his van) is “sung” by Ned Albright. It seems this was his first attempt at singing. Not just in front of a microphone at a recording session...I mean EVER. Is this the best they could have gotten? NED ALBRIGHT?

In all, B.O.R.N. is an amusing curiosity, and its claim to fame, besides its cast, is that it paved the way for Action USA.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Street Corner Justice (1996)

Street Corner Justice (1996)-* *

Directed by: Chuck Bail

Starring:  Marc Singer, Steve Railsback, Soon-Teck Oh, Kim Lankford, Tommy "Tiny" Lister, Clint Howard, and Bryan Cranston



 "The law of the land just came home to stay."








 The wonderfully-named Mike Justus (Singer) is “The Best”. The best cop in Pittsburgh, that is. Because of his rogue ways and defiance of authority, his higher-ups decide to let him “retire early”. Justus sees this as a good time to fix up and re-sell a house his aunt left him in the suburbs of Los Angeles. Upon arriving in a section of L.A. called Norwood, he finds it overrun by criminals, hoodlums, punks, ne’er-do-wells, scofflaws, loiterers, scapegraces, Sir-Lucius-O’Triggers, delinquents, ruffians, thugs, hooligans, and the like. Not getting any help from local cop Freeborn (Railsback), Justus, along with a rainbow coalition of people in the community such as restauranteur Lee (Oh), stereotypical Irish Priest Father Brophy (Cranston), stereotypical Bible-quoting tough guy Angel (Lister), and video store proprietress/love interest to Mike Justus Jenny (Lankford), form a Guardian Angels-like group called TNB, or “Take Norwood Back”. This doesn’t sit well with the local gangs, so a showdown ensues. Will Justus actually get STREET CORNER JUSTICE?

As far as “take back the community” movies go, Street Corner Justice isn’t as good as The Annihilators (1985) or Private Wars (1993) (which also featured Steve Railsback, who must really care about his community). It’s one of our favorite themes for DTV movies, so we could never get sick of this formula, but this one in particular is just relentlessly dumb. It’s also too long, and oddly paced at that. Even though director Chuck Bail is a veteran of the movie industry, it’s like he was a newbie in the production department. 

That aside, at least he had the raw nerve to name the main character Mike Justus. As if to drill the point home to viewers who may be even dumber than this movie, at one point Justus says, “There’s no justice. There’s just us.” Yes, we get it. But Mike Justus smokes - because he’s cool - and that’s something you’d never see today. No hero would ever smoke in our ridiculously P.C. society of the 2000’s. Also Singer looks a lot like David Spade in this movie. If you’ve ever wanted to see David Spade beat up bad guys and chase rapists that are Clint Howard, this might be your only chance.

‘Justice is riddled with cliches and stereotypes (there’s even a fast montage of nothing but cliches early on in the movie, watch out for it) and these are fun to watch, but is it enough to support a whole (overlong) movie? There are some moments which aren’t in the box of cliches, such as the fact that the main baddie and supposedly the toughest gang member in town wears a sweatervest, and the fact that this whole “citizens vs. punks” war was initiated when a fat guy couldn’t play a game of Street Fighter II. All the way up until the time-honored final abandoned warehouse fight, there’s plenty of unmitigated stupidity on show. But that may be your thing.

There’s also an “evil playground” that we haven’t seen since Balance Of Power (1996) - it might even be the same one as Balance Of Power, which would be weird. That’s one seriously evil playground. We can see why two movies have highlighted it. And the video store that Kim Lankford’s character, Jenny, works at is called Cine-Video, and looks like a real place. Lankford gets to sing not one, but two songs on the soundtrack. But no rockin’ tunes, just ballads. It’s a shame, a faster song might have bumped up the energy level a bit more.

Considering Mike Justus fought his whole life against red tape, it’s pretty ironic that this movie comes housed in a red tape. But no amount of gimmickry or colored inks can blot out the fact that Street Corner Justice is video store shelf-filler and a waste of a nice B-movie cast.

Comeuppance Review by: Ty and Brett

Digital Man (1995)

Digital Man (1995)-*1\2

Directed by: Phillip J. Roth

Starring: Matthias Hues, Ken Olandt, Adam Baldwin, Chase Masterson, Kristin Dalton, Paul Gleason, Ed Lauter, Susan Tyrrell,  Don Swayze, and a Special Appearance by: Clint Howard












In the future, if there is a situation too dangerous for human soldiers to go into, there is such a thing as the "D-1 Weapons System", or "Digital Man" (Hues). Such a situation arises when terrorists steal the launch codes for some nukes and demand 2 billion dollars in gold. Digital Man spoils their plans, but he uploads the launch codes on to his system. He then ends up in Badwater, Nevada, a small, dusty hamlet in the desert. When it is found out he has the nuclear launch codes, a special, crack team led by Anders (Olandt) is sent to Badwater to "take him off-line". Also there's some sort of stupid intrigue involving Adam Baldwin and Ed Lauter that is impossible to care about. So it's a scenario with a multi-racial team trying to stop Digital Man, Digital Man eluding them, and rednecks and trailer park dwellers such as Billy (the Swayze of the Don variety) interacting with all the high-tech goings-on.

Maybe it's just us, but we hate these low-budget sci-fi future movies. The dialogue consists of nothing but gobbledygook which is completely unrelatable to any audience. Thus they mentally "check out", lose interest and stop caring about the proceedings. Digital Man in particular is guilty of this, with very few, if any, likable characters. The most likable of the bunch is probably the emotionless supersoldier Digital Man. It's a perfect role for Hues. 

In 1995, CD-ROMs were huge, and this movie feels like one long, painful CD-ROM, with all the graphics and silly "morphing" effects that would entail. I've played flight simulators that are more thrilling than Digital Man. Flight Simulators.

Just imagine a mish-mash of Virtuosity (1995), The Terminator (1984), Neon City (1991), Robocop (1987), American Cyborg: Steel Warrior (1993), Hologram Man (1995), Circuitry Man (1990) and even the Sega Genesis game Vectorman.  The idea of the "sci-fi western" has been tried with everything from Westworld (1973) to Oblivion (1994). While the novelty of Don Swayze in a Chad McQueen-style sleeveless shirt angrily spouting lines like "You can't tell me what to do, robot!" in utter seriousness to such people as Matthias Hues is worth noting, Digital Man is just so dumb and tedious it wears off quickly.

For example, the weaponry the cast uses look like spray-painted leaf blowers, and robots die like the Itchy and Scratchy robots in that episode of The Simpsons.  The "crack team" does hone their craft, whatever that's supposed to be, by fighting "Virtual Ninjas" (you gotta figure the word "virtual" is going to show up sometime). The idea of a virtual ninja is cool and is probably strong enough to support its own movie. Maybe there will be a spin-off (please God not a sequel).

So while the movie does have a professional look thanks to the cinematography, and there are a lot of explosions, the only real reason to watch this is for Matthias Hues. Which is the only reason we watched it. So that works out. The climax does feature some Hues hand to hand combat, which is nice, because Hues walking around a trailer park with a leaf blower for 90 minutes sounds more entertaining than it actually is.

In the end, Digital Man seems like something you'd happen to catch on HBO or Cinemax in the middle of the afternoon sometime in the 90's. Sadly though, the strong B-movie cast cannot save the dire stupidity within.

Comeuppance Review by: Brett and Ty