Review

  • Sorry, that's the best I could do to get Alan Silvestri's theme across. I saw the last part of this movie many moons ago and one of the reasons I thought it was soooooooooo bad was that insipid theme playing over and over and over again. It's a bright, peppy, we're-number-one theme, so it hardly works for all the death and destruction, but I'm sure Silvestri, one of Hollywood's most accomplished composers had nothing to do with this aural overkill; he composed a theme for one scene and the producers just kept placing the same theme EVERYWHERE in the movie where there's Delta Force action.

    So last night, Delta Force comes on. In the mood for a bad movie, honey? Sure, she says. At first I'm surprised. It's not bad. In fact, it's quite promising. Robert Forster as an Arab terrorist? Enough character actors to make a disaster flick? Kim Delaney as a nun? Hanna Schygulla as a stewardess? The acting was good, the plotting tight, and there was actually some genuine tension.

    Then the Delta Force arrives.

    And so does that unstoppable theme music. Ah, this is the part where the movie gets bad. I was right! My memory hadn't been faulty. Phew. Open a window.

    Poor Lee Marvin, looking tired, puffy, and letting his eyebrows do the acting in this, his last role. Norris isn't a bad actor, but come on man, get a hair cut and a shave. The clichés are so painful, I wished they'd shot this without anyone doing any talking at all. And even the most patriotic, flag-waving guy or gal will cringe at how noble and heroic and elite and superior our boys are compared to the sniveling, savage, sneaky Arabs; at the height of the action the Arabs come off as though they studied terrorism with the Ritz Brothers.

    The fight between Forster and Norris is perhaps the highlight, but ends stupidly (Mr. Forster's terrorist is killed by a motorcycle-to-Mercedes missile, just like all the special forces use).