Hey again, everyone!
Not gonna make excuses for vanishing this time: 2022 was a very tough year for me, so I fell rather behind on almost every writing and blogging project I have. I do want to make up for the 2021 Sleaze-A-Thon falling through, though, so I will post the only review I have managed to write for it this month as a sort of mini-penance... as well as finish something else I started last year for y'all. Namely, I've been writing a recap for the most action movie I have ever seen: a little gem titled U.S. SEALs 2, an unforgettable follow-up to a mostly-forgotten action movie called U.S. SEALs, both from the famed low-budget fun times film studio called Nu Image. This bonkers sequel was directed by my favorite schlockmaster and direct-to-video wizard Isaac Florentine, so we're in good hands. I have been very fond of Mr. Florentine's output since my first jaw-on-the-floor encounter with Undisputed 3 (I made my mom watch that one with me and I still refuse to feel embarrassed over it), and this one didn't disappoint either.
Get ready, we're diving into the schlock in 3... 2... 1...
ACT 1: THE WARMUP
Oh, U.S. SEALs 2, how I love thee.
For the record: I know stupid. I’ve seen stupid. I’ve liveblogged stupid and come out alive more than once. But not even slightly was I prepared for the sheer tour the force of stupid that U.S. SEALs 2, a direct-to-video Nu Image sequel to a direct-to-video Nu Image movie nobody much cared about, turned out to be. A movie so out-there dumb I’m fairly sure it punched a hole in my brain, and so utterly entertaining that I rewatched it twice after my first time with it; a lethal methane-fueled kung-fu meltdown of melodrama, high kicks and sword duels that takes ass and kicks names for 94 minutes straight. I could write a dissertation on this masterpiece, from the acting to the directing and the… everything, but alas, I’m not majoring in action movies, so a recap it shall be.
A brief aside: the only character/actor in this movie you won’t be hearing anything genuinely mean about from me is Kamiko played by the late Karen Kim, for two reasons. One: she passed away young, and I don’t want to be a jerk. B: she absolutely rules in this movie and I have nothing bad to say about her whatsoever. Trust me, there’s plenty of stupid left for us to point and laugh at.
Get prepared to take your suspension of disbelief bungee jumping… This is U.S. SEALs 2: Fist Farmers. (The real subtitle is The Ultimate Force, but let’s be honest, it’s a Nu Image movie. They mean the same thing.)
So we start off at the docks of a small island in the North Pacific, where a Navy SEAL team is being sent in to stop a covert deal between two bad guys from taking place. Take note of the words “covert” and “two”. The team consists of Generic Guys 1 through 4, including Generic Guy 3. (Take note of him as well.) Their leader is one Casey Sheppard, played by actual martial artist Michael Worth, an actor I hold in very high esteem, especially after seeing him in this kung-fu carnival. Another important team member is a guy I shall dub Evil McSmirk, for the simple reason that the very first thing he does onscreen is smirk into the camera while ominously cocking a gun. Gee, I sure do wonder who the villain is.
One thing you might find noteworthy (read: hysterical) is that every single time a character gestures dramatically, motions at something or turns their damn head, a very loud FWOOSH sound effect is dubbed in. These characters are so badass that even their covert hand signals make kung-fu noises. That, or this entire movie has been watching too many wuxia flicks.
Short version of what follows: instead of two bad guys there turn out to be approximately 3282, and a machine gun/hand grenade/actual rocket launcher-powered bullet-stravaganza breaks out. I counted: we’re precisely 4 minutes in when the machine guns come out. From a Nu Image movie that’s restraint.
Amidst the bullet-storm and people making huge HYAAH noises and throwing themselves backwards like they were yanked by God’s invisible walking leash whenever they get shot, Casey does a front flip off a truck while dual wielding pistols, blows up a boat and makes a ginormous FWOOSH noise by turning around. Naturally, after such incredible feats of WTF, the mission is a success. Well, sort of, as the two guys they actually came here to catch both die dramatically: one of them gets taken out by an explosion, and the other one… well…
Once the bullet farming is done with, Bad Guy #2 a.k.a. the wimpy one, now a captive of the team, pisses off Evil McSmirk by hitting him in the face with a briefcase full of money. Casey, standing around and seeing this, does nothing. McSmirk looks up with hate in his eyes and raises a gun at him. Casey proceeds to stand around and do nothing. McSmirk cocks the gun, and Casey doesn’t even move a facial muscle. McSmirk lowers the gun, everyone breathes a sigh of relief… then he raises it again and shoots the guy in cold blood as Casey – say it with me – stands around and does nothing. Only when the guy is dead as a doornail does he yell at McSmirk, “Our orders were to bring him in alive!” Stellar team leader right there. Once Casey stalks off into the night, mildly annoyed by cold-blooded murder, Generic Guy 3 gives a look of vague disapproval to McSmirk, and that’s… literally all he does. End scene.
We then cut to the SEAL team’s karate sensei in his dojo, giving Casey training advice in broken English about “Much anger… must learn calm” and generally being the most stereotypical sensei you have ever encountered. He has twin daughters named Nikki (she’s the ditzy one) and Kamiko (she’s the serious one), because he might be a man of great honor, but he’s not a man of great consistency, apparently. Casey and Kamiko are implied to be into each other by exchanging looks of… longing, I suppose, except the way it’s shot (and acted) generally makes it come across like Casey is hideously uncomfortable in her presence. And speaking of hideously uncomfortable things: I’d love to know who the hell I have to thank for the constant closeups of people’s sweaty faces after fight scenes pretty much filling up the screen. I like these actors fine, but when I start expecting their breath to start fogging up the camera lens, I believe we might have too much of a good thing on our hands.
The editor then has enough of the dojo, so we cut away and land in a bar where McSmirk is talking to Casey, who is still feeling guilty about the bloodbath at the docks. McSmirk is of the philosophy that getting to kill people in the line of duty is really fun if you just lean into it. Gee, I WONDER who the VILLAIN is. They spot Nikki having some good drunken fun with the Navy boys, and McSmirk (whose full name is Frank Ratliff – Ratliff? Seriously? Was Doucheberg already taken?) offers to escort her home.
Alas, as Casey finds out driving home from the bar, “escort her home” apparently means “assault and kill her offscreen in the woods”. A horrified Casey dukes it out with McSmirk but ends up losing, and McSmirk takes off into the woods just as the police arrive.
If you wonder what the sensei’s reaction to losing his dear Nikki is, well, naturally he is crushed by grief, but with the support and love of his beloved other daughter Kamiko he manages to get through these trying times... Pfff who am I kidding he commits seppuku. Because this movie has all the maturity and subtlety of, well, a Nu Image flick. Perfect way to treat such a serious topic, eh?
Three years after the Melodrama Train hit Casey and Kamiko, McSmirk shows up again at a US Army base, with a gorgeous blonde martial artist lady and Jackie Chan’s stunt double. That’s not me being an asshole, by the way: Jackie Chan’s actual stunt double worked on this movie both as an actor and as fight choreographer, and trust me, he did his work when he came to the martial ballet.
Team Evil are here to abduct a world-renowned nuclear (pronounced “nucular”, of course) scientist lady, Dr. Burrows. We know she’s a scientist because she wears fugly thick-framed glasses. She also has a tracking chip implanted in her arm by the Army Major whose project she works on, because that is, quote from a later scene, standard procedure for “people with very sensitive job descriptions”. Do ignore the uncomfortable surveillance-state undertones with that particular plot point. Not because you should, mind you, but there are a lot of uncomfortable undertones here for us to get mad at and we don’t have all day.
Alas for the Major (who is actually my favorite character in this), McSmirk and his lackeys manage to steal Dr. Burrows right from under their noses, despite the Major and his men valiantly trying to shoot their getaway plane down while the scientist lady is inside it. As McSmirk is kind enough to leave his DNA behind via a cigar, they identify him in less than one day as the villain of the movie, making the Major turn to McSmirk’s old Navy boss for help. Which becomes even more urgent when McSmirk phones them both and demands a billion dollars in 48 hours, or else he’ll… do something dumb. You’ll see.
“Son of a bitch.”No comments on these lines because they don’t need any.
“Roger that, sir.”
Naturally, the two military geniuses’ first trip is to Casey, who is now a civilian with a Stubble of Sorrow. And I agree: turning a high-risk covert operation over to a guy who has been out of active duty for years instead of any of the available teams, just because said guy is the movie's top-billed actor, is indeed a smart move that will in no way backfire later. The conversation can be summed up thusly:
Casey: I’m not interested.The catch of the mission? McSmirk is hiding on an abandoned Soviet island that became contaminated with methane (fun fact: one of the natural sources of methane is animal digestion) after a chemical fire. What this means is that the air is entirely breathable (!) but one single spark from a gun could blow up the entire island (!!), so the mission has to be done entirely with fists and knives.
Admiral Whatshisname: Casey… it’s McSmirk.
Casey: [DRAMATIC ZOOM]
Trust me, it gets stupider.
So while Casey is left to hurriedly assemble a team to invade Cow Fart Island with, Evil McSmirk reveals his brilliant plan to Dr. Burrows. He happens to have put his hands on two ol' high-tech Russian rockets as well as some weapons-grade plutonium, and he wants Dr. Burrows to whip up a Cocktail O’ Nuke with those so he can threaten to blow up everything in sight until he gets paid. You know. Build warheads from scratch. As one does. (Siiigh.) Naturally, she’s like “kindly fuck off”, and McSmirk tells her that if she refuses, he’ll get someone else to do the job, but he’ll just go straight to blowing up everything in sight instead of asking for money. I imagine if that scientist also said no, McSmirk would just go on a world tour until he found someone who’s somehow both smart and dumb enough to carry out his schemes.
Alas, Dr. Burrows says yes, probably because she was stunned into stupidity by this line:
Anyway, back to the Cow Fart Island recruits: the first person Casey phones is – naturally – Kamiko. The conversation can be summed up thusly:
Casey: Kamiko… we found McSmirk.
Kamiko: [DRAMATIC ZOOM]
Casey: Since bringing civilians along on covert military missions is the level I operate at, and besides I have the hots for you, I want you to come along and help us catch him. What do you say?
Kamiko: TALK TO THE HAND, CASEY-SAN. [hangs up]
The next person to be asked after that epic fail makes his appearance in the world’s most dramatic military drill/game of capture the flag, naturally played with an American flag and… machine guns? Explosives? Holy shit. Of course, he wins and reveals himself as our old friend Generic Guy 3 from the firefight at the docks. If you don’t remember him, don’t worry: no one does. He didn’t even have a line in that scene.
Once the flag has been grabbed, Casey shows up all a-smiling, and the second the words ‘Cow Fart Island’ are out of his mouth Generic Guy dramatically goes YOU KNOW YOU’VE GOT ME, CASE, which would be a very touching sentiment if we knew who the hell you are, dude. Just for fun, I’m going to pretend that he’s Casey’s boyfriend. Given that when he fistbumps Casey it makes a SH-BOOM noise, the bromance is way strong with these two anyway.
The following recruit is Omar, a hitman playing pool at a titty bar, and after a brief pool cue duel, he agrees to do the job for triple pay. If that sentence made perfect sense to you, I’m afraid the brain damage has started to set in. Of course, if you’re wondering whether bringing a literal hitman on a secret military mission is such a hot idea, you’re probably not operating on the level required to understand this movie. Feel free to hit yourself in the head a few times before continuing if you wish to fix that.
The only thing you need to know about the third guy they visit, a hatchet-faced gentleman whose name I completely forgot, is that when he finds out that they’re going on a covert island operation the only thing he asks is, “Casey… can I take my bike?” Special Forces material indeed.
The last in the line is Finley, a deeply religious prisoner doing hard labor with a bunch of other inmates who have bad teeth. As in, regular teeth with bad makeup on. And Finley is a character, all right: he manages to say literally the worst line I have ever heard in a movie, and as a regular Nu Image survivor, that is a claim I do not make lightly. Ladies and germs: actual dialogue from U.S. SEALs 2.
Inmate: “Heh, heh… busy with your boyfriend.”
Finley: “Forgive him, Lord, for he knows not what he speaks. [dramatic pause] Such sins are committed by fornicators, sugar mama.”
I’m fairly sure part of my brain melted and leaked out of my ears the first time I heard that. I want that engraved on my gravestone – Here lies a fornicator, sugar mama. (Actually, I want the entire script of this movie on my gravestone like one of those Bee Movie script t-shirts. People will come to weep and pay respects and confusedly read And then everyone takes out their bitchin’ machine guns and starts shooting at the same time in very tiny letters. Do you think that can be arranged?)
Next scene. As the team of zeroes are dramatically sharpening their knives and muscles in the gym, the Major reveals that he wants in on the operation too because he feels responsible for Dr. Burrows’s safety. Aww. Casey is like “Apologies, but I think you’d be kind of useless in a SEAL mission because I guess I’m a dick now, and I forgot that this team was put together about as carefully as my grandmother’s quilt”, to which the Major proceeds to take out an air gun which shoots freaking pure acid rounds and is like “You sure about that, son?”
Bad. Ass.
And of course, to give our cast of illustrious nobodies some much-needed style, who else should show up but Kamiko – with what else but a katana in her hand. I sense shenanigans… join me next time in ACT 2: FIST FARMING ON COW FART ISLAND to see how things immediately go pear-shaped!
No comments:
Post a Comment