Pentathlon (1994)

The Worst Film Ever

Don't listen to the negative reviews

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Pentathlon tells the story of an olympic athlete who defects to the USA and is hunted by East German Stasi agent (David Soul). Compare film with the German book, "Tod dem Verraeter" (2000) by Heribert Schwan, which tells the TRUE story of olympic athlete, Lutz Eigendorf, who escapes East Germany and is tracked down allegedly by Stasi and murdered. When I watched Pentathlon I could not help but compare it to the book and wonder where the film writers came up with the story???? And by the way, Soul, with a pseudo German accent, is awful in this flick. Wherever the film's plot came from, it could have been an exciting action film. Instead it was dull and plodding.

Pentathlon is not an enjoyable experience, and despite the fact that I dig Dolph as an action hero, I was bored silly during this movie. It's clearly inspired by Rocky, only Rocky didn't have a lack of action, a poor story and horrible dialog to sit through. One of the worst things about this movie is David Soul's performance as the villain. He is WAY too over the top and laughably campy, he ruined much of the experience for me and he didn't mesh well with Dolph at all. As I said I'm a Dolph fan, he's far from a great actor but his charisma and presence is awesome to say the least, so when I found this for 2 dollars at a VHS blowout sale I decided to pick it up. Dolph's rigorous training scenes are impressive and the bantering with Roger E. Mosley as Creese was somewhat fun, but the action is clearly lacking. I'm a film buff, but I enjoy B-movies and low-budget movies as well, I'm very open-minded, but Pentathlon has nothing out of the ordinary and to be honest it was a waste of 2 bucks.Performances. Dolph Lundgren tries really hard, but his accent works against him and some of his dialog is absolutely awful. He has charisma to spare but that can only take him so far. David Soul is laughable as the villain. On more than one occasion I wanted him off my screen for tarnishing the quality, he obviously knows he is in a below average movie and disgustingly tries to camp it up. He's better than this, much better, watch Magnum Force to see what I mean. Roger E. Mosley is fun as Creese, but did test my patience with his act sometimes. Renée Coleman is pretty wooden as the love interest.Bottom line. Definitely one of Dolph's lesser works and not even enjoyable for B-movie value. It's boring and will annoy you to no end. Avoid it.2 1/2 /10

How damned stupid could people be, to constitute Germans like in this movie. The Nazis and all Neonazis (not just in Germany) have nothing in common with the Stasi and the DDR. Its kind of an opposite! Do not watch this movie, it just crap and it tells you just crap. Maby Dolph Lundgren is the best thing in this movie and that means a lot! The story is so thin, you can watch trough it after the five minutes. The whole movie is pure waste of time. It's not even funny, like b-movies. Excepting the Nazi terrorists that come up with a rocket to shoot the German ambassador. By the way, David Drummond has the role of the German guy Hundt. Correctly it's spelled Hund and means dog.

I enjoyed this film. I must admit I only watched it because I am a bit of a David Soul fan. However, it took quite a bit to get used to David Soul in such a different role than the type he played in Starsky & Hutch. Nevertheless, it was quite exciting, and had me trying unsuccessfully to work out what was going to happen. I found the acting quite good. David Soul did a good German accent. It also had Roger E Mosley (TC from Magnum), playing a good role too. I am glad I saw it.