McBain (1991)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Good concept, poorly executed.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

I expected worse when I picked this one up for 99p in the local supermarket - cheap effects, awful plot and other things came to mind. Luckily, it wasn't as bad as I thought - the budget must have been considerable, the plot is OK (well, as OK as action flicks can be) and over all it's quite entertaining. Walken has this screen presence which, even in this rather "early" work, just comes over very well. All the locations look well done, and nothing indicates that this movie was done "on the cheap" - not very often that you find something like this in the bargain bin. If you want to add a cheap to buy action flick to your collection, without missing big explosions, then this is for you.

I purchased this film on the cheap in a sale, having read the back of the DVD case and assuming that either way I can't lose, it if was rubbish then no loss, if it was any good then bargain...Then I watched it...I am normally a fan of Christopher Walken, but in this film he commanded very little screen presence, seeming not to do a whole lot, even the death of his friend near the beginning which sparks off the "action" in the plot seems to affect him very little, and his eventual revenge is just boring and undramatic.Normally a film which has themes as grand as revolution and revenge are able to capture the audience and snare them into feeling something for the characters, however watching this film felt more like seeing a series of confused, and almost random events that loosely tied together towards it's eventual conclusion...At this point I wept...I thought this film was the most horribly painful piece of viewing I have ever been subjected to, the scene where the pilot sacrifices himself by refusing to jump out the explosive laden truck due to not wanting to kill any civilians is not so much tragically sad as it is unnervingly horrible and painful, although not quite as bad as the emergency surgery on the wounded girl. The acting was poor all round, the script and story was weak, the "action" was even weaker, and the "visuals" were but bluntly not all that visual. To summarise there are films which are good, films that are bad, films that are so bad they are good, films that are terrible...And then on a whole new level is "McBain"

*SPOILER ALERT* *SPOILER ALERT*I bought this one from Blockbuster for three bucks. The title "McBain" instantly made me think about the McBain character from "The Simpsons". In the various clips they showed on the show, McBain was always trying to take down Latin drug kingpin Mendoza. "MEEEENNNNDDDOOOOOZZAA!!" I was hoping Walken was going to do a Schwarzenegger impersonation while gunning down insane amounts of Colombians. Well, there's no Arnold impersonation but Walken does get the lead out. Of his machine gun that is.This is a ridiculous B-action movie. When you see Walken hanging out in the jungles of Colombia wearing a Hawaiian shirt, you'll be laughing. Walken is asked to come to Colombia to settle some scores. His old army buddy was killed there and Walken decides he owes him a violent revolution. So a handful of guys take on the Colombian army. It's a B-movie war.If you're into insane B-movie body counts and idiotic action scenes, you'll get into this one. If you need more coherence and logic in your action flicks, steer clear.

this is the best action no-brainer since schwarzenegger´s COMMANDO. it´s absolutely pointless, the action scenes are totally insane, walken is bored out of his pants, all in all some heck of a laugh. i especially love the fly-by-shooting scene. cracked me up. everytime i watch this masterpiece it makes me gag. watch it with some friends and a huge supply of beer and you have one hell of a party