Raw Deal (1986)

 "You should not drink and bake."

…Or, indeed, shoot and drive. Please, any drivers reading this: keep your eyes on the road (or quarry). Engaging in a gun battle with the goons of an entire Mafia family can impair your driving concentration, even if, like Mark here, you also come armed with prodigious quantities of plot armour.

I must be close as dammit to having blogged all the '80s Arnie action movies, so here's another one. And it's good, it's fun, like all movies of this ilk. It isn't the greatest action film of all time, but it doesn't have to be. The action set pieces are great. Sam Wanamaker is also great as a Chicago Mafia boss, and Robert Davi is exceptionally good, as ever, as Max. But Arnie, in his first real role with lots of proper dialogue, just oozes so much charisma.

The film really showcases Chicago as a city, too, as all the suspense and action takes place. Admittedly the final scene is very Saturday morning cartoon, and the film nicely reminds us that two bottles of champagne in one sitting is perhaps not great for one's sex life. But then, of course, the plot mustn't allow Mark to sleep with the rather lovely Monique, lest he commit adultery with his rather unpleasant, cake throwing wife.

Still, the flaws of this film are all partr of the fun. Highly recommended if you just want to switch off your brain and watch some '80s action with car chases and shooting galore.

Captain America (1990)

“This time we’ll have it made in Japan.”

Let's make no bones about this film, before I start to ironically praise it: there's no question that it's shite.

Its sins are many. Yes, films often change the mythology from the comics, but making the Red Skull Italian and not particularly Nazi means you haven't really got the |Red Skull... and then they remove the actual, er, red skull bit of him for the present day sequences. Matt Salinger has zero charisma or talent, and spends the first half of the film running away or being nervous. It's all plot with no characterisation- we're given  no reason to like these characters.

Comparing this with the 2011 MCU film would be a  cheap shot but, well, why not show us Steve in 1943 (why this pointless change?), telling a mate how desperate he is to serve his country, rather than having random characters blatantly exposit? Why not show Steve and Bernie as a couple before their embarrassingly awkward parting? Let's not pretend this film is at all adequate.

And yet... this film is by an offshoot of Cannon (it's complicated), by the same director as Cyborg, and has a perverse B movie charm, amusingly of its time in so many way. It's bad, of course, but entertainingly so. The Italian locations are pointless but beautiful. So yes, this film is rubbish, but perhaps more enjoyably so than its execrable reputation may imply.