Monday, December 28, 2009

bad/awesome flixxx review: The Octagon (1980)



Merry After Xmas folks... I finally got around to watching this, and it took me 2 sittings to stomach and force myself through it. Chuck Norris, and Lee Van Cleef in: The Octagon.



ok. i bought this @ a Flying J truckstop for 2.99. Somewhere in the middle of the country... i have no idea where, b/c all of those Flying J's, T&A's, Pilots, etc. look the same. But this one had a brand new shipment of these dvd's in the flatcards. Hundreds of them, and hardly any were the same. I only stood there for a second, and most of them looked like shit, but this one's cover stood out. How tuff does that look, right?? WRONG!!
For all intents and purposes, i think this movie is supposed to be about a training camp for terrorists run by a bunch of ninjas (who aren't supposed to exist anymore) and simultaneously led by Chuck's estranged half-brother. Ok. well, it starts off good enough, with a mansion and a car pulling out, and 2 chicks with a runaway baby carriage, when the driver jumps out to see if the baby is hurt, the chicks pull out machine guns and fucking slaughter the driver and the dude who he was driving. And they used a shit load of blood packets, so you'd think these dudes were important too, but nope, they hardly mention them again except that they were victims of a terror attack. So, next scene, we're @ some banquet for some chick, and there's our hero, and his buddy, no explanation why they are there. Norris wants the chick, at the afterparty, he says 2 words to her, then BANG! she's off for drinks with him. Ok, so only later to you get some kind of idea that there's a karate convention in town, no idea why this chick was singing at it, AND you never see any of the karate matches. I still have no idea if im right about that. They vaguely mention it, b/c everyone is hounding Chuck about not fighting b/c he "accidently" hurt someone years ago. Anyway, i forgot to mention that Chuck is a schizofrenic in this one too. Every five minutes he keeps hearing voices with an annoying double layered Echoplex that is like him arguing with himself & explaining (poorly) whether he should fight or not. So back to the "story". That chick is killed in 5 minutes (by ninja). A huge gang of rednecks are trucked out into the desert to train in the ninja style. One badass ninja keeps beating the shit out of the rednecks to "teach" them. Lee Van Cleef tries to convince Chuck to avenge the chicks death. He says no. Some old chick breaks down, and Chuck tries to help her. Then she splits leaving him stranded. He has her card so he shows up at her house. He smells a rat. He calls her bluff. She wants the ninjas killed but she's shady. The buddy falls for her, and is jealous of Chuck. He thinks Chuck is a pussy and goes after the ninja himself. Chuck tries to infiltrate the ninja school. They know who he is. He whoops some ass. A 3rd love interest redneck chick defects from the Ninja (somehow). She tells chuck she wants to help him. She takes her shirt off. He bangs her. Ninjas break in. Its taking him WAAAAY to long to "convince himself in his head that he can believe himself" that his brother Sekurya is training terrorists. Then the old chick is murdered. Then FINALLY, chuck and the 3rd chick fly to japan or wherever, and chuck goes to avenge all the chicks deaths, find his buddy and stop his brother. The last 15 minutes of the movie are all you need to watch. As a matter of fact, 99% of the trailer comes from the last 5 minutes of the flick! Then you finally get to see some explosions and whatever. It really wasnt worth it. You'll never get your time back from this one, but in its defense, i did watch this completely sober. Im sure it may have been a bit better stoned. maybe. have a great new year yall!

1 comment:

  1. seems to be the same with the majority of chuck norris films, poorly scripted, poor acting, making little sense, 90% of the film has people saying how insane chuck is at fighting, but he doesn't till the end. you seen the one where he fights the turbo-nazi that he eventually throws down a well...?

    GKFennell

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