NAVY SEALS (1990)
Reviewed by Jerry Saravia
So imagine a movie where a group of armed soldiers, experienced in infiltrating terrorists, are called in at the most awkward moment - in the middle of a wedding ceremony. Imagine that one of these armed soldiers is played by Charlie Sheen, who is cocky and a real fighting machine. You can also imagine for the time being that he is aping Tom Cruise in "Top Gun" and that his fighting spirit is a result of endless hours of video game playing. In other words, it is a character far removed from the one Sheen played in Oliver Stone's "Platoon."
So this cadre of Navy Seals are after Arab terrorists (who appear as generic as you can imagine, particularly in this post-9/11 climate) who possess an arsenal of Stinger missiles. Sounds timely, doesn't it? Imagine Sheen shooting every target and never missing. Also imagine Dennis Haysbert (who has seen better days since) as the only black SEAL who is killed (I don't mean to ruin it for you). Also imagine Bill Paxton appearing as the sharpshooter, along with Michael Biehn as another SEAL who tries to get inside information from a Lebanese journalist (Joanna Whalley-Kilmer, back when she made horrendous bad movies). Oh, lest we not forget that Paxton and Biehn appeared in the first "Terminator" movie. Just a thought that occurred to me while watching this movie.
The real Navy SEALS were formed in 1962 by President Kennedy and trained to be experts in all kinds of killing -- on sea, air or land. That fact alone should have merited a superior, more thought-provoking action picture than this "Rambo" wannabe. Maybe I am sick of these kinds of movies with explosions and bullets whizzing by in all kinds of point-of-view shots. Maybe it was the golfing montage. Or possibly the moment when Charlie Sheen jumps from a moving jeep on a bridge and lands in the water unscathed. If nothing else, mindless comic-book movies like this give comic-book movies a bad name.
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