Bullet Points: Strike Force

If the name of your movie is the same as one of my all-time favorite wrestling tag teams, chances are strong I will at some point watch your movie. And that was most definitely the case with Strike Force.

•  The Premise: William Forsythe plays Simon, a former agent from a fictitious government agency, who leads a team of mercenaries that specialize in recovering missing people. For some reason they refer to themselves as The Librarians. I guess collecting over due books is an analogy for finding missing people?! Simon’s motivation to do this is because his wife and daughter were abducted and he wants to save others from the same horror he had to face. The movie’s alternate title is The Librarians, but my guess is not too many action fans would have clamored to check that one out, so instead they named it after Rick Martel and Tito Santana.

• All-Star Cast: The most impressive thing about Strike Force is the all-star cast that was assembled. As I already mentioned there’s William Forsythe from The Rock and The Substitute as Simon, the lead Librarian. Daniel Bernhardt of the Bloodsport sequels plays one of The Librarians. Andrew Divoff from Toy Soldiers and Extreme Justice plays Marcos, the main bad guy. Matthias Hues from Kickboxer 2: The Road Back and I Come In Peace is Marcos’ muscle. Erika Eleniak from Baywatch and Under Siege fame is Marcos’ lady. But wait there’s more!!! Ed Lauter from Death Wish 3 and Raw Deal plays Simon’s former boss from “the agency” who calls in The Librarians to help out a mutual friend, William Clark. Clark’s grand daughter went missing in Miami. Oh and did I mention that Clark is played by Michael Parks of Death Wish V and Kill Bill fame. Burt Reynolds of Malone and Sharky’s Machine fame has a small role as an informant for Simon. And just because they didn’t hit their salary cap yet, they go get Christopher Atkins out of the Blue Lagoon and make him one of Marcos’ stooges.

• The Action: This one is not wall to wall action, but there is a good mix of story and action. We get a fight scene between Daniel Bernhardt and Matthias Hues. I want to commend this movie for getting the most out of Bernhardt. I was not impressed with his work in Bloodsport 4, where he had to carry the movie. But here, as a member of the team he did well. They were able to work in his fighting abilities and it really maximized what minutes he did have on the screen. The finale of the film is pretty action packed with a shoot out, some fisticuffs and my favorite, a boat that jumps onto the dock! I did not see that coming.

Had this movie featured a bunch of unknown, inexperienced actors it likely would have been a disaster. But given the all-star cast and their wealth of experience, Strike Force is actually pretty enjoyable. For those of you with Amazon Prime, this one is currently streaming there.

Now for a few more Strike Force Bullet Points…

• Abuse of Power: The only way I’d believe that William Forsythe could nail Erika Eleniak (even past her prime Erika) is if he wrote the scene that way. And in fact, Forsythe does receive a writing credit for this movie.
• Hallmark Moment: While Forsythe may have the ability to co-write an action movie, he is probably not going to get hired by Hallmark anytime soon based on this quote from the movie, “Gather up your sh*t. Merry Christmas and get the f*ck out of my house!”.
• Not To Be Out Done: While the forces of good in this film are known as The Librarians, the bad guys wanted to have an even less imposing name… they refer to themselves as The Techno Boys.