Bullet Points: Trained to Kill (1989)
It sometimes amazes me how easy it is to find a movie. I can remember searching through all of my local rental shops back in the day and watching any action movie I could get my hands on. Believe it or not, though, those small town VHS shops didn’t always have the lesser-known gems that I find myself enjoying now. Luckily, YouTube and the internet has corrected many of those issues by giving me a nearly limitless amount of movies to watch. Let’s see if 1989’s Trained to Kill is one that deserves to be sought out.
Synopsis: After a retired US army man is murdered by a crime lord, his two sons, one of them adopted after the old man rescued him from Cambodia during the Vietnam war, train hard and then start looking for the criminal to avenge their father.
- Escape from Cambodia: The film starts out in the Southeast Asian country of Cambodia. It’s there that young Sam is being whisked away to the U S of A to live with his new white daddy. For some reason, the village that Sam lives in is being attacked at the very same time that he’s being choppered out. Can you believe the luck?
- A Face Even a Mother Might Not Love: Veteran B-movie actors Robert Z’Dar, Henry Silva, and Marshall R. Teague join the cast as a few of the nefarious fellows looking to kill the great Ed Cooper. You see, Cooper was in charge of many of these goons while they were in Vietnam and ended up turning them over to the authorities when he found out they were running heroin on the side. You can imagine why Z’Dar and the rest aren’t so keen on Cooper.
- Let’s Have Some Fun: Major Ace Duran (Henry Silva) and his crew of bad guys sure know how to enjoy themselves. He and his buddy Loc Syn (Harold Diamond) break Z’Dar and Teague out of the slammer and get to planning a combination murder/theft of the Cooper family. Duran and the men hang out at strip clubs cleaning their guns, gamble high sums of money, give loads of high fives, and generally have one hell of a time while being totally bad dudes.
- The Cooper Clan: There just isn’t much of a chance for the Cooper Family at this point. If you really believed that Papa Cooper was going to make it through the first act then you’re watching the wrong genre.
- Revenge is the Ultimate Bonding Experience: Fans of Frank Zagarino (assuming they exist) will be pleased that their boy gets to be one of the two men who are “trained to kill”. You would have to be crazy to say that Matt Cooper and Sam are “trained” as they mostly just wander around looking for the guys who killed their family. It does, however, give our two main heroes a chance to bond over their shared interest in killing some people. George (played by Ron O’Neal) attempts to train them since he knows all the bad guys from his time working with Mr. Cooper in Vietnam but he’s really not much help. We all know what they really need…
- We’re Gonna Need One Hell of a Montage: Even if you aren’t impressed with the acting, writing, or choreography of the film you would have to be a complete fool to not appreciate this epic training montage. It pretty much has everything; beach runs, high fives, slow motion hugs, push up competitions, and make out sessions.
- Double Dragon?: The brothers have really come a long way in the two weeks that they’ve known about one another. The matching dirt bikes seemed a bit 80’s until I inspected the amazing clothing choices made by these two. They must be seen to be appreciated.
- Elaborate Plans and How to Fail at Them: By the time that Matt and Sam catch up to the bad guys they already have the lovely Jessie (played by the crazy hot Lisa Aliff) attached to a massive contraption that looks like it was built to drive a monster truck through in some Podunk county fair. It’s easy for me to site here and say that they should have just killed her when they had the chance…but they totally should have killed her when they had the chance.
- This is the End: Frank Zagarino’s aim with a rifle is on point! I don’t know if his Dad taught him how to shoot before his untimely demise but Matt Cooper is on some next level Tom Berenger Sniper shit! The finale also dips into the Double Dragon-esque waters of having the two brothers double team the psychotic Loc Syn which turns out to be one of the better fights of the movie. It shouldn’t surprise you that they do, indeed, save Jessie from the giant Universal Studios attraction. The movie is just about to end on an awesome note when all of a sudden someone hands Jessie a bazooka and the film turns it up to 11.
The Verdict: Movies like this tend to have a long life because fans like myself enjoy them more than they probably deserve. There isn’t anything great in the movie and one could argue that no one thing is that good but it all seems to work out to being an incredibly entertaining film. Zagarino and Glen Eaton work well as a duo without any real chemistry between them. The action scenes never have that one “Oh Shit!” moment but they’re all perfectly acceptable. What really pushes this movie out of the mediocre range is the work by the villains. Henry Silva, Harold Diamond, Robert Z’Dar, and Marshall R. Teague are totally evil and improve every scene they’re in by simply being bad. Fans of the good old days of exploding helicopters and excessive montages should definitely give Trained to Kill a look on some lonely Sunday.
