 | Captain America (1990) Director's Cut arrives on DVD and Blu-ray |
Back in the day, this film was heavily promoted by Marvel Comics as their next big thing before it mysteriously disappeared only to finally surface as a notoriously panned direct to home video release. It was strange to see what promised to be Marvel's answer to Tim Burton's Batman fall off the face of the planet so quietly that many educated comic book fans have no idea it ever existed in the first place.
I revisited the film last January...
The film painstakingly tells the origin story of Steve Rogers, a 'weak polio-ridden boy' transformed into a powerful super soldier, determined to win the war against the Nazis. The level of detail that the filmmakers go to is rather admirable in the first thirty minutes, then I found myself checking my wristwatch. This was all back story, where was the Captain America movie? When we finally get Captain America in all his glory, he is the secret weapon dropped behind enemy lines to stop the launching of an ICBM aimed at the White House. Rogers debuts as the brilliantly colored Captain America and is humbled by the Red Skull in their first encounter. After declaring them 'brothers,' the Red Skull defeats Cap and straps him to the very rocket that will destroy the seat of Western power. Captain America manages to take the Red Skull's hand with him and somehow divert the path of the rocket so that it misses the White House and instead crashes in the arctic. During his brief journey he is glimpses by a young boy who captures an image on his camera. He shares it with his good buddy Sam who is obsessed with comic books and they agree that they have come close to something fantastic and wonderful that no one else would ever believe.
Years later, the young boy has become President of the US and his buddy a conspiracy obsesses reporter. As the leader of the free world, President Kimball (played by the evil Ronnie Cox of Robocop fame) is perhaps the most violently left-leaning politician to ever achieve such a position. He has made enemies of big business and the military alike. In particular, General Fleming sees him as a problem that must be dealt with permanently, so he meets with the Red Skull with whom he and several other world leaders have sculpted the modern political world into what it is. We learn that the assassinations of Robert and John Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. were all the work of the Red Skull, collaborating with a shadowy and sinister cabal of evil leaders of men. Rather than kill the President, the Red Skull instead abducts him with plans to turn him to their plans. After all, the previous assassinations resulted in creating martyrs rather than stifling the troublesome voices of progress.
While the bad guys plot, Captain America is discovered frozen in a block of ice. Defrosted, he finds his way to Canada. Making the papers thanks to yet another quickly taken photograph, the President discovers that the mystery man he caught on film is actually real. Discovering that his old foe has returned, the Red Skull becomes obsessed with Captain America's destruction and sends his best young hot killers to get the job done. President Kimball calls Sam (played by actor Ned Beatty of Superman and Deliverance) who rushes to intercept Rogers who comes under attack from a pair of sexy Italian motorcycling assassins.
No kidding.
After an awkward action sequence, he is taken in by Sam who tries to bring Cap up to speed and find out what the star-spangled patriot knows about the Red Skull (whom Sam is convinced lies at the center of ALL the worlds problems… and he's right). Noticing that all of the objects in Sam's possession are of German or Japanese creation, he rejects anything that he has been told and becomes convinced that Sam is a spy for the Axis Powers. Taking control of Sam's truck, he tries to find his hometown and get back in touch with his teenage love, Bernie.
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On the whole, the movie has its heart in the right place. It captures the character of Captain America rather well. However, there are vast portions of film where nothing of note happens aside from incidental 'all American' music piping through as we watch Steve Rogers revisit his old haunts or just go site-seeing in Italy with his old girlfriend's daughter. I have to ask, what was the obsession with Italy in the first place? It almost seems that the film is saying that it was the home of the Nazi empire rather than Germany. It does look very beautiful and it is shot very well, but… it's just odd is all. Someone, somewhere, made the call that if you are going to film a Captain America movie, it has to showcase Italy.
The lack of any real similarities to the comic book are rather jarring. Aside from the two confrontations with the Red Skull, we don't really see Steve Rogers in uniform throughout the movie. After actually seeing him in costume, I understand why, but still it is a glaring problem and hints at the underlying flaw in the whole affair, a lack of faith in what it was doing. Also, why was the Red Skull Italian rather than German? If it was to avoid offending Germans it must have been a real knee to the groin for Italians as it is the broadest stereotype of an entire nationality I have ever seen since Mario and Luigi searched for coins in the sewer.
(Read the full review here)
Thanks to a certain Summer movie starring the First Avenger, the 1990 version is getting the four star treatment... very strangely. The film certainly had good intentions, but can't really be praised for much of a celebration. Nevertheless, opportunity waits for no one.
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. (MGM), which was forced to file a Chapter 11 petition in U.S. Bankruptcy Court last year because of its staggering $5 billion debt, is apparently willing to capitalize on any opportunity to make a buck. Case in point: MGM is releasing director Albert Pyun's cheesed-out 1990 Captain America adaptation on DVD three days before Captain America: The First Avenger opens in theaters. To get you hyped to buy it, MGM has even put together a new, longer trailer that highlights all of the reasons why you probably never saw this movie in the first place (terrible dialogue, bad lighting, cheap sets, rubber ears on Cap's mask — that's right, rubber ears).
During World War II, a brave American soldier (Matt Salinger) volunteers to undergo experiments to become a new super-soldier, codenamed "Captain America." Infiltrating Germany to sabotage Nazi rockets pointed at the U.S., Captain America faces off with Nazi superhuman warrior Red Skull (Scott Paulin, The Right Stuff) who defeats the hero, throwing him into suspended animation. Frozen for 50 years, Captain America is found and revived only to find that Red Skull has changed identities and has targeted the President of the United States (Ronny Cox, RoboCop) for assassination. With America on the verge of utter chaos, it is up to one man to save the day!
(Via ReelzChannel)
Trailer
watch?v=DbQdVAowqAk
Now if only the Reb Brown films could get some kind of special edition release we could all be happy, right?
Reb Brown as Captain America
Captain America (1944)
Captain America Vs. The Red Skull (Grantray)
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