“There ain’t gonna be no rematch.”
— Apollo Creed, telling you there won’t be a “Philippine War Week III”

Thank god. The last and final, ever, Philippine war flick reviewed on this site (well, sans the idiotic Commando Invasion snafu that led us to review it, twice, this week). We started this nonsense four months back, with our first week of reviews during the first week of August. Our reviews of 40-plus film — with plenty of links and mentions of so many others — will get you were you need to be, that is if you must watch every single Sylvester Stallone-to-Arnold Schwarzenegger-to-Chuck Norris ’80s war rip ever made in the lands northwest of Down Under.

In one of Jun Gallardo earliest rips, he shanghais Richard Harrison (we explore his career by way of his Neapolitan-cum-North African passion project, Three Men on Fire) in a tale about ragtag group of not A-Team lads led by Richard Harrison into the Cambodian jungle.

The roles of the good guys and bad guys are divided up among the familiar names and faces of, well, everyone that’s on that VHS sleeve. Yes! Romano Kristoff (Raiders of the Magic Ivory) is here as well? Hey, Mike Monty, you’re back . . . oh, not for long? What flick did your scene get cut-in from, I wonder? If you’re keeping track: Anthony Alonzo was in W Is War and Mad Warrior. Vic Vargas? IMDb him: he’s got over 300 credits to pick at (Daughters of Satan is one of them). Remember the Robert Clouse (Golden Needles) mess that is Gymkata starring Kurt Thomas? Well, Tetchie Agbayani — who’s done a few of these Asian war romps and is a much more serious, accomplished actress, one with over 100 credits, as well as Asian television series — not only stars in Gymkata: she “invented” the martial art-gymnastics hybrid used in the film; something to that effect.

As you can see, I am going to rant and make this Namsploitation’er sound way better than it is.

Harrison — with a ‘stache that’ll scare the shite out of Tom Selleck (who got his start in Daughters of Satan) — is an ex-Special Forces ops who makes his scratch as a mercenary for hire who leads a ragtag group of U.S and Southeast Asian guerrilla freedom fighters into Cambodia. Harrison’s claim to fame: he’s the only one that comes back alive from his missions. Lovely. In steps Tetchie, our hot guide — the only one who knows the terrain — because you need a sex-love interest between the showers of blank n’ squibs. All the racist cliches are then thou unleashed: the Italians are oversexed nut bags (Romano Kristoff), the Asians are all yellow-troped to the extreme, and the African Americans (actor Jim Gaines, in this case) make Sgt. Lincoln Osiris positively subdued.

This is a movie that, before we get to the no-plot-and-just-explosions part of the picture, our newly formed force of no-Rambos hangs out at a disco-strip joint (lifted from another Harrison war opus, Fireback by fellow Sliver Star alum, Teddy Page; we did that on Friday; we are writing ahead, here) and bowling alleys to pad the running time until they find that “secret” document that started this mess.

Wow. Poor Richard Harrison. He made ONE ninja movie for Godfrey Ho, then, by way of splicing, ended up “starring” in a dozen more films — and had his career ruined because everyone thought he was down-and-out and on the drunken skids to a grave in Manila. He was anything but, as he was putting together his grand opus, Three Men on Fire.

Just damn you to Charlton Heston ape hell, K.Y Kim, you cheap bastard. Curse your Silver Star Studios for torturing me and Sam the Bossman these past five months in dealing with faux-Nam joints. But oh, my crazy celluloid uncles of Cirio Santiago, Teddy Page, and Jun Gallardo: your Z-grade rips of Clint Eastwood’s The Dirty Dozen to Sly Stallone’s Rambo: First Blood II made my VHS home video days of youth all the much sweeter.

And as we add another oxtail to the Kare-Kare: Anthony Alonzo previously appeared in another Pearl of the Orient warsploitationer, Wild Cats Attack. But you’ll notice Tony’s name isn’t on the video sleeve (seen below). So what’s the stewed mechado all about, my kaibigan? Well, in the grand tradition of all things Manila-doubling-as-Vietnam-and-Central America and actors starring-by-proxy: Wild Cats Attack clips all of its war footage from Task Force Alamid (1982), which aka’d as The Red Barrets — which should only have one “r” in the title, but it’s Philippines cinema, don’t cha know? But Wild Cats Attack, to keep that wheel of title confusion, spinning, also aka’d as Special Forces U.S.A. “Ahiiiiyaaaah! Make it stop!”

Now you, our fellow Philiploitation fetishist may disagree on that Wild Cats Attack titling snafu, but let’s not forget that Tony starred in Diegong Bayong (1984), which was recut into a post-Oliver Stone world as Platoon the Warriors (1987). Hey, if starring-by-proxy is okay for an expatriated Richard Harrison and Gordon Mitchell, then it’s good enough for our native son, Anthony Alonzo. Oh, did you know Alonzo won an award for “Best Actor” in the Filipino Academy of Movie Arts & Sciences for Willie Milan’s Bambang (1982)? True story. No, sorry, that’s a Death Wish–Lethal Weapon-styled story about Manila street gang wars and not a ‘Nam flick, so you’re on your own with that one.

Okay, let’s get back to Invasion Cambodia . . . er, uh . . . there’s nothing else to tell . . . except that there’s no trailer to share. But you can pick through the full film on You Tube and see if you want make a 90-minute go of it.

Well, that’s it! Thanks for playing along with our two “Philippine War Week” blow outs. See yahs for the next “theme week” at B&S About Movies. As for our “Philippine War Week” theme weeks: click the hyperlink to populate all 48 reviews in one easy-to-scroll list. You can learn about the genre with an in-depth interview with Godfrey Ho at Nanarland.com.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Well, it had to end sometime. Two weeks (the last one was during the first week of August) and 48 films. Sure, there’s oh so much more Vietnam war raging in the South Pacific — and just as many jungle-based sci-fi off-shoots, such as Reb Brown starring in Bruno Mattei’s Robowar. But we just can’t, anymore. From here on out, you’re on your own to discover the rest of the Sylvester Stallone-to-Arnold Schwarzenegger-to-Chuck Norris ’80s war rips. And lets not forget the ones with Ron Marchini and Michael Dudikoff.

Okay, so right off the bamboo shoot: we want to know who wrote this logline: “Superb action set during the Vietnam War. The prologue shows a French army convoy being ambushed by the Vietcong in 1950.”

What’s wrong with this logline: the use of the word “superb” in a Jim Goldman, aka Jun Gallardo movie.

Okay, so there’s second unit and Assistant AD Rod Davis, aka Davies, aka we’ve never been able to track down if he’s an actual American expatriate or a South Asian doing the Americanization waltz on the lens as well as working the Brother typewriter. Paul Vance, aka Paul Van, however, is a real American who — as with our “star,” here, Gordon Mitchell — never “made it” in the U.S. film industry, but Vance forged a nice career northwest of Down Under with an acting resume of 20 films (starting with W Is War in 1983 and ending with Jungle Rats in 1988). We also have to mentioned that, in addition to co-writing Commando Invasion, Rod Davis also gave us this week’s Slash Exterminator (go back to Monday at 12 noon, folks; were writing ahead, here), and the we-love-it-so-much SFX Retaliator, among his five Filipino writing credits.

Then there’s our real “star,” the lead of these proceedings: American expatiate Micheal James, who was in eight of these jungle romps, including Mad Dog II and Rescue Team (both 1985; yep, reviewed this week and we’re writing ahead, so use that “search box”) for our Jim Goldman, and Searchers Of The Voodoo Mountain, aka Warriors of the Apocalyspe (1985), for Bobby A. Suarez. Michael James actually made a decent war film alongside David Carradine, Mako, and Steve James (a frequent Micheal Dudikoff sideman) in P.O.W: The Escape (1986). (I know: how “decent” is a down-and-out David Carradine Chuck Norris-wannabe knockoff?)

Okay, so since we already went deep with Gordon Mitchell — as well as with his frequent acting partner, Richard Harrison (I wish he was here; he’s not) — in our review of their joint, Neapolitan effort, on Three Men on Fire, let’s blow this one up!

Ol’ Gordo is good-to-bad guy General MacMoreland (he’s barely here and probably from another film, entirely) with Paul Vance picking up a co-starring credit as Lt. Frank Terryl, and Ken Wantanbe — from the 1985 martial arts classic Nine Deaths of the Ninja and the writer behind that same year’s Ron Marchini-starrer, Ninja Warriors! — as our evil General Diap. Hey, there’s Jim Gaines — who blew out 60-plus of these films since 1974, but we remember him best as Reb Brown’s sidekick Sonny “Blood” Peel in the previously mentioned Robowar — as Lt. Frank’s sidekick, Sgt. Morgan. Everyone else: they are somebodies that we think are nobodies because they all have bogus, “Americanized” names like “John Crocker,” “David Scott,” and “Bobby Clinton.” As is par for the Filipino jungle course: not only are the actors, stock (defacto “starring” in some cases as result of their cut-in from other pictures): all that sfx-slaughtering war footage is stocked as well.

So, not only is the U.S. in the jungle, so are the French, whose 1950-era army convoy rife with millions in art and diamonds is ambushed. The booty is stolen.

Meanwhile, 15 years later: We have an American commando unit doing what they do best: kill Asian commies as they track down that booty to VC General Diap’s (Watanabe) underground bunker. The men turn on Captain Brady, the head of the unit who — not again, how many of these flick have this subplot: he makes his scratch stealing diamonds from the locals. Why? Well, we weren’t there to stop Communism. We are there for the diamonds. Brady’s men plan to kill him and take the loot — then Diap and his men show up and killing them all. The exaction unit finally arrives and finds ol’ Cap Brady alive: with a gaggle of dead bodies around him and a fistful of sparkly rocks.

To stop his court martial, Brady is allow to return to “Vietnam” for five days track to down Diap, bring him to justice, and save his own skin in the process. In the jungle, Brady soon realizes U.S. General MacMoreland is in kahoots with Diap, that’s he’s been double and tripled-crossed, and the French military is on his tail to retrieve the stolen loot. And I swear I’ve seen this same plot in another movie we’ve reviewed during these two weeks?

Flash forward four months later . . .

Shite! I did. I just watched the same movie, twice — months part — I just reviewed Commando Invasion, again (it posed back on Monday). Oh, Dear Lord. Okay, well, let me go watch and review the film that I meant to review: Jun Gallardo’s Invasion Cambodia. Oh, man. I can’t. But I have to. Ugh! Just . . . one . . . more. I can do it! You just gotta believe!

See what I mean? Arrrrrgh! NO MORE PHILIPPINE WAR FLICKS! I’m losing my mind. The celluloid coffers are closed. Find the rest on your own. And watch this one on You Tube.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Richard Young. Only 50 credits to his resume, but what a bunch of films: Night Call Nurses (1972), Inferno in Paradise (1974), Cocaine Cowboys (1979), High Risk (1981), The Ice Pirates (1984), Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985) — and don’t forget Saigon Commandos (1988), which, you guess it, pinches footage off the earlier Final Mission, courtesy of its acting common denominator, like any good Phillipines-backed namsploitation movie should. And if you know your Philippines warsploitation ’80s like we know you do: you know that Final Mission pinched from another war flick, somewhere in the Laos backwaters of it’s-not-Vietnam-it’s-the-Philippines. For it’s the Cirio way, baby!

And guess who’s the director behind Saigon Commandos? Surprise! Not Cirio H. Santaigo. Or Godfrey Ho. Or Jun Gallardo. Or Teddy Page. Nope. It’s Clark Henderson, who made his bones with the Corman House of Waste-Not-Want-Not in the production cues for Forbidden World, Android, and Wheels of Fire.

Oops. Getting excited over Philippine war flicks and digressing, again.

So, Uncle Cirio is a back with another Deacon-named character (not forgetting we had a Deacon Porter in The Devastator* and that later film is actually a script retread of Final Mission). This “Deacon” is Vince Deacon (Richard Young). This time, our ex-vet is not a wayward vet of the John Rambo variety. This Deacon has got his shit together and turned his Vietnam War decorations into a gig as a Los Angeles P.D. SWAT commander. But instead of countryside pot farmers with blood on their hands, with lots of blowin’ up and bullets in the woods, we’re in the big city.

So, when a gang attacks his family and Deacon kills one of the thugs in self-defense, the law coddles the criminal, natch, and our Deacon is suspended by the force. So his family heads out to the woods for a get-away-from-it-all camping trip . . . shite, we are back in the woods, after all. Oh, well.

Well, you guessed it: that attack was a hit — that failed — and now the thugs are back to finish the job. And who’s the chief thug? Deacon’s old, slighted ex-war buddy, Slater. Will the town sheriff help? Nope, he’d be Slater’s brother, you neophyte Philippine warmonger, get with the plot twists of these flicks, will ya? So, think of a happier, gentler, socially well-adjusted Rambo with a wife and kids and a job and having to protect them. So goes this “final mission” where the ultimate mission is projecting your family.

Oh, shit. Plot twist. His wife and son are dead. Uh, oh.

Anyway, in the spirit of keepin’ the “Rambo” a-go-go’in the woods: we have a Col. Trautman — only his name is Col. Cain — called in to talk some sense into his ex-soldier.

Right, Col. Cain. Just bring in the body bags. And don’t forget the “Aiahhh-yeeee” rail kills, but since we aren’t on a ship or inside an old factory and are in the woods: tree, cliff, and mountain kills. Oh, and flashbacks to ‘Nam . . . because Cirio’s heroes must always have a flashback because, well, how else can we reuse all of that old ‘Nam-shot-Philippines war footage. Of course, since we are in the California woods, again, don’t be surprised when that wooded battle footage returns in The Devastator two years later.

Dude, I don’t care. Xerox, copy, soldier, spy. I love this movie. One of Cirio’s ripped-off best as he tinkers with the Rambo Steenbecks, once again.

As you can see from the ’80s VHS sleeve, this had great direct-to-video distribution in the States and spun on HBO back in the day, so it’s not hard to find on disc. Ah, but we got you covered with the freebie on You Tube. Sample the trailer . . . if one minute of it doesn’t grab you, nothing will.

* Yeah, we reviewed it . . . and we are writing ahead, here. You gotta work it for, aking kaibigan. Right click that mouse and use the search box.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

Ol’ Uncle Cirio, he of the one hundred directing credits beginning in 1955 and ending in 2014. Hey, wait a minute . . . we lost Cirio H. Santiago in 2008. As it turns out: Cirio’s final film was Bloodfist 2050 (2005) — the ninth film in the Bloodfist series, if you’re keeping track of such things. Water Wars began shooting prior to Cirio’s death, but his then ill health resulted in his stepping down from the production. Roger Corman flew in (the great) Jim Wynorski to complete the film, which was released in 2014.

Ah, but this is our second “Philippines War Week” tribute (did you play with us back in August) and as much as Uncle Cirio loved to rehash Mad Max’s road warrior’in over and over again (Stryker, Wheels of Fire, Dune Warriors, and Raiders of the Sun — all of which were edited into Water Wars, natch), the king of Philippines junk cinema loved making copies of Rambo (Eye of the Eagle, Final Mission, Kill Zone, Firehawk*, Nam Angels — and don’t be surprised if you see those film each interchanging their footage into each other — and here).

For The Devastator, Roger Corman loosened the purse strings and allowed Cirio to shoot outside of the Philippines in Los Angeles. Also known as Kings Ransom and Force Commando, as well as The Destructors and The Destroyers in other quarters, ex-Canadian Football League running back Rick Hill (Deathstalker, Wheels of Fire) and director Katt Shea (Stripped to Kill, Poison Ivy, The Rage: Carrie 2; she also scripted The Patriot and starred in Barbarian Queen) co-star in this warsploitation tale about Deacon Porter, an ex-Special Forces officer out to avenge the death of his old commanding officer.

When Porter arrives in the small town of Kings Ransom, he discovers his commander died at the hands of marijuana farmers who control the town. To that end, he reunites his old squad — of Santiago stock players (so footage can be pinched from other films with some sense of continuity) with Bill McLaughlin (Silk), Terrence O’Hara (Naked Vengeance), and Jack S. Daniels (Wheels of Fire). Katt O’Shea is the local gas station grease monkey, aka the hot ‘n’ ass kickin’ local tomboy, that takes up their cause.

Now, if you know your Cirio like we hope you do, you’ll say, “Hey, this sure feels a lot like Final Mission* from 1984?” Have you not been following along? Did you not hang out with us during our first “Philippines War Week”? Have you not watched Cirio’s post-apoc movies at all? Of course it is — and does — as it’s all about the recycling.

But it doesn’t matter. The scripts may be been-there-done-that dopey, rife with dumb characters spewing bad dialog who talk a little bit too much and slow down the action, but when the action hits — as with any Cirio flick, even when recycled — you get your monies worth.

So, if you need a film with a faux-Rambo cuttin’ loose in the woods of North California taking down pot growers in a rejected First Blood sequel, this is the film to see. And, you’ll notice — if you know your Cirio like we hope you do — he never, ever lets those three-wheeled apoc trikes go to waste. Oh, and Corman never lets the stock footage destruction of the likes Avalanche go to waste, either. Or wherever that dam footage came from. For you know Cirio didn’t shoot that for the film.

MGM/UA picked up a bunch of Corman’s Concorde stuff, which includes a lot of the Cirio H. Santiago canons, so this one is easy to find on disc. But, you know us: we found you a freebie on You Tube. You can also sample the trailer.

* One, if not all, of those films will be reviewed this week. We think. We’ve lost track at this point as all of the movies are bleeding into one, never-ending nightmare. So use the search box, you tamad anák sa labás.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.

If you joined us for our “Philippine War Week I” and made it though this second and final week, you know the production drill of these films. Nick Nicholson, Steve Rogers, Jim Moss, Mike Monty and Vic Dias all “star” here — and with the added incentive of Robert Patrick, yes that one: the T-1000 one.

Everyone has to start somewhere and Patrick debuts, here, as Cpl. Johnny Ransom for this Cirio H. Santiago faux-Stallone romp. Patrick also starred for Cirio in the Max Mad rip, Equalizer 2000. Then Patrick became a defacto “star” in The Raiders of the Lost Ark rip, Future Hunters — by way of Cirio cutting in footage from Equalizer 2000. Or that may be the other way around: Patrick ended up in Equalizer 2000 by of way hunks of his Future Hunter work being cut in. You know how it goes in the Philippine editing suites of Silver Star Productions.

It’s been critiqued that Cirio’s Killer Instinct (1989), aka Behind Enemy Lines, which also stars Patrick, is a sequel to Eye of the Eagle; it’s not: the only throughline is that Patrick’s character is also named Johnny Ransom — and for no particular reason. But all of the war footage certainly looks the same, because it is — and is par for the course when it comes to the recycling war coffers of the Philippine Rambo Consortium.

Adding to the confusion: Eye of the Eagle is also known as The Lost Command. And Battlefield Vietnam. And Killer Instinct, aka Behind Enemy Lines, is also known as Eye of the Eagle 2: Inside the Enemy, and as Killed in Action (instead of Missing in Action IV to evoke a little Chuck Norris). And Last Stand at Lang Mei (1989) — which has nothing to do with the other two films, outside of Cirio H. Santiago directing them — is known as Eye of the Eagle III.

We give up. Is one a sequel to the other? We really don’t care.

Patrick also starred in another 1987 film, Warlords from Hell, that is believed to be another Cirio cut n’ paste joint: it’s not. That’s actually a trashy action flick about American bikers taking on a Mexican drug cartel that shot in the U.S. and was directed by Clark Henderson; he’s known for his behind-the-scenes production work on Roger Corman’s Forbidden World and Space Raiders, Cirio’s Wheels of Fire, and major U.S. films such as Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow and The Cider House Rules.

And now, back to our program of Eye of the Eagle. The first one.

All of the usual, endless barrage of (stock footage) gun battles and over-the-top explosions ensues as Sgt. Rick Stratton (Brett Baxter Clark, who got his start in Tom Hanks’s Bachelor Party and the teensploitation romp Malibu Express; he also appears the Filipino war flick, Delta Force Commando), along with Cpl. Johnny Ransom (Patrick), set off with their “Eagle” squad to stop a band of U.S. renegades known as “The Lost Command” terrorizing South Vietnam. Stratton also has a side hussle: avenge the murder of his brother by the renegades. One of the missions Stratton and Ransom need to pull off is a train hijacking — and yes, those are shots of an electric model train. Hey, Silver Star productions can’t afford tanks or planes — only ones cut in from other films — so why did you think they could afford more than a model train and one real rail car to shoot on? Is there a mouthy, know-it-all pesky female photo journalist to get them into scrapes? Ah, you know your Philippine war flicks better than we thought.

You can enjoy the awful sound and jumpy edits and bad-everything-else-we-love on You Tube.

Of course we dug up Eye of the Eagle II and Eye of the Eagle III for you, both on You Tube. Sorry, that is actually kind of mean of us. Eh, you know you wanna watch ’em.

About the Author: You can learn more about the writings of R.D Francis on Facebook. He also writes for B&S About Movies.