Flash Gordon himself, Sam Jones appears in this Hong Kong produced Vietnam war flick as an affable sort of army drill sergeant given the task of breaking in a group of local Vietnamese recruits. The trouble is, he is not allowed to reveal to them the full extent and danger of their future task at hand. Basically their mission is to run essential supplies via convoy through extremely hostile territory that's crawling with VC and in addition, a particularly vicious gang of bandits. The poor recruits don't know it yet, but they're very much on their own with the US not supplying any military support whatsoever.
Inevitably, various ambushes ensue and our hapless heroes find themselves captured by the bandits who have a predilection for heinously inventive torture methods. The rest of the film showcases a daring escape, some more battles, and finally a daring and perilous rescue attempt of a captured comrade with a fair few more scenes of sinisterly creative torture and intense gore scenes thrown in for good measure.
It has to be said that the described fx sequences prove to be the main draw to watch this outing with the said scenes being admittedly rather cool, especially the often noted scene where a man literally jumps out of his skin! In fact the film is fairly enjoyable in it's own right to (bar one needless and particularly disgusting scene of genuine animal killing), as we follow the protagonists relationships (superficial as they may be) in this war torn land. Special mention must also be made of the cool, but seriously ill advised 'sport' that is showcased in this .namely driving underneath log lorries on motorbikes!
One thing I noted with interest though is that either the filmmakers were not familiar with the concept of continuity or else there appears to be some usage of the 'cut and splice' technique of film making evident here (ala Godfrey Ho. Hmmmmm come to think of it, this after all being a Hong Kong production....I wonder if director Jobic Wong is in fact yet another of Ho's infinite pseudonyms?) This is further evidenced by the main Vietnamese hero in this who fluctuates between sporting a full moustache in some scenes whilst appearing clean shaven in others (with the said scenes supposedly taking place merely minutes or hours apart!) In fact I lost count of the number of times our hero miraculously 'regrows' his 'tache before it just as suddenly vanishes once more!
Despite being top billed, Flash Gordon erm, I mean Sam Jones actually only appears in a few segments in this, again a hint to the cutting and splicing technique. In addition, the film is blessed with a very poor overdub throughout, even for the American actors' voices.
Nonetheless, as previously stated, the torture/gore scenes in this should certainly please all gore hounds out there in need of a quick fix and so I shall award this film an entirely honourable 6 out of 10.
Inevitably, various ambushes ensue and our hapless heroes find themselves captured by the bandits who have a predilection for heinously inventive torture methods. The rest of the film showcases a daring escape, some more battles, and finally a daring and perilous rescue attempt of a captured comrade with a fair few more scenes of sinisterly creative torture and intense gore scenes thrown in for good measure.
It has to be said that the described fx sequences prove to be the main draw to watch this outing with the said scenes being admittedly rather cool, especially the often noted scene where a man literally jumps out of his skin! In fact the film is fairly enjoyable in it's own right to (bar one needless and particularly disgusting scene of genuine animal killing), as we follow the protagonists relationships (superficial as they may be) in this war torn land. Special mention must also be made of the cool, but seriously ill advised 'sport' that is showcased in this .namely driving underneath log lorries on motorbikes!
One thing I noted with interest though is that either the filmmakers were not familiar with the concept of continuity or else there appears to be some usage of the 'cut and splice' technique of film making evident here (ala Godfrey Ho. Hmmmmm come to think of it, this after all being a Hong Kong production....I wonder if director Jobic Wong is in fact yet another of Ho's infinite pseudonyms?) This is further evidenced by the main Vietnamese hero in this who fluctuates between sporting a full moustache in some scenes whilst appearing clean shaven in others (with the said scenes supposedly taking place merely minutes or hours apart!) In fact I lost count of the number of times our hero miraculously 'regrows' his 'tache before it just as suddenly vanishes once more!
Despite being top billed, Flash Gordon erm, I mean Sam Jones actually only appears in a few segments in this, again a hint to the cutting and splicing technique. In addition, the film is blessed with a very poor overdub throughout, even for the American actors' voices.
Nonetheless, as previously stated, the torture/gore scenes in this should certainly please all gore hounds out there in need of a quick fix and so I shall award this film an entirely honourable 6 out of 10.