Black Eagle (1988)
3/10
Poor James Bond rip-off.
13 March 2008
Warning: Spoilers
Black Eagle starts as high ranking American military dude Dean Rickert (William Bassett) is informed that fifty million dollars worth of F-1-11 (yes that's F one eleven) fighter plane with a state of the art SX-1 laser tracking guidance system aboard has landed in the Ocean somewhere just off the coast of Malta, his best man Steve Henderson (Gene Davis) is put on the case as the sneaky red Soviet Russians are already there trying to steal it. Unfortunately the Russians lead by Colonel Vladimir Klimenko (Vladimir Skomarovsky) kill Steve, Rickert then sends in Father Jospeh Bedelia (Bruce French) & his other best man besides Steve, a Japanese dude named Ken Tani (Shô Kosugi) to retrieve the SX-1 & teach those Russians a lesson they will never forget...

Directed by Eric Karson one has to say that Black Eagle is a poor spy thriller in the vein of James Bond but unlike James Bond there's barely any action in it, the plot sucks & it stars a funny little Jackie Chan wannabe. The one & only thing of any great note with regards to Black Eagle & it's one & only claim to fame is that it was one of Jean-Claude Van Damme's first films, I am sure it's plastered all over the video/DVD case to try & sell a few more copies but in reality he isn't in that much & gets about five lines of dialogue during the thing. If your a fan of JCVD then I suppose you will feel compelled & obliged to see Black Eagle but be warned it's pretty tough to get through. The script by Michale Gonzales & A.E. Peters is a really poor low rent James Bond spy thriller with the Americans trying to beat the Russians to their super laser guidance thing & sending a whole two people to get it including a poor mans Jackie Chan & a priest. There's a fair amount of pointless running around Maltese locations & plenty of near misses as the Jackie Chan wannabe stays one step ahead of those Russians. It's pretty forgettable stuff all the way, the action scenes are few & far between, the dialogue is poor, the character's are poor & it's pretty slow going as well.

Director Karson probably wasn't working with a huge budget but Black Eagle is really lacklustre stuff all the way, there's not one memorable fight or action scene in it apart from the very slow car chase where the bad guy's are actually chasing the good guy's in a Lada! I have to admit some of the Maltese & Italian locations look very nice but I'm not watching Black Eagle for the scenery, I want action & frankly it fails to deliver the goods. When Ken dives under the Ocean (& holds his breath for about ten minutes) he finds the F-1-11 jet plane down there completely undamaged & in one piece! Wouldn't it have been smashed to pieces on impact with the Ocean if it had indeed crashed? I think so.

Technically the film isn't much to look at, it's got no style & is pretty forgettable on all fronts. Actually shot on location in Malta & Italy which is where most of the budget probably went. The acting sucks, I think Shô Kosugi is trying to be Jackie Chan but fails miserably. JCVD only speaks about twenty words (he apparently still got paid $70,000 though) & still sucks although he does do the splits a couple of times.

Black Eagle is a poor, poor film which I barely got through. Probably JCVD's worst film although he can't be held totally responsible, one to avoid unless your a masochist.
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