I found this movie review in my WORD document folder. I had completely forgotten that I had written it…probably because I was blacked out. Either way enjoy it. You can tell that it’s dated by some of the early references I make pertaining to articles on CBM. I added on the last paragraph tonight just to finish it,,,,you can tell that I’m lazy.
With Hayley Atwell phone interviews, editorials on why other motion picture studios should study Captain America 2011 like an Aramaic/Hebrew scholar studies the Dead Sea Scrolls, and of course the recent release of Captain America 2011 on Blu-ray/DVD, I thought it would be fitting to give some intoxicated scrutiny to Captain America 1990. Now I know most you think this movie is vile, heretical, and that the comic book movie angels should throw it into the abyss with the devil himself for a 1000 years, and rapture us all to a heaven where we only remember good comic book movies, but, I would encourage everybody to relax, grab a few craft beers (this part is critical), and watch this movie again. It might not seem as bad as you remember it… you can watch it on YouTube free, in 10 parts.
There was real effort on the part of the filmmakers to make this a serious attempt at a decent CBM. Don’t believe me? Well let’s just look at who starred in this movie. First we have Matt Salinger(Captain America/Steve Rogers)…. no idea who he is, never heard of him…too bad this life size Ken doll got the title role., further, throughout the whole movie he wears a facial expression that leads you to believe that he is constantly on the verge of fundamental retardation. Next we have Ronny Cox (Tom Kimball)…this guy is nothing to laugh at,- Deliverance, Taps, Beverly Hills Cop I-II, ROBOCOP, and Total Recall. This guy is a talented actor, and for while he was an in demand actor. He did Captain America at the tail end of his peak demand. Now we come to a man who is no stranger to comic book movies and certainly no stranger to comic book movie fans- Ned Beatty (Sam Kolawetz)-for those of you who lack higher cognitive functions and are living in your mother’s basement smoking pot all day long, let me remind you that Ned Beatty was Otis (Luthor’s Lackey) in the Superman movies. Last but certainly not least we have a brief appearance by Melinda Dillon (Mrs. Rogers) you may remember her from such movies as Close Encounters, A Christmas Story, and Harry and The Hendersons. So there was some above-B-movie talent here. The filmmakers wanted to get this right…. and they almost did.
Alright time for a movie summary and an examination of the execution-al mistakes the filmmakers made. This movie was made in 1990, but if you didn’t know that and judged it based on it’s cinematography, you would’ve thought it was made in the late 60’s – early 70’s. The graininess of this movie borders on offensive. Perhaps it was the way they were able to afford the aforementioned actors. The movie starts off blasphemous enough; it depicts the soon-to-be Red Skull as a young Italian prodigy. A bunch of fascist Italians abducts the kid; they subject him to a super-human experimental process that they are trying to sell to fascist German Nazis. Dr. Vaselli, who is the creator of this process, comes in and sees the kid being strapped down, and starts screaming bloody murder. I should note here that at this point in the movie all the dialogue is in Italian and German and the filmmakers only selectively added subtitles, so you have to kind of make up your own story. Now although all the evidence leads us to believe that Dr. Vaselli is upset at the inhumane treatment of this boy, we really can’t be certain… I think she was just upset that she was surrounded by Nazis who were dressed better than she was…maybe that’s why some fashion designers express naked love for Hitler….I don’t know. Anyway, Dr. Vaselli shows her contempt for this fashion fopa by jumping out of what looks like a 20 story window and changing allegiances with the Americans….typical female behavior. We now come to none other than Steve Rogers himself, but we don’t find him living in New York and trying falsify his information to get drafted, rather he is living in Redondo Beach California….I have no idea why the filmmakers thought this would be ok other than that they probably consulted Circus clowns in tiny red cars on whether or not it was acceptable to stray this far from the source material. In this movie Mr.Rogers suffers from polio, is able to limp great distances in a matter of minutes, and locate missing girlfriends…..Idiots shouldn’t have given him the serum. Steve gets the serum, sparks fly, Vaselli and him exchange glances that could understandably be mistaken as sexual, Vaselli gets assassinated by a German spy, Steve punches the German’s lights out, and Captain America is born.
One thing the filmmakers did get right in this movie was the suit and shield. It was a perfect recreation of the Captain America suit…and yes boys and girls, believers and infidels, and all those who are unfortunate enough to mindlessly stray into this review, we have wings on Cap’s head! What the filmmakers did get wrong however was a plausible explanation as to why any man would be wearing this ridiculous suit. The only ting that they offered was that it was “fireproof”…at this point I was drunkenly belly laughing with saline solution forming in my eyes.
So Cap gets dropped off behind enemy lines wearing his fireproof suit, and makes his way to a secret German base where he comes face to face with The Red Skull. In my opinion The Red Skull in this movie looks *%$#ing awesome. He’s moist, veiny, and gruesome. Even the dialogue between Red Skull and Cap is decent. A fight ensues between Skull and Cap where Skull beats Cap and he becomes Skullcap…just kidding! Red Skull ties Cap to a missile and launches it toward the White House. But before the missile launches Cap grabs The Red Skull’s hand in an attempt to take Skull with him. So the Red Skull employs his superior intelligence and cuts off his own hand instead of Cap’s, screams for the camera and holds up a prosthetic spurting stub while a fake missile dramatically lifts off behind him…it’s a good scene!
The rest of the movie as Kevin Feige would say is “not impactful”. It has absolutely nothing to do with any comic book you’ve ever read. The Red Skull ceases to be red and gets real skin, the movie doesn’t realize that it’s in the nineties instead of the eighties and portrays a president (Tom Kimball) running around thinking that environmental issues are more important than getting a hummer from an intern, and it suggests that women with Kelly Bundy bleached style hair are actually attractive. In a way this movie is kind of like the film FULL METAL JACKET….you only watch it for the first half and forget that the second half even exists. I could probably say a lot more on this film but I won’t because I’m reaching critical drunken mass. So all I can really say here is that you should grab a couple of home brews (store bought craft beer will suffice), sit back, forget about how your ape level intelligence co-workers treated you this week, and watch this deliciously awful treat of movie….I give it 5 out of 6 empty Bottles!
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