La via della droga

B-move stalwart Miles O'Keeffe (Phantom Raiders) and slimy bad guy Henry Silva (Above the Law) ham up the screen is this brilliant but little seen Italian action. Silva co-runs some kind of cocaine Drug Empire in the middle of some jungle and kills the hell out of anyone who tries to come in and stop him. O'Keeffe is Bull, some top commando type dude who along with a couple other commando type dudes go into the jungle to bust Silva's operation. Big mistake and it all goes tits up with Silva and his never ending army of goons (where the hell do they keep coming from?) chasing Bull and his dudes through the jungle. And that's it, as what follows is non-stop shooting, jungle traps, explosions, blown up helicopters and loads more shooting. Miles O'Keeffe once again gives image to an ultimately relentless and stone-cold hit man. His character owns a personal zoo (and uses cheetahs and hawks as murder weapons!) and he literally blows Henry Silva to pieces with a bazooka!

......So boasts a typecast Henry Silva in this very noisy, fun action outing.

B-movie god Miles O'Keeffe headlines here as Bull, leader of a three man squad whose mission it is to assassinate a major Bolvian drug lord.

Dropped in by parachute our intrepid hero's immediately come under fire from guerrillas thus setting the pattern for the rest of the film as our boys are constantly pursued through the jungle. If you like the sound of gun fire and explosions then this film will no doubt be music to your ears for the shooting never seems to let up in fact!

Not only are our hero's on the defencive against an incessant ground assault, but attacks are also launched against them from the air in helicopters whilst the terrain itself and various natural hazards (including a piranha attack!) also pose a major threat.

Matters eventually come to a climax in a village where the gun fire continues unabated and the noise is further added to by bazookas and tank shells! My advice is to have some ear plugs on standby!

Plot wise, this isn't exactly pushing the envelope admittedly but if it's raw action you're after, The Hard Way should provide you with a decent fix!

Directed by Michele Massimo Tarantini (Massacre in Dinosaur Valley), La Via Dura AKA The Hard Way The Only Way is fairly typical of the Italian straight-to-video jungle warfare genre that clogged up the action section of most video rental stores in the 80s: starring a hunky lead whose name you may recognise if you're a fan of low-budget trash (in this case, Ator the Fighting Eagle star Miles O'Keefe), a cult actor in the role of baddie (Henry Silva here playing Capt. Wesson, ruthless leader of a private army), and numerous Italian extras as machine-gun fodder, it consists of endless unimaginative battle scenes in which lots of stuff gets blown up and loads of people get killed.

Channeling Clint Eastwood for his role (ie., talking out of the corner of his mouth between clenched teeth in a raspy voice), star O'Keefe plays Bull, leader of a three-man squad who find themselves fighting for their lives when their mission to assassinate a Bolivian drug lord goes disastrously wrong. Essentially one long chase through the jungle culminating in a showdown between Bull and Wesson at the enemy camp, the film delivers loads of repetitive fire-fights against Silva's henchmen, the obligatory scenes featuring quick sand, piranha, and jungle booby traps, a couple of unconvincing model helicopter crashes, and O'Keefe effortlessly demonstrating how a really wide-legged stance while firing a gun can make you impossible to kill.

4.5 out of 10, rounded up to 5 for IMDb.