Crusader

An interesting concept proved to be a waste of money. Unaware at the start, I then, almost immediately, spent almost an hour trying to fend off my knowledge that I was watching a live train crash. So I turned the dvd off with 45 mins to go, and happily watched one of the "all-great" episodes of Dad's Army. If I was in a cinema, I would have walked out. A respectable cast had my absolute sympathy and earned 2 stars for the movie as they valiantly took turns unsuccessfully performing CPR on the film.

evidently Spain gets more rain than London, (contrary to "My Fair Lady"), nobody wears a raincoat, and women have a competition to see how few ounces of clothing they can wear. Media networks are peopled by directors like Michael York named "McGovern", and women named Luciana or Vittoria or something who speak with flat American accents and look like Bo Derek. The star reporters in Spain are Americans too, with names like "Hank Robinson", who seem to need to save Spain from its greedy media titans. Good thing America doesn't have any greedy media titans. It's amazing how much metropolitan Barcelona looks like Vancouver, during action shots, or even Pittsburgh. Also its amusing how everyone in the cast at the millionaire/executive level is two steps away from a grimy alley devoid of people, especially if they're carrying incriminating tapes/evidence. The streets of Barcelona would seem to be peopled about 85% with contract killers waving guns with perfect lip gloss. TV stations with tapes of global impact are empty so the villains can stalk the place, (we all know how stations wait to release killer videotape). have some beers ready to drink every time someone shouts "bullsh*t" at the screen!

The thriller element is alright, but the script is one of the most laughably bad I've heard in a while. Some of the lines are real clunkers.

The odd combination of a couple Americans (McCarthy and Bo Derek) and a Brit (Michael York) in the main roles and a cast of Spaniards is incredibly unrealistic. Hokey, but still, kind of fun.

The opening scene is full of gratuitous violence. It was so full of death I almost stopped watching, but some people may find that cool.

Andrew McCarthy looks thin and wizened. He really should pack on a few pounds. Bo Derek is surprisingly good considering she really isn't much of an actress.

"Crusader" is another good film from Bryan Goeres. He's 4 for 4 because of this, "Art Heist", "Face Of Terror", and "Phase IV".

The plot is about Hank Robinson (Andrew McCarthy) who is a reporter for a local news station in Spain. He inadvertently gets footage of a massacre at a powerful computer company. After that he is hired to be a top reporter for VisionTV run by Archie McGovern (Michael York). Hank gets assigned other stories by Nicola (Bo Derek) but the story that got him into the big time turns into a battle of deceit, double-crosses and murder.

Andrew McCarthy is great. Michael York puts in a fun performance. Bo Derek is okay.

In the end: There's a lot of action and suspense to definitely warrant a rental.

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