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The ever enjoyable to watch Chris Mitchum headlines in this rather confused Indonesian outing which appears to have at least initially the exact same plot as Arizal's absolute classic, Final Score (again starring Mitchum). But wait......whilst the first half of the film follows the story of our man taking revenge on the scum who murdered his wife (although she technically takes her own life here) and child, about the mid way mark the plot suddenly takes a somewhat dramatic turn and we find Mitchum and his old Vietnam buddies going into the Golden Triangle to destroy the entire Heroin network!!!!!! What the hell?!!!!

Well, let's be honest, for fellow bad movie lovers such an abrupt and delightfully illogical plot contrivance renders the film as simply glorious straight away. Add to this the plethora of highly enjoyable and completely OTT action scenes throughout and sure enough, this is indeed a highly entertaining, little known gem of a film.

Check out especially the scenes in which our hero's drive into battle in their A-Team style, souped up armoured truck. Not only has this baby got hidden weapons seemingly all over it, but it also houses a compartment in the back wherein Mitchum drives out on a rocket launching, bullet proof motorbike! Woah!!!

Good wholesome B-movie fun!

My review was written in March 1986 after a Times Square screening.

"American Commandos" is a subpar action picture made in the Philippines for undemanding international audiences. It opened domestically last November in Miami under the title "Hitman", a moniker retained in its theme song. (Shooting title was "Mr. Salvage".) Christopher Mitchum toplines as Dean Mitchell, the owner of an L. A. gas station who thwarts a robbery of his business by young punks. The youth later decend on his home, kill his young son and rape his wife (Karen Lopez), who subsequently commits suicide.

Bent on revenge, Mitchell accepts a mission assigned by vaguely CIA operative Brady (Ken Metcalfe, film's co-writer who frequently pops up in Far East pics) to go to the Golden Triangle and wipe out drug operations there. Mitchell recruits members of hisold Vietnam War platoon for the job and, despite treachery within his unit, wipes out numerous Filipino bit players pretending to be Thais. In flashbacks the Filipinos pretend to be Vietnamese.

Mitchum's stone-faced non-acting here ets new low standards for the second-generation thesp, while the Filipino victims are quite funny in their exaggerated, choreographed death scenes. Opening reel in which the Philippines awkwardly doubles for L. A. is a hoot, with Mitchum sent to Siesta Inn (Filipinos doubling for Chicanos) for a rendezvous at what is described in the silly dialog as an "AC/DC joint".

Much of the action footage involves the outnumbered heroes working out of an armored van, which looks like a cheap version of tv's "The A-Team", perhaps an homage to that show's co producer John Ashley, who pioneered in making U. S. action films in the Philippines in the 1960s.

I must have seen this movie like 100 times.. I thought, I was gonna be the only one to review..BUT for I see some cool IMDBer's have the same opinion as me.

What a treat! What can I say that hasn't been said: Great plot-holed B movie. A review mention, he thinks he had a bad tape, that repeat the same scene TWICE..well, mine DID TOO..

From the rapes at the beginning...to the them, being super cool as nothing happened after. Really, there's nothing I can add. Just wanted to say, that this is one kick ass B movie.

P.S I came here, to see if they had an TRIVIA for American Commando's: They don't. I don't understand. They have 123880 threads of TRIVIA for AVATAR and none for THIS!!mmhmhmh..

Now, I'm off to check out "Tougher Than leather" TRIVIA..hoping that's it's FULL. Another GENRE B-movie..but still CLASSIC!

This movie's full of holes and chock full of badness like all B-movies, but this one's different. Perhaps it's just the video I was watching (probably not), but the movie actually repeats a 5 minute section of the movie back-to-back. So when the bad guy says go to plan B he says it twice. So is the second plan B actually plan C or maybe B2?