Militia

I'm stunned by how many commentators here think this film features footage either mimicking scenes from bigger budget films or that the filmmakers stole these scenes and put them in their films. The studios routinely offer footage from their movies as potential stock footage for others to use. The early episodes of the JAG TV series were filled with footage from the Jack Ryan/Tom Clancy movies. It works better if the footage is from big budget flops or if only brief sequences are used rather than entire scenes as is the case in MILITIA and it helps if some attempt is made to hide anything obvious that might tip off a viewer as to the source of the footage (the Cyberdine sign being an example here)but there's nothing new about using stock footage to make your movie look bigger than it is. It's been done since the early days of film. If you want a real laugh check out RAPTOR from the same director which uses tons of footage from the 3 CARNOSAUR movies. At one point some soldiers walking (supposedly) through a warehouse pass life preservers on the wall. The reason being that this is footage from CARNOSAUR 3 which took place on a ship.

This TV-movie premiered locally on HBO last Friday night(August 4). I was favorably impressed with it.

Frederic Forrest(played mystery author Dashiell Hammett in the Zoeotrope film "Hammett" with finesse and style) played an imprisoned militia and right-wing fanatic. Dean Cain(also of the "Superman" TV series), played an ATF agent who had captured him. Stacey Keach played a malevolent and reckless militia movement leader with chilling authority.

In today's "politically correct" climate, it would have been easy to portray all of the militia-men as morons or thugs. HBO's production, however, deftly distinguished between degrees of fanaticism and various types of men. The result was more dramatic, more thoughtful and more optimistic than a standard "PC" piece of **** would have been.

In the wake of its errors at Ruby Ridge and Waco, the ATF and the FBI have already taken to heart the implicit message of this fine film--even paranoids want and deserve their "day in court".

Man, it kills me to see the direct-to-video fare that Jennifer Beals has been starring in recently. This predictable grade-C flick is passable only because it rarely takes itself too seriously. Jim Wynorski is the master of camp mediocrity, and so we see Fredric Forrest spoof his "terrorist looney-toon" persona that was hysterical but chilling in Falling Down, and Stacy Keach and Dean Cain try their hardest to not let us know they'd rather be anywhere else than on the set of this movie. That brings us to Jennifer. Why, oh why, is this gorgeous actress with passable chops whiling away her time in trifle like this and Turbulence 2 (or was it 3?).

Anyway, I watched it all the way through and if you ask me next week about "Militia" I promise you I won't remember ever having seen it. In the meantime, Corkymeter rates Militia 2 (out of 5) stars. (Yes, it rates higher than "Woo" because it knows it's piffle). Jennifer, Jennifer, Jennifer...

Bad acting, lousy special effects among other things, transform what was suppose to be an action movie into one of the best comedies I´ve ever seen.

I specially like the parts where they took scenes from Terminator 2, Rambo: First Blood Part II and Delta Force 2 to make them part of this film.

For a good laugh, I strongly recommend to watch this one.

Like another reviewer I also saw this late at night with nothing better to do. ( I should have looked some more) I would like to add some more details to the rip-offs of scennes. Of course everyone noticed the T2 scene, but when they left the building in the SWAT van you could actually see a large man with sunglasses driving. Also at the end when they blew up Monte's House (Stacey Keach) the explosion was from the drug kingpin's house in Clear and Present Danger. 1 out of 10 stars...