DELTA FORCE 2: THE COLOMBIAN CONNECTION (1990)
Rating: 1.5 on 4 / Buy the DVD here
Tagline: Norris and the force are back !
Directed by Aaron Norris
Starring Chuck Norris, John P. Ryan and Billy Drago
THE KILL: If there’s one name in action to reckon with, it’s Chuck Norris, and if there’s a team of families in action to reckon with, it’s Aaron and Chuck Norris. The two have made a number of movies together, including the infamous THE HITMAN and MISSING IN ACTION 3, and the two come together without a hitch in DELTA FORCE 2, a film filled with ridiculous action sequences, Chuck kicking people’s asses left and right, and one of the coolest/sickest/baddest bad guys in cinematic history. Sure, it may not be the crème de la crème of Chuck Norris flicks, but it delivers the unflinching violence and action like you would expect.
What the film doesn’t deliver are memorable one-liners, gratuitous T&A moments, or character development. I know, that last one seems like such a pansy thing to say, especially since we’re talking about a Chuck Norris action movie, but after watching cars, helicopters and buildings explode for more than an hour, I still didn’t really get who McCoy was nor why he was such a badass. It’s like Norris showed up and did his thang, but it could have been for any movie, and not specific towards this one. My assumption is that the film relied too much on people seeing DELTA FORCE to waste any time establishing McCoy as a military badass.
But whatever, let’s talk about some of the shit that did work. Norris kicks ass in a Chinese restaurant, in the air while sky diving, and takes down a house full of gun-running coke heads almost singlehandedly. That’s the other thing about this flick that’s kind of weird. Whereas DELTA FORCE was about the team of ass-kickers, DELTA FORCE 2 is about the one-man army that is McCoy. Sure, there is a team of dudes in black outfits, but you never get to know any of them. It should have just been called DELTA FORCE 2: MCCOY GOES SOLO or something like that—it would have been more appropriate.
Where was I? Oh yeah, the good parts. The best thing this film has to offer is its bad guys because they are awesome. Not only are they unflinching in their evilness, but goddamn do they have some epic hair. I’m talking about the thick ‘80s mustaches and long flowing curly mullets. If you love mustaches and mullets on your bad guys, you will LOVE this movie. No joke, it’s like the casting call went out to anyone with a mustache or a mullet. If you had one or the other (or both), you’d get the gig, which makes for one entertaining movie. Not only are there mullets, but there’s also a skullet of two, one of which belonging to one of the main badguys, the toughest henchmen of the bunch that eventually goes mano y mano with Norris for a round or two. This guy could have made skullets a fashion craze if he really wanted to, I think.
For the bad guys to be really bad they have to have a badass leader, and Billy Drago as the Colombian drug lord Ramon Cota takes the cake as one of the most evil villains ever seen on the big screen. Not only is Drago one scary looking dude with his creepy hair and those f*cking crazy eyes he has, but he’s just a ruthless dude with no conscious, making all his decisions based on what can make him the most money and how much cocaine he can sell. That’s it. He kills his migrant workers without flinching, then rapes their wives and kills their babies, then uses baby carcasses to smuggle cocaine into America. They couldn’t have made a more hardcore villain as this and thus saving the film from being a total bore.
While Chuck Norris is awesome in kicking ass and looking tough in that red beard of his, DELTA FORCE 2 doesn’t live up to the original in terms of epic action sequences nor does it feature a team of ass-kicking military ninjas. But if you’re just looking for lots of explosions, car chases down windy Colombian roads, sky-diving fight sequences, rock climbing, and a general who gets off on shooting the bad guys from his helicopter, then you’ll have a decent time with this flick. Not the Norris brothers best, but it still has its moments of ‘80s action entertainment.
TOP DEATH: Surprisingly enough, this one goes to one that Chuck isn’t involved with. When the bad guy helicopter has Chuck and his gang of rescued DEA agents in its crosshairs, there’s a moment of realization that something’s off right before the good guy helicopter rises up behind the bad guy helicopter and fires a missile at the bad guy helicopter, blowing it (and the evil general) up with it. It was a perfectly executed kill that had me cheering.
TOP ACTION SCENE: Chuck Norris goes head to head with the skullet bad guy—the two beat the crap out of each other while teaching each other lessons on how to get their asses kicked. It may be the perfect scene of what happens when Chuck Norris unleashes his karate skills on someone.
TOP HOMOEROTIC MOMENT: Colombian henchmen Billy Drago and his right-hand man have a moment of hand-holding during a touchy-feely car ride through the jungle. Not sure what was going on there, but it made the man in me feel a little uncomfortable.
FEMALE EXPLOITATION: Besides the talking about raping of a poor woman and the other women who are murdered throughout, this one doesn’t feature anything female related, let alone T or A related. Boo on you, Mr. Norris.
TOP LINE/DIALOGUE:
McCoy: School’s out!
DRINKING GAME: Every time you see a nice mullet or well-groomed mustache, you have to take a drink! And I’m not elfin’ joking’ around here!
TRIVIA: Michael Dudikoff and Steve James were originally set to star, but after they passed, Chuck Norris stepped in and the rest… is history.