The Least Action Heroes

By Ian Watson

"Remember, Boo Boo, we have one weakness."
"What's that, Ratpfink?"
"Bullets!"
Bad action movies may be the guiltiest of pleasures , but they're also a ton of fun. Whether you're watching Rutger Hauer fight a rubber-suited monster or Chuck Norris thwarting a Communist invasion in his pick-up truck, there's a strange appeal to their occasionally inept, often silly shenanigans. In The Least Action Heroes, from the author of Movies That Witness Madness, you'll discover which Gary Busey film inspired a Simpsons character, how Cynthia Rothrock became a YouTube phenomenon and why Richard Harris bothered to appear in an Italian Rambo clone. So whip out a pizza, dim the lights, open the brewskis and relax with this bonkers b-movie extravaganza!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ian Watson
• Release date: Dec 1, 2012
• ISBN: 9781301265817

Ian Watson

Ian Watson is the author of the #1 bestseller Midnight Movie Madness, a 400+ page guide to such bizarre, campy and endearing classics as Reefer Madness, Attack of the 50ft Woman and Poultrygeist: Night of the Chicken Dead.

Book preview

The Least Action Heroes

By

Ian Watson

Copyright 2012 Ian Watson

Published At Smashwords

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License Notes

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Book List

By the same author and available at Smashwords:

Movies That Witness Madness

Schlock Sleaze & Cheesy Bs

Introduction

Once you’ve seen enough bad action films, you acquire a taste for movies featuring bulletproof cops, invulnerable martial arts masters and disturbed, indestructible villains. These guys aren’t likely to be mistaken for, say, Douglas Fairbanks or Alan Ladd, their silly shenanigans are several rungs below Bond or Bourne, and the picture itself isn’t even good – that is, endorsed by critics – but so what? Most of us don’t go to the movies for Great Art, just Good Popcorn. A film doesn’t have to be Vertigo or Citizen Kane, just ninety minutes that doesn’t leave the viewer feeling they’ve been had.

You grow to love the clichés in all their cheesy glory, and these occasionally lame, often derivative efforts still pack a surprising amount of dumb fun, whether you’re watching a WWE brawler chasing the scumbags who took his wife or, if you want something more cerebral, a WWE brawler fighting a chainsaw-wielding frog-man in the post-nuke desert.

Besides, who said every action hero has to be as noble and patriotic as James Stewart? Gary Daniels may not have shot Liberty Valance (neither did Stewart – it was John Wayne, standing in the shadows) but he has the power to make his opponents’ heads swell and explode just by tapping them. And who needs wholesome role models when you’ve got Chuck Norris? Takes all kinds to make a planet.

What follows is a bunch of guilty pleasure action classics, not necessarily the worst pictures in their genre or even the best worst, just some recommendations for bad movie fans. Read our comments, seek out the movies and enjoy them. That’s what they’re for.

Part I: Hollywood Strikes Out

Split Second (1992)

You’ve probably never seen this Rutger Hauer cop thriller because it was in and out of theatres faster than you could say Straight-to-video, partly due to the critical drubbing it received and partly because it was overshadowed by some tacky Michael Douglas/ Sharon Stone flick, but mostly because it’s such a shambles. It can’t make up its mind what it wants to be, what its ground rules are or where it wants to go so it tries several genres and approaches on for size before settling for the most ill-fitting in time for the end credits.

Hauer is Detective Harley Stone, an American-accented Dutchman living in a London of the not-too-distant future – well, 2008 – where, courtesy of global warming, rising sea levels have submerged the capital. As backdrops go, that’s a pretty interesting