Delta Force 3: Young Commandos

This latest chapter in the DELTA FORCE series--sans Chuck Norris--is a bellicose cousin of TV's "Mission Impossible." A fictitious Middle Eastern country; a highly qualified group, each with their own special talent; and a task critical to world peace. Voila. The story even drafts that golden oldie--an American city threatened by nuclear devastation.

At a conference of a Soviet peace and brotherhood organization, an Arab is awarded the International Prize for Peace for his dedication to Islamic and Judeo-Christian harmony. But he is assassinated when a flower girl presents him with a bouquet which conceals a bomb. Back at the Pentagon, Major Charles Stewart (Nick Cassavetes) is ordered to capture Kadal (Jonathan Cherchi), who has demanded a quick US withdrawal from the Middle East, or consequences will be severe. To abort Kadal's ultimatum, he must be taken alive.

US intelligence learns that the mastermind of the Arab cabal will visit an isolated desert fortress in Sudalia. The commandos are poised. But there is one twist. In the new age of glasnost, half the unit is to consist of a band of elite Soviet shock troops dubbed Spetznatz. It's even a mixed gender mission; at the last minute, they are joined by KGB officer Captain Irenia Usuri (Hanna Azulai-Haspari), the daughter of a former Soviet adviser, who once lived in the fortress and speaks the local patois. At training camp the Delta men engage their Soviet cohorts in another form of peace, namely non-lethal hand-to-hand combat.

Meanwhile, Anwar Hussein (Dan Turgeman) meets Kadal, his hero, in battered Beirut. Hussein's suicide mission is to transport a nuclear bomb to America and use it. The commandos begin their raid on an isolated beach where a minefield and a confrontation between mission commander Stewart and Sergei (John Ryan), the Soviet leader, tests national resolve.

Back in Miami, a fetching television director, Wendy Jackson (Candice Brecker) is assaulted by Arab thugs. They break one of her legs before Hussein comes to the "rescue." (The ploy is calculated, for reasons not yet clear.) The Delta Force nears the desert fortress, running a gauntlet of local rebels, angry women and an army patrol. They enter, conveniently, through the rear cavern door while Irenia mixes with the citizens gathered for Kadal's standard harangue. He is not a psychotic, an ideologue or a megalomaniac of sufficient depth to be credible as a would-be nuclear mass murderer. In short order, Kadal is seized and the Force escapes. On a US-bound plane, Kadal reveals, via polygraph and photos, the identity and location of Hussein.

Despite brief moments of inspiration, logic, as is often the case, yields to film dynamics, which avoid the more complex, and truly suspenseful, issues of war and death. Arab troops are easy targets, poor marksmen and worse tacticians while our commandos slaughter with virtual impunity. The screenplay, courtesy of Boaz Davidson and Greg Latter, spoons out cliches: a Soviet (Mark Ivanir) dies as his American high-explosives partner and pal, Sam (Eric Douglas), exhorts him not to, and then charges to his own death in what is supposed to pass for courage; Helicopters--miraculously escaping the hail of bullets that downed so many choppers in Vietnam--ferry the men away. The final scene may or may not be symbolic. What are we to make of an American who uses a Soviet knife to skewer the foot of a disillusioned Arab to the unreleased pedal of a bomb that may turn Miami into a pillar of fire?

Production values, combat and otherwise, are standard. The cast, rather than acting, merely pretends to be personable lethal weapons. The violence is nearly bloodless, almost tame. Director Sam Firstenberg, along with the writers and producers, would have done better to invoke some tried and true Sturm und Drang instead of "The A-Team." (Violence.) leave a comment