Tiger Joe (1982)

A lively adventure film from Italian director Antonio Margheriti, retaining much of the same cast and crew from his earlier THE LAST HUNTER and being almost exactly the same in design. Once again we have war veteran David Warbeck - here plying his trade as an illegal arms smuggler - crash-landed in the Cambodian jungle and teaming up with various refugees to fight the ever-vicious Vietcong. Sure, there may be a sense of déjà vu surrounding this movie, but I'm a sucker for cheap and cheesy action flicks and I'd pay money to see any movie which has David Warbeck stripped to the waist and going gung-ho against various villains in the jungle.After his plane is shot and he crash lands in a lake, Warbeck makes his way through the jungle before he is captured and imprisoned by a group of refugees. He is escorted to a small village which turns out to be occupied by the enemy and a firefight ensues in which all but two of the refugees are wiped out. Warbeck saves their lives and in turn is set free. However, more reinforcements soon arrive and the trio are forced to escape. Meanwhile, a rescue team out searching for Warbeck is itself shot down in the jungle, and the group quickly meet up. From then on its action on top of action as the gang struggle to help a number of refugees escape to the border whilst being attacked on all sides by the bad guys.Okay, so the plot is not particularly taxing or complicated, but that's why I like it. This easy viewing experience is fun to watch and has lots of shooting for fans to enjoy. There's a fair number of explosions in there too, thanks to some effective miniatures which Margheriti is fond of. The cast is also a good one of Italian veterans. Supporting Warbeck as the trigger-happy hero are Annie Belle as the love interest Kia, old hand Luciano Pigozzi as Lennie, an old friend of Warbeck's, and the excellent Tony King who overacts like nobody before him. As "Midnight", King puts in a fairly understated turn...at least to begin with.Warbeck himself seems settled in his action man role and brings a laconic charm to the screen. He doesn't really seem to be taking things all that seriously although his acting is fine, and he more than acquits himself in the action when needs be. Highlights include a fire fight in a jungle village, a baddie attacking with a flame-thrower, the blowing-up of a huge bridge, and the mass-firepower finale on the boat. Margheriti also inserts his trademark scene of horror, here when the heroes discover a hut crammed with the corpses of dead refugees left to rot.The budget is very low as usual, but Margheriti usually discovers a way to cut around the action while still making you think that you've seen it (take for example the various plane crashes). There are some rough edges, like the occasional continuity error, but generally the film is well-made and exciting. I would recommend this movie as a good starting point for fans looking to branch out into cheesy '80s Italian action and a must for fans of direction Margheriti, of which I am one obviously. A shallow yet rewarding movie for undemanding genre fans who know what to expect.

The title character is a pilot, who along with his buddies runs guns to rebels in a South Asian country. When his plane is shot up by government forces he's taken prisoner by a different group of rebels than he he has been dealing with. Winning the trust of the group he begins to make the trek to home only to find himself joined by his friends who end up stranded when their rescue attempt goes wrong.Very good action film is definitely a little gem of a film. With a good collection of characters who are more than stick figures to be moved about between action scenes this is a film where you actually care about what happens. I was pleasantly surprised that I never felt the need to reach over and hit the fast forward button. The action scenes are plentiful and keep the tension up and seem to have been done with care (A bridge attack in the later part of the film had me unsure if it was done real or with a model for most of the sequence). This is a solid little film that worth not only a bucket of popcorn and a soda but also a repeated viewing or two.

The always excellent value for money David Warbeck headlines in this action yarn as an ex special forces leader in Nam who is now making a living flying in arms for a rebel cause somewhere in south east Asia. On one such run however, our hero finds himself getting directly hands on involved as it were when his plane is brought down by the enemy forces. A fair number of fairly well staged action sequences inevitably follow as Warbeck subsequently tries to make his way back to safety aided by the rebels he was supplying and in addition, with a little help from some buddies who stage an unsuccessful mission to retrieve him.This was director Antonio Margheriti's second film in a war trilogy (the first being the excellent The Last Hunter and the sequel to this effort was Tornado a.k.a. Tornado Strike Force) Whilst the film reviewed here certainly has it's moments, it sadly pales in comparison to the first in the series. Nonetheless, the enjoyable performances of the leads in this (who also headlined in the earlier film) raise the standard immeasurably, especially as displayed in some of their highly amusing verbal exchanges amongst themselves. The ever so sadly missed Warbeck especially is on great form here. In fact it has to be said that with his incredibly charismatic personality, Warbeck could always be relied upon to raise any film in which he found himself.It's such a great pity that he never made it big outside of the Italian movie industry. How tempting it is to imagine how Warbeck would have been in the role of James Bond for instance.

Antonio Margheriti's second entry in his Vietnam Trilogy is surprisingly the weakest of the three films (the first being "The Last Hunter" and the third being "Tornado"). However, despite some lackluster and uninspired direction, several quick action sequences and great cast chemistry hold this flick together over the course of 90 minutes.Sometime during the mid-1970s, three Vietnam vets, Tiger Joe (David Warbeck, "A Fistful of Dynamite"), Midnight (Tony King, "The Last Hunter") and Lenny (Luciano Pigozzi, "Tornado") run weapons to Cambodian refugees who are fighting against the Khmer Rouge forces. When Joe is shot down behind enemy lines, he meets a beautiful guerrilla fighter (Annie Belle) and the two basically run around blowing up enemy bases while Lenny and Midnight search for their missing buddy.That's about all there is to this quickie actioner. It's obvious that this was shot right on the heels of the classic "The Last Hunter", in order to make use of leftover money and sets, and fill out the contracts of several of the actors – the cast and crew of both films are virtually identical. The production values are awfully low, and it shows. The film is almost completely void of Margheriti's signature slow-motion photography, and there are only a few big explosions. Margheriti and crew obviously produced this film in haste, and it shows. There's no variety of camera angles: no cool zoom-ins, no low angle photography, nothing to manipulate light and dark sets. Even the miniature work is below par: we do get to see one bridge and a toy train comes crashing down, but that's about it.Most of the story revolves around a ragtag bunch of guerrillas and Cambodian peasants wandering the Cambodian jungle (actually the Philippines) and constantly running into enemy patrols, which they dispatch with machine-guns and knives rather quickly and without much effort. This is yet another film where a handful of un-trained civilians with AK-47s can suddenly mow down tons of trained enemy soldiers, who don't seem to understand how to take cover or aim their weapons. A good deal of the action footage – particularly that of helicopters and the burned-out village – is lifted directly from "The Last Hunter".This only thing holding this plot less, mindless piece together is the great chemistry of the leads. Everyone involved in this film seems to be having a good time, even if they're not delivering incredibly thoughtful dialogue with gusto. David Warbeck, another British actor who failed to make it in Hollywood like Sean Connery and Roger Moore did for the James Bond series, went to Italy where he made a ton of decent action pictures (often for Margheriti). Here, he's enjoying himself as a witty Brit who simply gets to take an M-16 and grenades and kill half of the Khmer Rouge without effort. Tony King over-states every one of his scenes as Midnight (well, when he does he not overact?) but is great fun. Pigozzi seems right at home as Lenny, the type of part he was born to play, and despite his age and build, gets to be involved in some very physically demanding sequences. His final scenes are a bit corny and forced, but great fun for that exact reason.This is a very entertaining and attention-holding film, but Margheriti doesn't offer us anything new to think about and doesn't seem to be experimenting with either the script or technical side of the production. If not for the presence of a great cast, this flick would have been a total waste of time. As it exists now, you'll probably watch it once, enjoy it but forget it almost immediately. Check out Margheriti's "The Last Hunter" instead; the series should have been left where it was.