Operation Delta Force V: Random Fire (2000)

Recap: A team of Delta Force is lured into an ambush trying to protect an American ambassador. The team takes heavy casualties, and flees leaving wounded men behind. Ambassador forgotten, this now become a vendetta between Delta Force Captain Kennedy and the terrorist mastermind Jaffar. Jaffar wants to brainwash the captured soldiers into walking bombs and Kennedy must rescue them at all costs.Comments: This is impressively and depressingly bad. Its completely stupid, full of boring, never ending and repeating shooting. There is no story, no real dialog and nothing really ever happens, well except people shooting at each other. And if you missed one scene, don't worry, it will repeat itself at least once.Some action movies ignore rules of reality and might get away with it. This doesn't. I can actually accept movies ignoring the ammunition limit, weapons being able to fire in infinity. But to have a scene where one soldier clearly calls out "Out of ammunition" releases his cartridge and THEN resumes firing can only be the sign of a really incompetent director. And it is incredible that not anyone, writers, actors, none of the people involved, seem to have noticed.That the movie then continues to completely disregard anything of military tactics or weapon abilities, and that the supposedly elite soldiers of Delta Force seem to be the weakest bunch around (with the exception perhaps being the terrorists shooting at them), was almost to be expected, but it just underlines the poor quality of this entire project.My recommendation to any and all. Avoid at all costs.2/10

writing as someone who's occasionally liaised with UK and US special forces I can only hope that they have a sense of humour if they ever see this. Certain sections obviously weren't skimped on but surely they could have afforded less flabby and more talented actors and a story that at least tried to inject some tension and humanity.

The most unexpected plus in this otherwise botched job is seeing the fabulous African railways steam train heading through the veld in the opening scene. After this, however, it's downhill all the way with a basically boring 'deja vu' scenario: megalomanic terrorist uses brainwashed hostages as human suicide bombers. Turn to CNN and it's happening daily for real. Apart from that there's plenty of military hardware mostly wasted in badly filmed action SFX where explosions look more like fireworks.For the money they could have done much better.

Well, I bought this one right away, knowing how I liked the rest in the series. Following the ending of #4 I wondered what would happen here. Well, now you have a new team to work with. So, forget about viewing this one as if it were a sequel. Look at it as if it were a stand-alone film. The budget might not be there like it was for Patriot, MI2, or X-Men, but the cast and crew do well within their constraints. Maybe it's not everyone's choice of titles to own, but I definitely recommend checking it out. You've got government conspiracy, terrorism, emotion, and psychological warfare, not to mention the physical type as well, wrapped up in this film. Just don't pass it up for its title, you'll be missing out if you do.