{"id":3423,"date":"2011-08-17T17:12:58","date_gmt":"2011-08-17T21:12:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mondomark.com\/wordpress\/?p=2310"},"modified":"2011-08-17T17:12:58","modified_gmt":"2011-08-17T21:12:58","slug":"george-pan-cosmatos-part-i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/?p=3423","title":{"rendered":"George Pan Cosmatos, Part I"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

'Yo Marion'<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Back when I was in high school, I remember walking towards Wellesley subway station after another soundtrack buying binge (Cheapies, of course), and displayed against the side of a bus stop shelter was the poster for Cobra<\/strong>, the latest action \u2018drama\u2019 from Sylvester Stallone, bearing the immortal line \u201cCrime is a disease. Meet the cure.\u201d<\/p>\n

It looked glossy, chic, and the dominance of red inferred a lot of blood was spilt within the film. Critics reviled the movie as being sadistic, and it garnered a reputation as one of Stallone\u2019s nastier films (even though he does get creative several times in Cliffhanger<\/strong>).<\/p>\n

Cobra<\/strong> is one of the few Stallone films I\u2019ve never seen, but more importantly, it was directed by George P. Cosmatos, a mad Greek-Italian-Canadian whose C.V. isn\u2019t long (10 films + 1 TV episode), but contains some of the best action films of their day, of which Rambo: First Blood Part II<\/strong> (1985) is his best-known.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ll eventually get to Rambo<\/strong>, but for this examination of his work, let\u2019s start with one that bears a bit of mystique, being a classic example of violent eighties actioners which most critics loathed, but I\u2019m sure a good contingent enjoyed because they were pure popcorn movies: big, loud, kinetic, and filled with the exaggerated machismo that isn\u2019t easy to replicate today.<\/p>\n

That genetic combination was unique to the decade because heroes weren\u2019t weak, spoke few words, and regardless of how much carnage they caused \u2013 directly or indirectly \u2013 they earned the respect (begrudgingly) of their superiors, or even got promoted. Spilling blood was fine as long as it oozed from the cadaver of scum.<\/p>\n

And scum is exactly what the villains were. Not even comic-bookish; just evil<\/em>. Whether covered in a consistent slime of glycerin sweat and grubby clothes, or cultured to the point of playing chamber piano solos (Lance Henriksen in John Woo\u2019s Hard Target<\/strong>) before hunting humans with a crossbow, the villains had no social value.<\/p>\n

The screen persona of Sylvester Stallone was the extreme antidote to the purebred villains: a man of action, little time for romance, let alone emotions, and a preference to sleep with a chilled gun instead of a warm hot body. Love or whoopee would have to be set aside until after the End Credit crawl, but the fact Stallone\u2019s characters tolerated<\/em> women was a sign he had a heart and was capable of being in love. To be a sexist was native to the hero, and that rampant misogyny may very well have stemmed not just from pulp novels, but the seventies Italian crime thrillers, where women were similarly dragged, booted, and ferried around like luggage or an unfinished lunch.<\/p>\n

Warner Home Video\u2019s Blu-ray release, part of a 4-film Stallone wave (including Assassins<\/strong>, Demolition Man<\/strong>, and The Specialist<\/strong>), should also please fans of the Cannon Boys, Menachem Golan and Yorum Globus – the two Israeli cousins who built a small production empire making exploitive, violent B-movies.<\/p>\n

Cobra<\/a><\/strong> [M<\/a>], however, doesn\u2019t feel like a Cannon film. It\u2019s too upscale, lacks the famous \u2018Dub-Dub, Dub-Dub-Dub\u2019 logo, and probably would\u2019ve contained more violence <\/em>had it been a pure Cannon film. Like fellow indie prodco Carolco, makers of Rambo<\/strong>, Cannon wasn\u2019t concerned with making nice movies, and among action fans there\u2019s a wellspring of affection & nostalgia today for these flicks that delivered key goods with precision, and without fear of upsetting critics, or moral tightwads.<\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mark R. Hasan<\/strong>, Editor
\nKQEK.com <\/strong>( Main Site<\/a> \/ Mobile Site<\/a> )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part 1 of a breezy retropspective on director George Pan Cosmatos, starting with a Blu-ray review of Cobra (Warner Home Video), featuring Sylvester Stallone and Brigitte Nielsen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[6,5],"tags":[663,661,659],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8nuyW-Td","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3423"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3423\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/kqek.com\/mobile\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}