Die Hard 2 Die Harder is the second installment of the Die Hard series. The film is now 20 years old the film is once again set on Christmas Eve.  The film begins with McClane (Bruce Willis) waiting at the Washington Dulles International Airport for his wife Holly (Bonnie Bedelia) to arrive from Los Angeles the flight also has on board reporter Richard Thornberg (William Atherton). While waiting for his wife’s flight McClane sits down and has a coffee, while drinking his coffee McClane spots two men dressed in army fatigues and carrying a package. The two men get up and leave, McClane follows them into the baggage area.  McClane announces himself to the men who respond by saying they work in the airport and then by pulling their guns on McClane and firing.  During the course of the fire fight one of them is killed while the other escapes. Before the dead mans body is removed from the airport McClane takes his finger prints so he can identify him.  McClane phones his old friend LAPD Sergeant Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson) and asks him to run the finger prints, Powell comes back with a startling discovery. McClane learns that the dead man was a mercenary who was thought to be killed in action, McClane believes something is about to happen.  Former US Army Special Forces Colonel Stuart (William Sadler) and other former members of his unit, O’Reilly (Robert Patrick) and Burke (John Leguizamo) set up a base in a small church near the airport. They take over air traffic control systems, stating that they want to rescue Ramon Esperanza (Franco Nero) a drug lord and dictator of a South American country named Val Verde, who is flying in for trial on drug trafficking charges. They demand a Boeing 747  ready and fueled so they can escape to another country and warn the Dulles air traffic controllers not to try to restore control to their systems. Upon learning about this, McClane becomes upset because his wife is on one of the planes which are circling above Washington with too little fuel to be redirected and therefore are most likely to crash if the terrorists remain in control. Dulles communications director Leslie Barnes (Art Evans) heads to the unfinished Annex Sky-walk with a SWAT team  to establish communications with the planes. Stuart’s henchmen ambush them, killing the SWAT team. more…

The Abyss is a 1989 science fiction film written and directed by James Cameron.  The Abyss was released on August 11 1989 and grossed $9.3 million on its opening weekend. It went onto make $110,000,000 million worldwide.  The film is now 21 years old the film begins with USS Montana an American ballistic missile submarine sinking after an accidental encounter with an unidentified submerged object.  With time critical the US Navy launches a rescue operation in an attempt to salvage the sub, with a hurricane moving in the navy decides that the quickest way to mount a rescue is for a Seal team to be inserted onto a privately owned experimental underwater oil platform.  The designer of the platform Dr Lindsey Brigman (Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio) insists on accompanying the Seal team down to the rig even though her estranged husband, Virgil “Bud” Brigman (Ed Harris) is currently serving as the platform’s foreman.  On board the submerged oil rig the Seal team UN pack there gear and get ready for the dive to the USS Montana.  Before they dive to the USS Montana Lt Hiram Coffey (Michael Biehn) holds a briefing where he tells everyone what is required of them for this mission. With everyone now ready they begin the dive to the USS Montana, they find the USS Montana near the edge of the Cayman Trough.  As the oil workers and Seal team investigate the wreck one of the oil workers has a strange encounter with a creature they can’t identify the same being that inadvertently caused the USS Montana to crash.  Now back on the oil rig, Jammer the oil worker who saw the creature they can’t identify is now in a coma.  As the storm topside intensifies Coffey contacts his superiors on board the Benthic Explorer, who order him to retrieve one of the warheads from one of the Trident missiles on board the USS Montana.  To do this Coffey and his team take one of the rig’s mini subs without authorization on a classified mission to the Montana to retrieve one of the warheads from the ship’s Trident missiles.  Unbeknown to the Seal team the mini sub that they took was the only vehicle capable of disconnecting the station’s umbilical cord to its parent surface ship the Benthic Explorer.  Upon their return the Seals remove the warhead and turn the sub over to its normal pilot One Night (Kimberly Scott) who takes it out in an attempt to disconnect the umbilicus.  By this time the Explorer is in the middle of the hurricane and is being tossed around violently by powerful winds and waves generated by the storm.  The ship’s motion makes it impossible for One Night to disconnect the cable.  Then all of a sudden the Benthic Explorer is hit by a big wave and loses one of its stabilizers, which enables it to keep its position.   As a result of this the ship begins to move out of position, which intern begins to drag the rig by the umbilicus.  more…

Ladyhawk is a 1985 fantasy film directed by Richard Donner and is now 25 years old.    The film begins with Phillipe “The Mouse” Gaston (Matthew Broderick) a thief escaping the dungeons of Aquila through the prison sewers and flees to the countryside.   He frequently talks to God about his woes and concerns.  The Bishop of Aquila (John Wood) is the harsh ruler of the region and hears of Phillipe Gastons escape, who sends his Captain of the Guard Marquet (Ken Hutchison) to hunt down Phillipe Gaston and kill him.   A short time later Phillipe arrives at a inn and offers to by everyone a drinkm, he tells everyone that he has just escaped from the dungeons of Aquila.  After he says that several men stand up and unveil themselves to be soldiers from Aquila looking for a escaped prisoner.  After a brief attempt to escape from the soldiers Phillipe is captured by Marquet and his men, without question Marquet gives the order to kill Phillipe.  Then from nowhere a mysterious black knight inter veins and saves Phillipe’s life.   He holds Marquet and his men at bay while Phillipe escapes,  he reveals himself to be their former Captain Etienne Navarre (Rutger Hauer).  Marquet reports back to the Bishop telling him of Navarres return,  after which the Bishop summons Cezar (Alfred Molina) the wolf trapper.  Navarre is accompanied only by a hawk,  Navarre tells Philippe why he saved him he needs Philippe’s unique knowledge to lead him inside Aquila and kill the Bishop.  Phillipe has no desire to return to his death sentence, but Navarre threatens to kill him if he will not help.  Navarre and the hawk mysteriously vanish at night and a beautiful woman Isabeau (Michelle Pfeiffer) joins Philippe.   Sheltering in a barn they are attacked by a peasant but are saved by a large black wolf.    In the morning Navarre and the hawk reappear and at night the lady and the wolf again accompany Phillipe.   In another encounter with the Bishop’s men Ladyhawk is hit by a crossbow.   Navarre fights off the guards and has Phillipe rush the injured hawk to an old monk named Imperius (Leo McKern) who lives nearby to heal her.  At the ruined castle of the monk he works to heal her, but Phillipe spies on the monk and sees Isabeau laying where he placed the hawk with a crossbow in her shoulder.  more…

Rambo First Blood Part II is now 25 years old and the first sequel to 1982′s First Blood. The film opened in the US in May 1985 and was the number one movie that weekend taking $20,176,217 at the box office.  Rambo First Blood Part II is the most successful of the Rambo series taking $300,400,432 worldwide at the box office.   The film begins showing Rambo (Sylvester Stallone) working in a prison labor camp when he gets a visit from his former commander, Colonel Sam Trautman (Richard Crenna). Trautman offers Rambo the chance to be released from prison after the events of the first film and given full clemency, but on condition of him going into Vietnam  to search for American POWs.  Once released Rambo meets Marshal Murdock (Charles Napier) an American bureaucrat who is in charge of the operation who tells Rambo that the American public is demanding knowledge about the POWs.  Rambo is briefed on the mission and given orders that he is only to photograph the POWs and not to rescue them, nor is he to engage any enemy soldiers.   Rambo reluctantly agrees and he is then told that an agent of the American government will be there to receive him in the jungles of Vietnam.  Rambo parachutes into the Northern Vietnam but loses most of his equipment in the process and is left only with his knives, his bow and arrows. He meets the agent a native girl named Co Bao (Julia Nickson) who wants to go to America.  She takes Rambo to the camp and in contradiction to his briefing Rambo finds American prisoners there and rescues one of them.  He, Co and the American POW escape in a boat but are attacked by a gunboat,  Rambo sends Co and the POW to safety and manages to destroy the gunboat with an RPG.  Rambo and the American POW make it to the extraction point, only to be left behind on orders from Murdock who fears what will happen to him and his party if the American public come to know about it.  Rambo and the American POW are recaptured. Rambo’s is bound to a oxen yoke and is lowered into a cesspool.  Later Rambo learns that the Soviet Army is aiding the Vietnamese and training them, later that night Rambo is tortured by a Soviet officer Lt Col Podovsky (Steven Berkoff) and his robust henchman Sergeant Yushin. more…

Lethal Weapon 2 is the first sequel to the 1987 film Lethal Weapon, it was the third most successful movie of 1989 in North America earning nearly $150 million domestically and $80.6 million overseas.  The film opens with Riggs (Mel Gibson) and Murtaugh (Danny Glover) engaged in a car chase with a red BMW.  After the BMW crashes Riggs and Murtaugh move in to arrest the driver but find he has escaped, they open the trunk of the BMW and discover the trunk is full of South African Krugerrands  (gold coins which are illegal in the US).  Arjen Rudd (Joss Ackland) and his chief enforcer Vorstedt (Derrick O’Connor) meet with the driver of the red BMW Hans (Mark Rolston) in his office, where Vorstedt kills him for loosing the shipment of Krugerrands.  Arjen orders Vorstedt to deal with Murtaugh who is in charge of the investigation, later that night Vorstedt and his men sneak into Murtaughs house and attack him and his family tieing them up and gagging all of them warning him to cease the investigation into the Krugerrands.   After the attack on Murtaugh, he and Riggs are reassigned to a less dangerous task of protecting a Federal witness Leo Getz (Joe Pesci).   Shortly after arriving at Leo’s hotel room an assassin posing as room service enters the room and tries to kill Leo.   Riggs leaps into action and he and the assassin end up going out the window 7 stories up and they both land in the swimming pool below.  The assassin gets away, after which Leo tells Riggs and Murtaugh that he had been laundering funds for the same drug smugglers.  Leo remembers he had some sort of interview with them before he got the job and leads Riggs and Murtaugh to a house on stilts.  Riggs takes a look inside the house and recognizes one of the men in the house as the assassin from the hotel.  The assassin tries to make an escape by stealing a tow-truck parked outside the house but Riggs jumps onto the back of the tow truck as it pulls away.  Murtaugh and Leo chase after Riggs and the suspect, which ends with the suspect being impaled by a surf board.  Later that day Riggs and Murtaugh return to the house on stilts with full backup of detectives and uniform officers.   Attempting to arrest the gang Riggs and Murtaugh are confronted by Arjen Rudd (Joss Ackland) the minister of affairs for the South African Consulate.  Rudd indignantly invokes diplomatic immunity on behalf of himself and his staff and threatens to report Riggs and Murtaugh to the State Department for violating South African soil.   Although ordered by the Department to leave Rudd and his associates alone, Riggs and Murtaugh are certain that he is the one they are looking for and commence a private war against them.  more…

Total Recall is a 1990 science fiction action film it grossed $261,299,840 worldwide making it a box office success.  The film is now 20 years old the film is set in the year 2084 the main character of the film is Douglas Quaid (Arnold Schwarzenegger) a construction worker, he is happily married to Lori (Sharon Stone).  On his way to work he sees an advertisement from Rekall a company that sells imaginary adventures by implanting false memories.  Against the advice of his co worker Harry (Robert Costanzo) Quaid visits Rekall and pays for a special package that will let him remember an adventure he had on Mars as a secret agent. During the memory implantation procedure Quaid has a violent outburst and tries to break free, ranting about how his cover has been blown and how men are coming to kill him.  The technicians manage to sedate Quaid, it is initially suspected that Quaid was acting out the secret agent part of the trip but wasn’t possible because that part of the trip had not been implanted yet.  The technicians realize that Quaid’s memory has been erased, covering up there involvement they erase his memories of Rekall and send him home in a taxi. Quaid wakes up in the taxi just before it drops him off, after getting out the taxi Quaid is met by his work college Gary who invites him for a drink but Quaid turns him down.  As Quaid begins to make his way up the stairs he is forcibly grabbed by five men, led by Gary they move Quaid out of sight behind the stairs and begin to question him about mars.  Quaid breaks free and kills all the men including his friend, horrified at the spectacle he rushes home.  He enters his apartment an turns off all the lights and tells Lori he´s just been attacked, Quaid goes into the bathroom and washes off all the blood from his encounter.  As he exits the bathroom he is shot at by someone in the dark, he manages to avoid being shot and grabs hold of that person and turns on the lights only to discover its his wife Lori. Quaid releases his grip questioning why she would do this in doing so she begins to attack him again this time with a knife.  He disarms her once again this time pointing a gun at her, she tells him that everything he remembers including their marriage is a series of false memories implanted.  While Quaid was in the bathroom Lori called Richter (Michael Ironside) her husband and fellow spy.  Lori tries to keep Quaid talking until Richter can arrive with his men, but Quaid notices several men with guns arriving at their apartment building on the monitor in there apartment. Quaid knocks Lori out and leaves the apartment before Richter arrives and heads for the local subway, chased by Richter and his men Quaid manages to escape and finds a safe haven in a cheap motel.  Richter and Lori both work for Vilhos Cohaagen (Ronny Cox) the corporate dictator of Mars. In his hotel room Quaid receives a call from someone who claims to be his friend and that they both worked for the Agency and if he ever disappeared to come and find him, so here he was.  He tells Quaid to wrap a wet towel around his head because he has a tracking device implanted in his head and wrapping a wet towel around his head disrupts the signal. Quaid does this then the man tells him to keep moving and leaves a suitcase by the telephone he´s calling from and leaves. Quaid leaves his hotel room and picks up the suitcase and heads for a taxi, when he is spotted by Richter and his companion in his car. Quaid makes it to a taxi and demands him to go, but the taxi is operated by a robot taxi driver who does not understand the instructions he was given.  more…