I tried folks. I really tried. I had every intention of reviewing Alves Batman En Robin, the Filipino version of Batman & Robin, this week. The caped crusaders battle the Joker, the Penguin, and Cat-Woman with wild action, mask-less villains and musical numbers, complete with bizarre lyrics in Tagalog, recorded over old Beach Boys tunes.

At least I think they do. 

I got about fifteen minutes into it and was laughing so hard I started seeing funny colors in front of my eyes and couldn't catch my breath. I figured out I can watch the movie in about ten minute increments, without fear of laughing to death, but it will take a while before I can get a review posted.

So, instead, I bring you another film from the Philippines. The only other one I had. A Paragon Video Production that was rescued from a dusty bin for $1 fifteen years ago and hasn't been viewed since. Amazingly the tape still worked, so I bring you The One Armed Executioner; a fine tale of three-appendaged vengeance with extreme prejudice -- Filipino style!

- - - -

We begin along the waterfront as a midget, in a phone booth, pleads with someone over the phone. (It's a Filipino movie alright. There's a law requiring at least one midget in the cast.) 

Mouse, the midget, is an informant and he's trying to sell information about a drug shipment to Martinez, the head of Manila's Interpol contingent. Martinez says they have all the info they need to intercept the shipment but Mouse says he can give them concrete proof of whose behind the drug trafficking.

Before he can spill it, though, a car pulls up and shines its lights into the booth and Mike Jason, the burly bearded driver, gets out. He wedges the door shut, trapping Mouse inside. He screams as Jason tips the booth over the rail and into the bay, where it slowly slinks out of sight. At Martinez's office, the phone line goes dead.

We change locales to Wo-Chen's restaurant. Wo-Chen welcomes back Ramón Ortega (Franco Guerrero) and his new wife, Ann (Judy Kay), back from their honeymoon in the States. We find out that Ann writes children's books and Ortega is an Interpol agent. Ortega gets a call from Martinez and heads for the phone. 

Wo-Chen talks to Ann about the perils of being the wife of an Interpol agent. Ann swears she knew what she was getting into and is all smiles and sunshine. (Oh, yeah, she's toast alright.) We find out that Wo-Chen is a former Interpol agent, as well. Ortega has to report in and Wo-Chen promises to take Ann home.

Meanwhile, Jason makes his way into a palatial estate. He finds his way to Edwards, the big boss man, himself, and assures him he got Mouse before he could talk.

Ortega and his partner, Sanchez, report to Martinez who tells them about his abrupt conversation with Mouse. He sends them down to the docks where the police are fishing the phone booth out of the drink and find Mouse, still inside.

They report back in with no leads or clues. Martinez tells Sanchez to find out what Mouse was up to and puts Ortega in charge of the assault team, to greet the airplane with the latest drug shipment in the morning.

Ortega heads home and finds his wife in bed with another woman. No. Wait. That's just a hideous over-sized doll. He quietly slips into the shower, as not to wake her up, but she just as quietly follows him in.

- - - -

Wohoo! Shower scene! This is gonna be gre...what the?! That's it? It's over already!?

- - - -

Ortega meets his strike team at the secluded airport. Armed with M-16s, he reminds them that they need info -- not dead bodies. A small plane circles and comes in for a landing. The pick-up men show up. They all spot each other and firefight erupts. So much for the info. 

Ortega goes after the plane, that's trying to take off again, while the rest of his strike team is wiped out by the drug dealers. Using a jeep, he cuts the plane off and blasts away at the cockpit. The pilot gets out, carrying a briefcase. They exchange fire and Ortega's magic bullets blow the plane up. The other dealers vacate while Ortega fumes as the briefcase, and the evidence, goes up in flames. 

The pilot is identified as one of Edward's top accountants. Edwards is a business man who uses his legal fronts to cover up his illegal drug trade. The briefcase contained vital info that proved Edward's involvement. Ortega apologizes for accidentally destroying it. Martinez says Edwards doesn't know it was destroyed. He tells Ortega to push the bluff on Edwards and see what happens. 

At his estate, Edwards is ripping his help for losing the latest shipment, with profanity suggestions from Milo, the idiot. Ortega and Sanchez show up and ask why his accountant was sneaking into the country with illegal drugs. Edwards feigns shock of the news and denies everything. Ortega says they found a diary in a briefcase and, as soon as they decipher it, Edwards is going to jail.

They don't have any proof yet, so Edwards kicks them out. After they're gone, he rages to Jason. He orders him to retrieve the briefcase, at all costs, and to teach Ortega a lesson and make him an example of what happens to smug and nosey Interpol agents.

That night Ortega returns home and finds his wife, bound and gagged to a chair, and is overpowered by three assailants and is knocked out. He wakes up tied to a chair, too. The crooks are wearing nylon stockings over their heads but it's easy to recognize the leader is Jason. 

He demands the diary. Ortega says he doesn't have it. Every time he denies it, Jason slaps Ann. Ortega swears it was burnt up in the explosion but Jason doesn't believe him. He draws a katana sword and cuts Ann's top off. Ortega pleads with him but the cackling Jason isn't getting the answers he wants, so he buries the sword into Ann's stomach, killing her. 

Ortega wigs out and notices one of the attackers wears a strange ring. Jason orders the other two to hold out his left arm. (Ortega is a left handed.) They do and Jason lops it off, at the shoulder, with one fell swoop. Ortega goes into shock and passes out. 

He wakes up in a hospital, surrounded by his friends and colleagues. He reaches for his left arm, feels the bandages and bloody stump, and freaks out -- swearing revenge on those responsible. Martinez manages to calm him down and promises they're doing all they can. 

That night, a mysterious figure walks into Ortega's darkened hospital room. The patient is sleeping fitfully and the figure torments him by reminding him how his wife died. We notice the he's wearing a very familiar ring. 

The next morning, the ring, and it's owner, meet Edwards at his super secret jungle drug lab. The ring man is put in charge of refining the latest shipment into high grade junk.

Back at the hospital, Wo-Chen encourages Ortega to look at things philosophically. (C'mon, you've still got one arm left!) Ortega is having some major guilt issues and, to make matters worse, Martinez threatens him again. Interpol has no room for one armed agents out for personal revenge. The Edwards case is hands off. (And the use of a plural there was very cold indeed.)

Sanchez and Martinez leave. Sanchez is worried about his partner's future. He'd never settle on a desk job and won't take a pension. Martinez assures him they can work something out. 

Time passes and Ortega is discharged from the hospital. He wanders the streets of Manila and winds up in a bar, to drown his sorrows. With the help of Maria, a friendly prostitute, he downs a fifth of Jim Beam and the crummy bartender rolls him for his money and tosses them both out.

Maria takes him to hotel room and puts him to bed. She finds more money, hidden in his shoe. At first she takes it; but then puts it back and leaves him to sleep it off. 

Ortega starts searching the local jewelers and pawn shops, looking for the kind of ring he saw on the killer, but, more often then not, he winds up back in a bar and drinks himself into a stupor. He wanders the streets by day, aimlessly looking for clues, drawing attention from everyone because he's still wearing the same clothes and is getting a little ripe. At night he cries himself to sleep, confessing to his dead wife that he failed her, again, that day.

Sanchez seeks out Wo-Chen. Ortega has dropped off the radar and no one can find him. Wo-Chen has been looking for him, too, with no luck. Wo-Chen fears he's trying to go after Edwards because he isn't ready yet. Sanchez says he never will be with only one arm. Wo-Chen has other ideas. 

That night, while stumbling around drunk, Ortega is mugged and the rest of his money is stolen. He stumbles back to the first bar, looking for Maria, but she isn't there. He tries to buy a drink on credit but the bartender throws him out, again. Luckily, one of the other patrons recognizes Ortega and calls Wo-Chen. 

Ortega stumbles along when a car drives up and several men hustle him into it. They drive him to Wo-Chen's Martial Arts Academy. They clean and sober Ortega up. Wo-Chen wants to help Ortega get revenge by training him to fight, despite his handicap. He questions Ortega's resolve for revenge because he will get nowhere with so much self-pity.

Ortega reluctantly agrees and starts training. He's blindfolded and run through obstacles to heighten his other senses. It's tough going but Wo-Chen is a taskmaster that won't accept failure. While he spouts out Yodian philosophy, about using the force, Ortega's shown how to defend, attack, and something that resembles the Vulcan death grip. He slowly realizes that you can open up a can of whup-ass with only one arm.

He spends his nights reminiscing, about happier times with Ann, but he still feels responsible for her death. Wo-Chen assures him that he didn't kill her, the bad guys did. The elder changes the subject and asks if he recognized any of the attackers. Ortega says all he has is the ring he saw. He describes it as a chalice with a serpent wrapped around it. Wo-Chen says he'll look into it, then sends him to bed because phase two of the training begins tomorrow. 

The next morning, Wo-Chen puts Ortega through the wringer, again, teaching him how to shoot with his right hand -- and to reload with only one hand. 1,000 rounds later, Ortega starts hitting what he's aiming at. 

More time passes and we find Ortega deftly bounding through the forest, bounding, and flipping around. (What the? Is he training for the Gymkata or what?) Wo-Chen throws four apples into the air. Ortega does a backward flip, out of a tree, and hits all four targets before they hit the ground. 

Wo-Chen says he's finally ready to go after Edwards and the men who killed his wife. He found out that the ring is of Hong Kong origins and it's the symbol of a healer. Ortega figures it must be a doctor and suddenly remembers the tormenting voice in his hospital room. He then makes the astounding leap in logic and pegs his doctor as one of the killers.

That night, Ortega sneaks into the hospital and finds the doctor in his office, wearing the damning ring. Ortega bursts in and tosses him around the room. He gets the doctor in a chokehold and demands to know who killed his wife. The doc confesses, it was Jason, and tells Ortega where to find him. He pleads for his life, saying he stayed behind and stopped the bleeding after the others left that fateful night. Ortega lets him go but when he tries to leave, the doctor lunges after him (for some reason), so he delivers a deathblow to his windpipe.

Sanchez reports to Martinez that the doctor has been killed. They piece it together that the doctor must have been involved because when Ortega was brought to the hospital, most of the arteries were already expertly tied off. They know Ortega must be behind it and redouble their efforts to find him. 

They can find him, right now, sneaking into Jason's penthouse suite. Jason is getting a rub down by the other man that helped kill Ann. Ortega interrupts them and a brawl ensues. While Ortega punches out Jason, the other retrieves the katana blades. No matter. Ortega quickly dispatches the other man, then disarms and corners Jason. 

Jason quivers (his sweaty chub rolls undulating in the moon light) and promises that Ortega is a dead man. Ortega replies by sticking the katana into his stomach. But his stomach is big enough that Ortega didn't hit anything vital, so Jason plays possum until Ortega leaves.

Ortega next steals a boat and makes his way to Edward's estate. He stiff-arms his way through most of the guards but meets fiercer resistance the closer he gets to the house. Edwards joins the firefight and soon Ortega's gun falls silent. Edwards, ever the chicken, sends Milo, the idiot, to make sure he's dead while he escapes by boat. 

Milo and several other guards approach Ortega and all get a deadly dose of lead. Ortega goes after Edwards but watches as he gets away. Ortega finds Milo, the idiot, barely alive but manages to get the location of Edwards' super secret drug lab then finishes him off. 

Edwards makes it to his super secret drug lab where Jason waits. They decide they better get, while the getting's good, but it's too late. A chopper roars into view. It's Ortega and Wo-Chen. Edwards orders his men to shoot them down. 

The copter circles the compound and Ortega drops grenades, taking out the gun towers and the only bridge off the island. Edwards and Jason still intend to retreat and, in an odd scene, steal there own drugs at gun point from their workers. (?) Their only escape is into the jungle, so, with an armed escort, they retreat into the bush. 

The copter drops Ortega off and he continues his assault on the compound where he systematically takes out all the guards. He spots Edwards and Jason on the run and pursues them into the jungle. Edwards tells the others to set up an ambush while he and Jason press on. 

Ortega uses the force and senses the ambush. He hears one of them, hiding in the mud, and takes them out. The last two bad guys break into a clearing and circle back to the docks. Jason's wounds are slowing them down, considerably. So when they reach the boat, Edwards takes the drugs and knocks him into the water when he tries to get on board. Edwards hits the throttle and speeds away, leaving Jason in his wake. (He got away again?!)

Ortega sees him in the boat and doubles back to the copter. Wo-Chen has already called in Martinez to mop up the drug lab. They take flight and quickly catch up with Edwards. And, as an audience, we tense up waiting for Ortega to drop into the boat and lock in a death duel with Edwards while the boat races for a waterfall, or crash on some rocks. Ortega simply pulls a pin on another grenade - drops it into the boat, causing it to explode. (Though it appears Edwards jumped clear, I think we're supposed to assume he's dead.)

Ortega tells Wo-Chen to circle back and find Jason. The spy him crawling along the beach. They drop Ortega off, so he can settle this, personally. 

He walks up to Jason, who tries to surrender because he's unarmed. Ortega flips him a gun and turns his back on him. Jason hesitates, for a moment, but Ortega hears the click of the gun being cocked - spins around - and shoots Jason in the leg. 

Jason drops the gun and collapses. He screams at Ortega to just go ahead and kill him if he's gonna. Ortega asks how does it feel? Jason starts his evil cackle and says "not as good as killing your wife" to which Ortega replies by putting a bullet into his privates. Jason grabs his genitals and rolls over, and Ortega puts two more slugs into his back for good measure. 

He returns to the compound and finds Wo-Chen and Martinez waiting for him. (And I still think they need to go and make sure Edwards is dead.) Seeing the carnage that Ortega wrought, Martinez offers him his old job back; but Ortega turns him down, saying, simply, my work is done. 

The End

I used to really get into the action movies of the '80s and early '90s. In my high school days, me and my buddies would watch anything and everything -- and the wilder the better. If the video box had explosions, fast cars, or someone holding a 50-caliber machine gun, with belts of ammo wrapped across his chest, surrounded by beautiful women with large, silicone-enhanced breasts, it got rented. It was a strange phase where I bought into the warped morality of it hook, line and blood squib.

At some point, though, I grew tired of it. How many times can you watch the same story of a [rogue cop, ex federal agent, or Zen-master bouncer] who has been [wronged, framed, or swindled] by a former [partner, commander, or crime lord] and didn't want to get involved until his [wife, son, or daughter] is [killed, kidnapped, or abused] or his partner of ten years (who is about to retire) is [killed, maimed, or revealed to really be the bad guy]? Vengeance is then dished out - with extreme prejudice, and a really bad pun.

A lot of movies fall under the criteria of an action film. So what the heck kind of movie am I exactly talking about? All action movies? No, heavens no. Something changed in the revenge film at the dawn of the '80s. An evil thing called "formula plots." Take a movie, any movie, from the last twenty years and run it through the paragraph above. If it remotely matches anything, then that's the kind of film I'm talking about. It has to be something special (like star Joe Don Baker), or I don't enjoy them at all and, in most cases, find them incredibly stupid and infuriating. (I will point out that HK and other foreign films with the same vibe are immune for some reason.)

I was so burnt out on this type of action movie, I came to resent them -- and their stars. I haven't seen an Arnie movie since The Last Action Hero (which I personally thought was a brilliant but Arnie obviously didn't get the joke.) Gave up on Sly long before Cliffhanger, and have seen one, and only one, Steven Segal picture. Of course there was my extended, yet bitter, affair with Chuck Norris movies but I don't like to talk about that. *sigh* Alright, I admit it, Invasion USA was one of the greatest movies, ever!

So the out for vengeance action movie is a sub-genre I've been avoiding; yet it is a bad movie goldmine that's ripe for the picking. This site has been neglecting them, and I apologize for that, and it's a situation I plan to continue to remedy with films like this one.

I will say if you need your actioneer fix I'll gladly direct you over to Dante's Inferno and the excellent job he's been doing bringing these movies to the masses. (Actioneer? Hey, I just invented a word!)

Slowly, I'm working my way back into the world of vengeful actioneers. It started after watching and truly enjoying Lethal Force, and followed that up by watching my first Andy Sidaris flick in about ten years, and then happily back-doored into this one.

One Armed Executioner commits some of the sins I've complained about but it has done nothing to turn me back off the genre. Writer, producer, and director, Bobby A. Suarez, teamed up with star Franco Guerrero for a series of actioneers shot in the Philippines, including this one, American Commando and Warriors of the Apocalypse (and Greywizard has a review of that right here.)

Guerrero makes a fine action hero and can hold his own, despite having one armed tied behind his back. (Is that what that ever present bulge is?) He sports a knock-off Bruce Lee haircut and wears all those polyester leisure suits rather deftly. He bears a strong resemblance to Rex Dart - Eskimo Spy, better known as the scientist's buddy, Goru, from Godzilla vs. Megalon. And poor Jody Kay. Not only does she get skewered here, but she went on to get her head lopped off in House of Death.

The action is fast and furious. The villains are sufficiently vile and extremely one-dimensional. Every blood squib is right between the eyes. Two bullet hits can cause a airplane to explode. Simple fragmentary grenades are packed with enough C-4 to bring down a small cathedral, and each explosion is so devastating, it distorts time, causing motion to visibly slow down (so we can see the two prerequisite bodies roll slowly away in the blast's shockwave.) 

There also wasn't a single quip, or bad pun, to be found in the whole movie and that was so refreshing.

All kidding aside, credit must be given to Suarez from some original thinking and ideas. I like the fact that it takes Ortega a while to recover from both his physical and emotional trauma. Suarez subtlety shows us how long Ortega has been on his drunken bender by the degeneration of his appearance. It's only by chance that Wo-Chen finds him, so this movie could have easily turned into the One Armed Reprobate. 

As the hero, Ortega is an amazingly complex character. He wants revenge but doesn't know where, or how, to begin. Wo-Chen charges him "You want revenge? You must earn the right to take it." Only an idiot would think, after losing an arm, that Ortega could march into the bad guys den and take them out. Again, he has to work hard to over compensate for his handicap and it doesn't come easy. Half the training footage is of Ortega failing, miserably. Time subtlety passes and Ortega masters the one-armed combat technique, yet he still relies heavily on Wo-Chen to set his revenge into motion.

It could have been paced a little better, the soundtrack toned down just a notch, and they really should have made sure that the bad guy was dead. Beyond that, One Armed Executioner is a fun, competent, and raucous entry in the good-guy-wronged-out-for-revenge canon. Best of all, it encourages me to get my butt back in the action aisle at the video store, making it a good choice for anyone else who was burnt out, too, and trying to ease their way back in.