Missing in Action 2: The Beginning (1985)

Missing in Action 2: The Beginning (1985)

 

Starring: Chuck Norris, Soon-Tek Oh, Steven Williams, Bennett Ohta, Cosie Costa, Joe Michael Terry, John Wesley, David Chung, Professor Toru Tanaka
Director: Lance Hool
Action Director: Aaron Norris

 

Filmed back-to-back with the first Missing in Action, this was originally supposed to the first movie in the series. However, the producers came to the conclusion that the “sequel” was better than the first movie and released it first. This film was released the following year as a prequel, telling us the story of how Col. James Braddock got captured by the Vietnamese and gained his reputation in Vietnam as a war criminal. Their hunch was correct: Missing in Action was a mammoth success and this one, while modestly profitable, probably worked better as a follow-up.

The film is set in Vietnam (played by the Philippines) during the latter days of the war. Col. James Braddock (Chuck Norris) leads a helicopter into enemy territory to pick up a platoon under heavy fire from Charlie—or the North Vietnamese (the film isn’t exactly clear). The helicopter is damaged by gunfire, forcing Braddock and the other soldiers to bail over a lake. They are subsequently captured and thrown into a prison camp.

Braddock’s fellow prisoners include Nester (Steven Williams, best known for Jason Goes to Hell and the “It” TV movie), Mazili (Cosie Costa, of Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins and Survival Run), Opelka (Joe Michael Terry), and Franklin (the late John Wesley, of “Superhuman Samurai Cyber Squad”). There’s another soldier (probably John Otrin) who tries to escape early on. He makes it as far as rope bridge across a waterfall before he meets his end at the hands of a guard armed with a flame-thrower. It doesn’t take long for Nester to go turncoat, convinced by the evil General Yin (Soon-Tek Oh, of The President’s Man and Beverly Hills Ninja) that Uncle Sam has forgotten them.

As Braddock is the highest-ranking officer among the prisoners, General Yin makes him an offer: sign a declaration of guilt for war crimes and he’ll let him and the others go. Braddock holds out, confident that someone will come to rescue him. General Yin can’t have any of that, so he begins a campaign of torture—both psychological and physical—against Braddock and the others in hopes of breaking down their spirits. If hard labor under the hot tropical sun isn’t bad enough, Franklin catches malaria and Yin refuses to treat him. Yin also does dastardly things like burn letters from Braddock’s wife and undress the prisoners in front of hookers so they (the hookers) can laugh at them. The torture scene most people will remember is when Braddock is hung upside down and then has his head placed in a burlap sack together with a hungry swamp rat.

The turning point comes in the form of Franklin’s malaria. It gets so bad that Braddock has no choice but to sign the declaration in exchange for medicine. But then General Yin goes back on his word: he injects Franklin with poison and has him immolated in front of the prisoners. Now, all bets are off the table. Braddock escapes the camp and wages a campaign of guerilla warfare against his enemies. This time, we win!

Missing in Action 2 is a decent prequel to the first movie, although it’s no Deer Hunter. The film is divided into two halves: the initial ordeal at the prison camp and then Braddock’s subsequent one-man army sequence. I suppose the first few scenes can serve as a sort of truncated first act. Chuck Norris is his usual self: a bit wooden, but he gets the job done. He’s been worse in other films. The film does one-up the first film in that it has a consistent villain throughout, instead of killing both main villains before the big action sequences. The film’s low budget is apparent, mainly in arming the North Vietnamese with American M-16s and Israeli UZIs, as opposed to Russian AK-47s. That little detail made me lift an eyebrow—I’m guessing that got whatever the local armorer (probably the same guy who worked for Cirio Santiago)—had on hand. But it still manages to end on some nice, big explosions.

The action was staged by Chuck’s brother, Aaron, as is par for the course for his films. People looking for Chuck’s martial arts will mainly have to wait for the final showdown between Braddock and General Yin, which is surprisingly well choreographed. Chuck does his usual solid tang soo do kicking, plus the two share some nice-looking (by 80s Hollywood standards) exchanges of punches and blocks. The gunplay is pretty standard stuff for that era: fire a machine gun (or assault rifle) in the bad guys’ direction and several stuntmen (including Jeff Yamada) fall over. Sadly, the imposing Professor Toru Tanaka, who had fought Chuck a few years earlier in Eye for an Eye, doesn’t square off with Norris a second time. He just gets shot to death. Boring!

Missing in Action 2: The Beginning doesn’t quite match the level of spectacle as the first film, even though it probably has a lot more heart. Thankfully, the next film in the series would manage to one-up both films in both departments. Unfortunately, audiences seemed to be growing bored with the standard one-man army model by then.