The latest chapter of the Trials and
Tribulations of Donna Hamilton brought us a very enjoyable caper
involving gun smugglers, transvestite assassins, a murder mystery
that led to Las Vegas, and Erik “Motherfucking” Estrada. All of
this fun came at a high cost however, as we lost our beloved Taryn
to... huh. They never actually said, did they? They didn't even
MENTION HER ONCE! BASTARDS!
Andy Sidaris went all out for 1991's Do
Or Die, not only did he bring Erik Estrada back into the fold, he
added Pat Morita as well. Honestly, I'm only excited about Estrada
returning as it's REALLY hard to even hear the name Pat Morita and
not be reminded of the utter abomination that was Jay Leno's Collision Course. That movie left SCARS, deep deep scars.
Let's hope I don't start getting PTSD-style flashbacks when I see
him as I undertake A Ghoul Versus Do Or Die!
We open with Donna and Nicole getting
down at a luau, but their fun is interrupted by a musclebound thug
that tells them they have a visitor outside. Not the least bit
suspicious by this, they find Pat Morita is the visitor in question.
He immediately announces he's going to kill them for messing with his
criminal operations and WOW we are just leaping headfirst into things
aren't we? Morita has his goons pull out guns and execute the two
agents, thus ensuring he can continue his illegal activities for
years to come with no opposition.
Cue the credits.
YEAH. RIGHT. No, Morita announces
he's hired SIX teams of assassins tasked with hunting the women,
because he's sporting like that. And by sporting, I mean incredibly
stupid. Donna even calls him out on this, probably because she's
sick and tired of this franchise and wants out, but he replies he
wants to best them at the top of their game because he's all about
that fair play. There is NO WAY POSSIBLE this will backfire on him,
I promise!*
*Promise not valid on any day of the
week that ends in “Y”.
This does lead to an epic exchange
between Kane, Morita's character, and Nicole where she yells at him
that he's mad. Kane glowers at her and responds with “You are
dead!” with all the grace of a sixth grader. He has the agents
released, telling them the game will begin at noon tomorrow. Holy
shit, we have some high stakes going on in this thing already! I
wonder how Donna and Nicole will deal with the doomsday clock that is
now ticking over their heads? Call in the DEA to mount a
counteroffensive? Leave Hawaii to hole up in a safe house somewhere?
Get naked and hop into the good ol' jacuzzi for a soak? If you
DIDN'T guess the correct answer, I think you need to read some of my
previous reviews for the Andy Sidaris Collection.
Donna calls Lucas, who wants them to
come in to Vegas by dawn because they're in a DO OR DIE situation.
Hey, just like the title of the movie! Nowhere near as clever as the
bit they did for Savage Beach but I'll take it. Kane returns to his
base of operations, where his busty assistant Silk informs him the
goons planted a tracking device on Donna's watch back at the luau.
Silk is played by Carolyn Liu, who was never a Playboy Centerfold but
did appear in videos for both them and Penthouse. Gee, I wonder if
that means we'll be seeing her topless in a few scenes? Anyway, a
tracking device doesn't seem that damn sporting Kane! What about
fair play?
The sun rises so Donna and Nicole hop
in their jeep to GTFO of Honolulu, but they are best upon by a
helicopter containing the first team of assassins. No worries
though, Nicole pulls out her cane (she sprained her ankle during the
encounter with Kane) and... fires a missile from it that destroys the
chopper?! Alright, sure! Nicole seems more upset that the game
started before noon than the actual attempt on their lives. They
head to the airport so they can catch their flight to Vegas, making
this the second straight film we get robbed of seeing Hawaii's serene
beauty for the entire picture. Say what you will about the earlier
Sidaris films, you sure as hell can't say they were gorgeous to look
at.
My question about if we'll get to see
Silk's nipples or not is answered as Kane gives her a naked massage.
He's wearing all of his clothes, fortunately. I don't think I could
take a nude Pat Morita at this point in his career. Their inane
conversation about her body and the power of massage is cut short by
an alert on her computer, which shows assassins Duke and Woody have
entered the “Death Zone”. BEST. NAME. EVER. Since Duke and
Woody didn't bother to get introductions, I paused the movie so I
could have the names of everyone else. Looks like Donna and Nicole
will have to defeat the teams of Ava and Skip, Bodreaux and Hebert,
Spencer and Dudley, Hotdog and Sledge, and Lew and Chen before they
get a chance to take out Kane.
Our agents arrive at
the airport, changing into some dark wigs and clothes that actually
do a pretty good job of concealing their identity. Lucas and Bruce
meet up with a Colonel Rico Estevez, the name of Estrada's character.
Sadly neither of the men comments how much he looks EXACTLY like
Juan Degas, because the resemblance is uncanny. Lucas requested
Rico's help on this latest bout of criminal shenanigans because... I
don't know, he's Erik “Motherfucking” Estrada? Lucas does put
the fear of God into me when he mentions Rico is less than a year
away from retirement, so let's hope that ugly trope doesn't rear its
head at the end of the movie.
In Vegas, Ava and Skip get word that
their targets have arrived. Ava, who is a top heavy brunette played
by actress turned sex therapist Ava Cadell, gets naked because of
course she does. They're parked in a trailer at an air show, which
is where Donna and Nicole show up to meet Norm, a fellow agent. How
in the world did the assassins know where the agents were going to
go? Just how advanced IS that tracker in Donna's watch?! Can it
read minds? Ava loads up a gun, telling Skip she's going to “blow
the tits off” the agents. I like her style already!
Norm gives the agents a trunk full of
weapons and they drive off, Ava and Skip following them in a
Volkswagen Beetle for a chase scene. A very confusingly edited chase
scene that is highlighted by Rico and Bruce appearing out of nowhere
in a dune buggy to turn the tide and send the assassins to the Death
Zone. Donna and Nicole drive on, their tits fully intact. I gotta
say I'm not super impressed with the quality of Kane's handpicked
hitpeople. They sure as shit aren't explosion proof IN THE
SLIGHTEST. When Kane gets the news of the latest failure, he
speculates maybe he fucked this whole thing up. YA THINK?
Rico and Bruce fly Donna and Nicole
somewhere in a scene that only exists so the women can strip in the
plane, which is damn near the trademark of the series. At least
they're not in the middle of a lethal hurricane this time. We learn
they're flying to Louisiana, where Lucas will assemble a support team
to help them. This takes us to a club called Cowboys, where Edy is
singing a song as is her fashion. She doesn't look as showstopping
as she did in the last film, this time she's in some kind of bizarre
cowboy themed white lingerie outfit she probably borrowed from a WWF
valet of the time. We get a SMASH CUT of her having sex with Lucas
in what might be the single most abrupt scene change in a Sidaris
film.
Elsewhere in New Orleans the next set
of assassins get the word the agents are in the area, and okay,
exactly HOW is this working? Kane can't have a pair of hitmen in
every single city in the world, because the computer only showed six.
This indicates he CLEARLY knows exactly where Donna and Nicole would
be traveling, which makes no sense at all! Hawaii to Vegas, sure as
that's been established already. But New Orleans? Maybe Kane used
to work for the DEA and has a working knowledge of the rule book
governing where to go in case a Japanese crime lord throws you into a
game of life or death. I think it's on page 134. These assassins are played by returning
actors Chu Chu Malave and Richard Cansino, playing the team of
Bodreaux and Hebert. IMDB has it spelled
Herbert, but Silk's computer said Hebert so that's what I'm going
with.
And no, they're not cross-dressers this
go around. They JUST HAPPEN to be undercover as cooks at a place
called the Big Pines Lodge, which is where all of our agents JUST
HAPPEN to show up to get their grub on. Our new assassins plan to
poison their catfish, which is seems like it's about to work until
Nicole feeds some to a conveniently placed cat in the lodge. The cat
drops dead, which is BY FAR the only death in the Sidarisverse that
actually made me sad. The agents storm into the kitchen to find the
cooks, leading to a banjo-filled foot chase. Its joined in progress
by Lucas and Edy, as well as everyone's favourite actor Shane and his
new partner Atlanta Lee. Atlanta is played by the notorious Pandora
Peaks, an adult model/actress boasting 42HHH sized breast implants
that was very popular in the 80s and 90s. 42HHH?! I assume she must
have had a titanium spine implanted as well to maintain those things.
Many failed attempts at comedy later,
the assassins are caught and taken into custody, yet Silk's computer
still shows them entering the Death Zone. Maybe the agency car they
were put in got t-boned by a semi off camera? The agents sit down to
discuss how they can't trust ANYONE at this point, but get bored
pretty quick and start flirting with each other since these people
have the attention span of goldfish. Ultimately they decide to hole
up in a lake house, even though they JUST GOT DONE saying they can't
even trust each other but whatever. I honestly am barely paying
attention, this film is DULL with every capital letter possible.
The next batch of assassins shows up
but quickly get dispatched in some of the most tedious “action”
you'll ever see. Things go from the extreme of boredom to horror as
we do indeed get a Pat Morita sex scene, and now I want to go back to
the grave. THANKFULLY this is brought to a screeching halt by Silk's
computer announcing Spencer and Dudley are the new residents of Zone
De La Muerta, which once again prompts Kane to look fucking pissed.
WHAT DID YOU EXPECT?! You knew Donna was the best of the best, none
of these deaths should be news to you.
The next morning Lucas, Edy, Shane, and
Boobs (I forgot her name) head out to a meeting point to get a
shipment of advanced guns from the agency, and I THOUGHT YOU GUYS
WEREN'T TRUSTING ANYONE! GAH, this freaking movie. Edy borrows
Donna's watch as they leave, so hopefully Assassin Duo #5 can track
them and thin out this cast some. Do you hear that, Shane?! I can't
even say I'd miss Edy as she's done NOTHING this entire film. Wait,
scratch that. After having to endure a looooooooong Shane/Boobs sex
scene, Edy single handedly kills the next group with two dead on
shots. That's pretty cool, but unfortunately the shootout that led
up to it lulled me into a near coma so I just don't care.
That's just leaves Lew and Chen, Kane's
right hand men. Now packing some serious heat, Lucas decides to move
everyone to his house in Dallas because... I have no fucking idea,
Sidaris wanted to catch a Cowboys game? After threatening to become
interesting by having the agents start accusing each other of being
Kane's mole, the movie returns to terminal blandness by having Edy
discover the bug in her borrowed watch. Now they're all friends
again, yay! Donna and Rico celebrate by having sex and/or practicing
their synchronized swimming moves in a pool, I'm not quite sure what
was going on there. Morning dawns and it's a NINJA BATTLE! Things
do NOT go well for the highly trained warriors, I think you can sum
it up in the scene where Nicole wails on one with a baseball bat and
quips that she's Batman. Hmm, it's a little too late to save this
movie but I appreciate the effort.
It's pretty obvious they ran out of
money and time at this point, as the next seen has Lucas rolling out
the trademarked Sidaris exposition by announcing they've traced Kane
to his headquarters AND got Silk to help plant a tracker on him so
they can detail his entire criminal empire. WOW! Maybe the whole
movie should have been done this way, it could have been over in
minutes and spared us the last ninety minutes of... well, nothing. A
quick wrap up of the cast toasting each other and cracking TERRIBLE
jokes sends us out of Dallas.
Cue the credits.
At six films in, the Sidaris formula
has officially worn itself out. Looking back, I miss the insanely
convoluted plots because at least THOSE kept me vested trying to
figure out what the fuck was going on. These last few have been
completely straightforward and basic plots, but when you have one of
the most unlikable casts ever assembled in one picture, it is HELL ON
EARTH. What do we know about Donna or Nicole? How about Shane, Edy,
or Lucas? I know Bruce really loves motorcycles, does that count for
anything? Besides the fact they like to get naked a lot in the face
of impending doom? These characters have no character, and all I can
think is LORD I MISS TARYN.
You know what the WORST fail of this
movie was? And no, it's not using Erik Estrada for a grand total of
maybe ten minutes, it's the assassins. With the exception of Hebert
and Bodreaux, they were all GENERIC AS FUCK! How in the hell were
they not all stacked Playmates with tons of wacky personality traits
and extravagant gimmicky costumes? THAT'S a movie, not a bunch of
middle aged white guys that totally suck at their jobs and couldn't
say anything clever even if it was written by Joss Whedon.
Generic as fuck works for everything
else going on here too, every single actor feels like they're going
through the motions and I'm sure they are as these films were made
yearly. I'd be worn out too of doing the exact same thing over and
over again... exactly like I am watching Bullets, Bombs, and Boobs
over and over again. Still two more movies of Donna and Nicole until
the new blood takes over, so let's see if we can survive them intact.
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