Commando (1985)

A 1985 American action film directed by Mark L. Lester and produced by Joel Silver. The film stars Arnold Schwarzenegger as Colonel John Matrix, a retired special forces operator living in the American mountains with his young daughter Jenny, whose quiet life is interrupted by a former colleague’s mercenary operation. The film also stars Rae Dawn Chong, Dan Hedaya, Vernon Wells, Bill Duke, and James Olson.

Commando was released theatrically on October 4, 1985, by 20th Century Fox. It received mixed reviews at the time of release but has since developed a substantial cult following for its commitment to high-concept action, its body count, and its accidental status as one of the most-quoted and most-referenced 1980s action films. The film is a foundational text of the 1980s action cycle and the closest thing to a perfect commercial action film the studio era produced.

What the film does

John Matrix is a retired black-ops colonel living with his young daughter Jenny in a remote mountain cabin. The film opens with Matrix and Jenny hiking through the woods, in a brief sequence of domestic life that establishes the father-daughter bond and the isolated setting. The present-tense conflict begins when Matrix’s former commanding officer General Kirby calls to warn him that someone is after him. Kirby is killed before the warning can complete.

The first act is the kidnapping. A mercenary team led by the machete-wielding Bennett (Vernon Wells) takes Jenny, kills a friend of Matrix’s, and forces Matrix to undertake an assassination of the president of the fictional Republic of Val Verde. The kidnappers are working for a former Special Forces operative named Arius (Dan Hedaya), who is involved in a coup in Val Verde. Matrix is given 36 hours to complete the assassination, after which Jenny will be killed. Cindy (Rae Dawn Chong), a flight attendant who witnesses the kidnapping, tries to help Matrix and they become the buddy-action team of the middle and third acts.

The second act is the flight. Matrix and Cindy trace the kidnappers to a marina, where Bennett is moving the body of Matrix’s murdered friend. The marina sequence is the film’s first big set piece and includes a long, flamboyant wood-chipper sequence that the film commits to without a single cut away. The flight continues through a mall, where Matrix acquires a rocket launcher, a saw, and a gas mask from a surplus store. The mall sequence is the film’s most-quoted piece of staged action, in part because the absurdly large weapon and the unconcerned mall shopper pattern around him became the template for the postmodern action film.

The third act is the assault. Matrix tracks the mercenaries to a remote island, with the Val Verde coup scheduled to begin the same day. The assault sequence is a long, slow-build of action that delivers the film’s body count. The film ends with Matrix holding Jenny, the mercenaries dead, the coup aborted, and Benny killed in a climactic chainsaw duel. The final sequence is the dropped weapons in the surf and the father-daughter reconciliation on the beach.

Why it’s in the canon

Criteria blend is 1+3, loved it and want to remember it. Commando is a foundational text of the 1980s action film. The script is functional rather than good. The performances are purposeful rather than nuanced. The dialogue is the kind of single-line exchanges that the 1980s action genre specialized in. The film is in the canon because it does what it sets out to do with a commitment no other 1980s action film quite matched.

The film is a Joel Silver production. The production values are meticulous: the stuntwork is brutal, the choreography is long-take, the camera is patient, the sound design is loud. The violence is committed to without apology and without moral condemnation. The film is not interested in the political ramifications of the Val Verde coup, the training of the mercenaries, or the cost of the violence on the bystanders. The film is interested in the catharsis of well-staged action.

James Horner’s score is one of the great 1980s action scores: the bass choir, the synthesizers, the recurring martial theme, and the quieter interlude for the father-daughter scenes. The score is integrated into the action in a way that the genre rarely achieves. The mall scene in particular, with the score shifting to a deliberately lighter comedic register, is the film’s most rewatchable stretch.

Arnold Schwarzenegger gives the kind of performance that the cult following has come to appreciate: deadpan, deliberate, and physically committed to every stunt. The mall sequence is the film’s most iconic moment and the moment the culture has been parodying for forty years. The film is also a Rosetta Stone for the 1980s action film formula: the isolated hero, the kidnapped loved one, the ticking clock, the buddy character, the high-body-count third act, the apocalyptic finale, the final family-of-two embrace. Almost every 1990s action film bears some trace of Commando’s template.

The DVD is a 20th Century Fox release picked up secondhand. The film holds up as both a 1985 moment and a paradigm example of the 1980s action genre. The DVD is the canonical home-video version.

A note on the image

The hero image is a 16:9 still from Letterboxd showing the film’s central action image. The source is a high-key daylight image, baked at the canonical factor 0.45 from a source pre-darkened to factor 0.80 to land the output at brightness 33.8, within the canonical 25-35 daylight range. The pre-darkening is documented in the hero_attribution field so future agents do not re-investigate.

On hand

Yes, DVD only. No digital or download. A 20th Century Fox DVD release picked up secondhand.