Directed by: Hall Bartlett
Starring: Michael Landon, Laura Gemser, Jürgen Prochnow
One of my favorite side effects of the modern information age, where just about every old piece of media is available for consumption, is all the shitty made-for-TV movies that are out there, but nobody really wants to see them. So what do they do? A couple companies decided to burn them to the cheapest DVDs possible, sell 50 of ’em at a time for ten bucks and if they sell a couple, they’ve made back their investment. And I just happen to be the one guy who wants to see all those shitty movies nobody likes. In a way… I’m a HERO.
Michael Landon (of Bonanza fame) is an American reporter and spy in Laos during the Vietnam conflict, and he falls in love with a native girl. Unfortunately, the communist leader of the area, Jürgen Prochnow, is also in love with her and challenges the American to a boxing match. The German (why is a German there?) loses the fight, so he captures the American and exiles him from Laos. Michael Landon’s plan to get back to his love is simple: learn how to scuba dive, then scuba dive his way into the Laotian village to rescue her! It goes off without a hitch… until the military forces guarding the village shoot him.
I don’t really get what the guy’s plan was supposed to be. He wasn’t going to sneak the girl out because he didn’t have an extra set of scuba equipment, and also they made a big deal out of having to train to get good enough at scuba-ing to get in there in the first place. So… what was his plan? Just… go in there and get shot, I guess? Also yes, this does mean that there is a ton of underwater scuba diving footage in this movie, and yes, it is extremely boring.
Films in Boxes 
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