FlashCallahan
Charlie, a Korean War veteran, is paid to drive a truck which is transporting plutonium from Nevada to Arizona. But there are a bunch of terrorists who want to steal the truck, and all of its contents....Thunder run is the cinematic equivalent of one of those £2.99 spectrum games you used to get from the chemist when you got your pocket money.It does exactly what it says on the tin, hardly any build up, straight forward plot, and bad guys that seemingly get progressively harder as the film reaches its climax.It's completely silly, the first twenty or so minutes are absolute nothing more than bonding between grandfather and grandson, but as soon as they get in the truck, it's mindblowingly brilliant in an 'only in the eighties' way.We get girls on bikes cooked to death, guys in dune buggies with missiles attached, and the actual truck filled with pound shop gadgets such as barrels filled with explosives, flame throwers, and a ram at the front.And then it finishes.It's not brilliant, but if you want something to entertain in a way that Cannon films did, you'll find something to entertain here.
jeimages
The only reason I remember this movie is because it was (and still is) the biggest waste of time and money ever spent. I was 17 and my friend was 18. We were the age when action movies were our thing to enjoy most (ok 2nd most). We walked out feeling so insulted, we wanted our money back, but the time could never be regained.The editing is what killed this movie. As the truck gets attacked by more and more vehicles with rocket launchers attached the movie completely insults the intelligence of the audience by having these rogue bad guys in 4x4 VW Bugs shooting rockets at the truck. Please, rockets at a truck known to be carrying plutonium? What's worse is the these VW's manage to get 15-18 shots off of a 4 rocket launcher. You would see on VW with 4 rockets fire 2 of them, cut around the truck with the last one attached, come back a second later with two rockets attached, fire another, then go in front of the truck and now it's back to a full set of 4 rockets.We toughed it out hoping for a big finish that never happened. It looks like they just ran out of money and stopped.Just ridiculous.
halhorn
The low budget, the synthesized soundtrack, the emphasis on action scenes over script...it has to be a Cannon studios action film from the 1980's!Forrest Tucker was one of the key action stars for Republic Studios in the 1950's. In many ways, Republic was the Cannon of its day. Like Cannon, it specialized in low budget action films, occasionally luring a big star from other studios (John Wayne, for example) and eventually overextending itself with pricey flops (i.e. "Jubilee Trail" and "Fair Wind to Java") and going bankrupt. Almost 30 years after leaving Republic to do a series of films for the British Hammer studio, Tucker's theatrical swan song would be his lone action effort of the 1980's."Thunder Run" is hurt by its low budget and inexperienced director (Hudson was doing his first feature), but many action sequences deliver the goods; terrorists chase Tucker through the desert, Road Warrior-style, in VW beetles equipped with heat-seeking missiles; Tucker jumps over a moving train in his 18-wheeler; "space age plastic" and some well-placed Molotov cocktails are among Tucker's defense mechanisms; and the chief terrorist is played by Dharma's TV dad (with a scar on his face, so we'll know he's the bad guy).MGM/UA has been slowly, but surely releasing Cannon's 1980's output on DVD, but this classic slice of cheese has yet to be released. Hurry up, MGM/UA! This one is not to be missed!A fun chase movie and a fitting farewell for veteran action icon Tucker (Cannon would do the same for another long-time action icon, Lee Marvin, in THE DELTA FORCE the same year). 7/10
Haplo-4
This must be one of the most enjoyable B-action movies I have seen. I first saw it in 1986 when it was new on video in Sweden and I have never manage to forget it - even if that was 13 years and a lot of other movies ago. The plot is easy - just 100% action all the time with as little focusing on the actors as possible. The movie is about a truck-driver who has agreed to transport plutonium to some outback testing ground, and there are many badguys who want to get their hands on that plutonium. To aid him in the transport he has a very well equipped truck and a lot of fuel. The actors do perform an okay job and the movie really isn't any worse than the other more costly productions. So I must say that watching it is one and a half hour acceptably well spent.
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