Cobra

A brief note on Cobra, as that's all it deserves. Anyone who has seen Cobra knows that its an utterly ridiculous film. Its a film that a movie star or big-league director makes at the top, when no-one says no, that's a bad idea. (sort of like The Hobbit, or Costner with The Postman).

It's Stallone's most bizarre film that I've seen (haven't yet viewed Over The Top, but don't worry, eventually I will.) The film makes no sense on all sort of levels but its at its most ridiculous when Stallone sets up his character. Its literally an insane number of bizarre tics that are unintentionally hilariously funny. He's a man with a tooth-pick always in his mouth, who drives a 1950's car with a passion that is deeply suspect, who responds to the most basic question about following the law with contempt. (The film is astonishingly right-wing). He has dialogue with his partner that is half-written and is literally gibberish. This kind of thing goes on for 45 minutes of utter insane behaviour, that feels like a parody of the cop cliches but is deadly serious. Then there's 45 minutes of dumb scenes of shooting people, which are crass, unexciting but strangely enjoyable in their demented fury.

The most absurd element is Stallone's home. He has police files in his home, which can be broken into at any time. He has a newspaper, which he places in his barbacue for safe-keeping. He eats a small bit of pizza for breakfast (which he then cuts one part of to save the rest for later). Inside an egg box he has his gun cleaner. (He cleans his gun a lot he he he). This film is a wall to wall example of an actor being completely egotistical and not noticing his own blind spots. Luckily he had a few movie bombs and returned to playing the underdog, which is the position he works best in with movies. But Cobra is one to see for demented actors at work.