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Remo Williams - The Adventure Begins

Remo Williams - The Adventure Begins

List Price: $14.95
Your Price: $13.46
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Remo Williams The Adventure Begins
Review: Very funny movie. Fred Ward was great but the best was Joel Grey. You won't regret this movie for an evening of fun.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fantastic Fun Ride
Review: This flm introduced me to Fred Ward and he is a great actor.This vehicle is perfect for him too, but Joel Gray stolethe show his character portrayal of Chiun is quite amazing!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: this movie rocks!!!
Review: if you are lookimg for a super movie look no futher ! this one has it all ,action ,adventure,the whole nine yards.Good vs evil what else could a movie junkie want? Take my word you will not be disapointed

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Based on The Destroyer by Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir
Review: In-accuracie's aside, I loved the movie, even though it doesn't do real justice to the Destroyer Series written by Warren Murphy and Richard Sapir. The method by which Remo is named and actually becomes a part of CURE is portrayed wrong in the movie. While he starts out as a police officer in both the books and the movie, Remo is originally framed for a murder he didn't commit, sentenced to die in an electric chair that didn't work, and then trained to be an assassin. All set up by CURE, the super secret agency that didn't exist, set up by a young president to battle organized crime outside of the Constitution. Conn MacCleary was a raging alcoholic and took his own life in a hospital, but only after he fell from the top of an apartment building. However, the movie does portray Chiun excellently, and the whets the appetite for more. Read the Destroyer series for the real story behind Remo Williams and Chuin, then you will view the movie in a whole new light and appreciate the premise.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Action/Comedy/Adventure abound in this ultimate dude flick
Review: Fred Ward plays a burnt-out cop recruited by Wilford Brimley's ultra-top-secret-government-assassin organization. His mission; eliminate a crooked Defense Department contractor. Kate (Star Trek Voyager) Mulgrew is cast as the bumbling army major/love interest of the film's "got his name from a bedpan" hero Remo Williams. The movie's most memorable scenes are those featuring the interaction of Remo with his assassin-instructor, brilliantly played by Joel Grey. This movie's perfect mix of epic adventure and silly humor place it in my top ten of all time.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Fun Film - Would Benefit from a Sequel
Review: A late-night cable favorite since its creation, REMO WILLIAMS has always been close to my heart and revisiting this DVD recently reignited my wishes for a sequel.

REMO WILLIAMS' strong point has always been its weakness as well. "The Adventure Begins" the title tells us up front, and presents a tale devoted almost entirely to character origin and development. Whereas lesser films would have thrown in a training montage across three minutes of film, Remo's lasts ninety. And it's not even over. Never "ready" to be unleashed as the assassin he's meant to be, Remo Williams spends the entirety of the film under Chiun's tutelage, forced into action only by circumstance. Only in the final minutes does he seem ready to begin the life he has been designed for.

How does this affect the film? Well, it will feel downright slow for the Fast and Furious generation weaned on quick-cut, shallow films like XXX which speed along from one explosion to the next. For those of us who used to read way back when and enjoyed seeing these pulpy characters fleshed out onscreen - as well as those of us who dug Kung Fu Theatre on Sunday afternoons (check out KILL BILL Vol 2's "Cruel Tutelage of Pai Mai" sequence for the heavy influence of Chiun), it means this is a simultaneous delight and letdown (the latter only because, realistically, we know there will never be a sequel to continue this story).

My only other minor criticism of REMO WILLIAMS is its relatively bloodless onscreen presentation. Not that I'm looking for gore, but for an assassination film, this one is very tame. On the upside, one could feel very comfortable sharing this film with pre-teen action enthusiasts.

The REMO WILLIAMS DVD is a bare bones, full-screen affair, but at its bargain price, who can really complain? You know what you're getting and it looks better than a TV re-run. A deluxe edition DVD would be nice but this viewer isn't holding his breath.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: His name was Remo and...
Review: First-this movie is far from getting it right.But just the fact that it was even attempted is enough for any Destroyer fan.I've always been a great fan of the paperback series-any series with a charachter like Chiun (pronounced CHYEEWN not CHYUN)can't go wrong.They at many times beat the world news on events that were going to happen.I really liked the movie in spite of itself.Grey did as fine a job as probably humanly possible for a cauc-ie actor portraying a nearly un-portrayable oriental charachter.The villains were alot like you encounter in the books ie: men in power who don't know what real power is and therefore must find out the hard way.Whoever cast Brumley (no offence to Wilford) is an idiot.Oh,and Kate was great-she stepped right outta the series-fine lady,beautiful woman & a wonderful actress.Alas, no sex or even full nudal frontity or even jellified villains eating their own firing guns with no hands,but hey,it's a Dick Clark production,and that's the reason why...and Guy,you Hamilton!!why could'nt you bring as much style and excitement to this as you did for Goldfingah.Which reminds me the theme song and soundtrack is sub-par to say the least.Who could write and sing a cool song out of a title like Remo Williams:The Adventure Begins,anyway.It should have been called His name was Remo and the script should have followed #1Created,The Destroyer up until the execution scene.Gotta admit the rest of this movie is really cool especially the carney played by William Hickey.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Remo is a fun film to escape to
Review: This film does not take itself seriously and you shouldn't either. Remo Williams is a lot of fun and it aspires to be nothing more than that which is great. Because of rising production costs, among other things, have forced studios to stay clear of movies that are made just for fun and focus on huge CGI effects blockbusters or long boring oscar winning dramas. All the easy going films that were so common in the 80's have gone away and it's a shame. Part of what makes Remo so great is that there is a complete lack of huge explotions, car wrecks, wire stunt action scenes, or CGI monsters. Remo spends more of its time dealing with the work of becoming a hero which, in this writer's opinion, is much more interesting.

I have never read the Destroyer series but you really don't have to to enjoy Remo. If you're looking for a giant action laced movie you may want to keep looking but if you are in the mood to see a fun, more grounded, how to become a hero, sort of film, Remo is perfect.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Good Movie, Poor DVD
Review: This is a nice DVD, if you don't mind that 27.9 percent of the original theatrical image has been removed for the DVD exhibition, so that the DVD image fills your entire 4:3 television screen (theatrical aspect ratio - 1.85:1; DVD aspect ratio - 4:3). If you're okay with that, enjoy!


Rating: 3 stars
Summary: An OK Artifact From Days Gone By...
Review: REMO WILLIAMS is a film extremely representative of its era...a time when Ronald Reagan, BETA VCR's, Cyndi Lauper and Linda Evans' shoulder pads all happily co-existed.

Ah, the 1980's...

But back to REMO...the film is strictly 'B', but given a slight edge due to its source (The Destroyer Book series), and a bit of unusual casting. Fred Ward is no classic leading man, but definitely more charismatic than other actors that were doing this kind of thing. Wilfred Brimley is miscast (you can almost picture him harboring a bowl of Quaker Oats inside that desk of his), and the talented Kate Mulgrew is sadly wasted. This leaves clear field for Joel Grey to steal the show, having a field day with his over the top Korean mannerisms and makeup (this would NOT fly in a 2004 film!).

The story limps along in places, the action a bit creaky, and, worst of all, there are production slip-ups galore (the wiring used on the Statue of Liberty is VERY noticeable, and remember the large glass window that Ward jumps through for him and Mulgrew to escape? Watch it shatter at least a half second before he touches it!) In spite of this, its a not-bad actioner that killed many an hour for people during cable's early heyday, and is still a serviceable little number today, although modern action fans may be a bit put off.

The Adventure ended for REMO WILLIAMS after this film failed to take off, but alas, we do have this moment in time to remember, enjoy, and perhaps chuckle a little at...


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