Iron Eagle (1986)

Directed by Sidney J. Furie. Starring Jason Gedrick, Louis Gossett Jr., David Suchet, Jerry Levine, Robbie Rist, Tim Thomerson, Larry B. Scott, Shawnee Smith, Melora Hardin, Lance LeGault, Michael Bowen, David Greenlee. [PG-13]

Preposterous right-wing fantasy where a teenager (Gedrick) steals an F-16 fighter jet and flies into a fictional Middle East country to rescue his Air Force pilot father (Thomerson), scheduled to be executed after getting shot down and captured. He’s joined by Gossett, a gruff-but-lovable Obi Wan Kenobi-esque Vietnam vet who “dies” during the rescue operation because the filmmakers have no confidence in the intelligence of the audience to see through the cheap misdirection. Although tempting to call this pic a Top Gun knockoff, it was actually released a few months before that movie; still, the slick dogfighting, rock score, and moral turpitude on the political stage certainly makes it “of a type.” The jingoism extends to one character denigrating the “gimpy, little countries” where the enemy “other” would hail from, a statement made right between a put-down of Carter and giving Reagan a cute nickname. The kid is lackluster, Gossett is way too good for the material, and the chief villain is an embarrassing stereotype; take away the fine aerial photography, and there’s no reason to watch except to give the eyeballs a “rolling workout.” Followed by three sequels.

33/100