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Is It Really That Bad?

So. You want to watch a pre-MCU Marvel movie.

The time before the MCU was truly a Wild West, so you have all sorts of bizarre offerings to choose from. Of course there’s the Blade trilogy, which covers a whole range of quality from good to bad; you have the Ghost Rider duology, a pair of campy supernatural action films where Nicolas Cage turns into a flaming skeleton; you have three different Punisher films of varying quality that all get Frank Castle at least to some degree; and you have Howard the Duck. But maybe you’re looking for something truly weird, obscure, and strange…

No, not that one.

Not that one either, that’s too obscure.

There we go!

In 1990 we got a film featuring the first Avenger, directed by cult filmmaker Albert Pyun and with a budget of only three million bucks. This tiny budget meant a lot of corners had to be cut, the script was constantly changing, the film had to be shot in Yugoslavia, and worst of all Stan Lee’s cameo had to be cut. And what’s the end result of this? A film that grossed barely over $10,000 and left many staff members at Marvel extremely disappointed. It would be a little over two decades before Steve Rogers was unfrozen for another ride, and this film was left to languish in obscurity. Hell, the only reason I know it exists is because it was the subject of an early video from the Nostalgia Critic.

But in the spirit of America, in the spirit of redeeming crappy old Marvel movies, and the spirit of cashing in on the release of the new Captain America film, I decided I’d finally check out this bizarre piece of Marvel’s history to find out if this really is as bad as critics say it is, or if this hero film is a lot more super than previously imagined.

THE GOOD

The biggest thing that stood out to me while watching this is that Captain America and Red Skull are genuinely perfectly done. Let’s talk about Skull first, since he’s a bit more mixed.

His makeup is extremely weird, but we only see it in the first quarter of the film, and his backstory is unexpectedly tragic seeing as he’s a boy forcibly orphaned by Italian fascists (yes, he’s Italian rather than a German Nazi) and turned into a super soldier through torturous experiments in a backstory that is vaguely and ironically similar to Magneto in a lot of way. But those things aside, he very much feels like a megalomaniacal comic book villain, complete with dramatic speeches and a truly dastardly plan. You see, he—a fascist foreigner—wants to mind control the United States president and use him as a puppet to rule by proxy. Thankfully, nothing so ludicrous as a foreign fascist using the president as a puppet could happen anywhere but in the world of comic books and their movie adaptations!

It really is Scott Paulin’s performance that carries the character. Yes, it sucks that Red Skull’s skull is not actually red outside of the World War II scenes that kick off the movie, but with how deliciously menacing he makes the guy it’s hard to be too upset. He may not have the look, but he has the wickedness down to a T.

But more impressive, and the thing that stuck out to me the most, is how good Matt Salinger is as Cap. I wasn’t expecting to be blown away, but boy did Matt knock his role out of the park despite the script and budget not always letting his Cap go as hard as he should. His simple refutation of Red Skull mocking everything he stands for—a simple rebuke of “I care,” delivered with conviction and sincerity—is so fucking good that it’s worth the price of admission alone. Salinger also nails the sweetness and corniness of Steve, such as genuinely complimenting his now elderly former flame by telling her she’s still beautiful or just in general having a cheesy fish-out-of-water charm of a man from the 40s transplanted into the 90s. I love Chris Evanas to bits, and his Cap is one of the best parts of the MCU… But I think Salinger might actually have done Cap best. If nothing else, it's very funny seeing a Salinger prevent presidential assassinations instead of being blamed for them (yes, Cap is The Catcher in the Rye author's son).

Ronny Cox as President Kimball is probably the biggest surprise in the cast, though. You’d expect the kidnapped president of the United States to just be a helpless plot device or even a dick, but no! Kimball is badass and resourceful, escaping on his own and being utterly willing to die just to foil Red Skull’s plans. When he finally gets to meet up with Cap near the end, they also have a really fun little dynamic going on. It’s so easy to make a shitty, unlikable douchebag president so it was just refreshing seeing a noble, selfless, and likable one, even though such a thing makes it glaringly obvious this is a work of fiction.

THE BAD

Look, this is a low-budget action movie and it shows. The action scenes are few and far between, and when they show up you can see where a lot of the corners were cut. Not to say there’s nothing good, but when half of the scenes feature Cap running away rather than kicking everyone’s ass, you know there’s a problem. There’s also a lot of really bad acting, particularly from the non-Red Skull villains. Like these guys just have awful line reads. And don’t get me started on the wings on Cap’s helmet. I am more charmed than mad at how silly it looks, but I’d be remiss not to mention it.

Of course, the bigger problem is just some of the weird creative choices. Changing the Red Skull from a Nazi to a fascist Italian lab rat is the big one, as is only letting him keep his iconic look for a brief window. While the latter is presumably due to budgetary reasons, the former is strange because while his new backstory does garner him some sympathy it’s just… not really dealt with at all? Like it never comes up after the opening, at least not until Cap weaponizes his trauma to give him PTSD flashbacks in the climax. It’s not glaringly awful but the fact they do pretty much nothing with it and have Skull be a scheming, unashamedly evil supervillain makes this feel like a forced attempt to garner pity from the audience.

Then we have Cap. Yes, Salinger does a great job with him and makes him extremely charming and likable, especially in the corny ways Cap should be, but the writing of the film also kind of makes him a dick in a couple of moments. I am of course referring to the two times he fakes carsickness in order to jack a car. Yes, seriously. I think people do harp in this too much—it’s not a huge dealbreaker and both times he is at least a little justified as to why he does it—but it is so strange to see Cap do something so petty and ridiculous that I have to mention it. At least it’s pretty hilarious.

IS IT REALLY THAT BAD?

So. You thought I was going to hate this movie.

For the first time I held a poll asking what viewers of my blog predicted what my opinion of the film would be, with the negative option winning by a very slim margin. Considering this movie’s reputation, it’s easy to see why, especially since as a big superhero movie fan and an ardent MCU defender I at least try and have some standards. But as a B-movie lover and a trashy cinema aficionado, it was pretty impossible not to be charmed by this film.

Yes, this film has tons of issues because of its tiny budget. No, this is not some pitch-perfect adapatation or an awesome action showcase. Yes, it is unbelievably corny. But I think in the vein of the unreleased Fantastic Four movie, this film has something a lot of other superhero films of the time don’t: Heart. This film has personality oozing from every pore, and for everything it does poorly or weirdly it makes up for with how well it understands core aspects of Steve Rogers and Red Skull. Salinger and Paulin really do carry this film, their acting paving over the cheap action and the janky acting of the villainous goons.

If you like cheesy 90s B-movie action films, you will love this. As the world’s only unironic Street Fighter fan, I am definitely deep into that category, and so I think this film is definitely worthwhile. I gave it a 7/10, but I think realistically it should be in maybe the high 5s or low 6s. This is a cheap, janky film, but it is full of heart and charm. It’s hard to love, but it’s damn near impossible to hate. At any rate, it's always interesting to go back and see what superhero films were like back in the day before they had to be cogs in an overarching franchise.

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