Light fun
Rottenberg's rotten book review | nyc | 01/25/2002
(3 out of 5 stars)
"Chappy Sinclair (Louis Gosset, Jr.) returns in "Aces: Iron Eagle III". Leaving the hi-tech F-16's of the first 2 flicks behind, Chappy spends his time flying restored WWII fighters in air shows along with wartime veterans of the Luftwaffe (Horst Buckholz), the RAF (Christopher Cazenove) and the Japanese Air Force (Sonny Chiba). He also works with at risk teens nearby a local USAF base. When one of Chappy's friends is shot down and killed, the retired ace realizes that there's a conspiracy linking a drug cartel south of the border and the corrupt officers running the nearby air force base. The cartel is run by an ex-Nazi air ace (Paul Freeman), and essentially occupies a picturesque central-American village and its inhabitants. Gathering the "aces" together, and arming their museum-piece planes with real weapons, Chappy and gang head south where they make short work of the drug cartel's private air force, destroy their ground base and save the town. It's innocuous fun - less Top Gun than an overlong episode of the "A-Team" - though not as much fun as the first flick. The flight scenes are so-so (real aviation fans will quickly realize that Horst Bukholz's german plane gets very little screen time because it's obviously a Mustang; they could have just used a dressed-up T-6, but it would look too closely like the one that's supposed to be Sonny Chiba's
A-6M), but this movie doesn't come out on cable any more so I guess it's worth a rental."
Silly fun
Beantown Jim | Florida | 03/01/2008
(3 out of 5 stars)
"The Iron Eagle series of films was a silly premise, contrived to get the elements of ground combat, air action, and a tacked on mystery plot all in one movie vehicle. Unless you were really into seeing aircraft go thru the motions, it never quite worked. The 3rd in the series, reviewed here, is a thin plot and sop to politics in Latin America. If you like "hardbody women"(as do I), and Rachel McLish in particular, then you may find this pretty hot(there are no nude scenes or even anything approaching that though). She was in great shape and was one of the true "prima donnas" of woman's bodybuilding. So, like her: buy it; else: don't bother.."
Best of the Lot
Beantown Jim | 10/21/2001
(3 out of 5 stars)
"Face it, the Iron Eagle movies were B-quality movies, but IE3 was the best of the lot. Any movie that features World War II fighters is sure to attract my interest. The plot of IE3, like the other IE movies, is quite shallow, and sometimes cliche. That still doesn't take anything away from the fine aerial battles between propeller planes and jets. Some folks have found it impossible that the former could take on the latter, but it has happened in real life."