Search - Pacific Inferno on DVD

Japanese, American, Filipino

E. Drake | 03/03/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is a low-budget blaxploitation flick, with very little of what you may come to expect of a blaxploitation movie. There were about two soul/funk songs, a brief encounter of racism and another brief encounter of a beautiful actress with very little sexual tension stirring. For language buffs, Japanese is spoken as is a language of the Philippines, which may or may not be Tagalog. I also recall a sentence or two in Spanish, though I may be mistaken. This version of the movie is very grainy, which adds to the already unappealing nature of the movie. This is not to say that this was a horrible flick, however don't get ready to see a good one either. For 2.99 in a supermarket's DVD bin, I felt it worth the buy for nothing more than another blaxploitation movie added to my collection. On a last note, there are two fun scenes worth mentioning. One where Jim Brown plays on his football days and catches, passes and runs with a bomb, the other, a surreal scene of deep water floating goat carcasses."

Bottom of the barrel dreck

F. J. Harvey | Birmingham England | 02/29/2008

(2 out of 5 stars)

"This movie about World War 2 in the Pacific was made in 1979 but did not see the light of day until a video release in the mid 1980's .Jim Brown -who also co-produced the picture -plays Clyde Preston a US Navy diver compelled by the conquering Japanese to lead a team of largely US divers in diving in Manila Bay to recover the consignment of silver dumped there by MacArthur to ensure it did not fall into Japanese hands .The team includes Zoe (Tim Brown),the composed and astute Dealer (Richard Jaeckel) and the argumentative Dennis (Rik Van Nutter).Aided by the local Filipino resistance they set out to delay and sabotage the project ,a key role being played by atractive and feisty Tita (Dindo Fernandez)of the resistance .The Japanese lose patience and call in the big cheese to sort things out.

Jaeckel apart this is poorly acted and the direction is soporific.The use of anachronistic songs on the soundtrack is also an irritant especially that bombastic sloganeering pile of musical pigeon poop Edwin Starr's "War"( A desperate bid for "relevance"perhaps.?)

Action scenes are poorly staged and the one plus point is the location shooting in the Philippines .The scenery is splendid but unfortunately some rather poor actors spend too much time standing in front of it and obscuring the view



Best avoided unless you are a Pacific war completist in which case it has curiosity appeal"