THE MOVIE

The late 80s-early 90s certainly was a boom time for the big action flick.

Movies like Predator, Commando, & The Running Man not only helped establish a certain Governor of California as a movie star, but also helped establish the action flick as a decent money maker.

So in 1988, a man we had seen play second fiddle to the two biggest action superstars of the time, Arnie (Predator) and Sly (Rocky), stepped into the spotlight to become a star in his own right. That man was Carl Weathers, and the movie was Action Jackson.

Carl plays police sergeant Jericho “Action” Jackson, an officer best known for his “hands-on” approach to dealing with crime. His nemesis here is auto tycoon Peter Dellaplane (Craig T. Nelson), a nasty piece of work who is killing all who stand in his way of political power. When Jackson gets too close to the truth, Dellaplane has him set up for a vicious murder, which turns the respected sergeant into a wanted man.

In his quest to expose the tycoon and clear his name, Jackson is aided by Dellaplane’s beautiful young mistress Sydney (Vanity), and along with the help of a few other friends, it isn’t long before Jericho puts together the puzzle and makes Dellaplane understand that no one messes with Action Jackson.

To be honest, the story is nothing to write home about. It’s the usual evil businessman versus good cop tale that was popular at the time. And let’s face it, Beverly Hills Cop did it before, and did it better. There are positives though, such as some nice action sequences and snappy dialogue that help give the film a bit of life, but some of the performances (well, one in particular) tend to let the team down.

Carl Weathers looks tremendous and does a fine job as Jericho Jackson, as does Craig T. Nelson as our big bad and Sharon Stone in her limited role as his wife. Vanity however, is a different story. After seeing her performance in this it came as little surprise to find that her film career since has been...shall we say...limited.

If you’re a fan of action movies back then you’ll notice a lot of familiar faces here too. Bill Duke, Robert Davi and Sonny Landham just to name a few. Hey, even Biff (Thomas F. Wilson) is here…

The film itself is not excessively violent, so the “R” rating is a bit of a mystery. I get the feeling that if this film was resubmitted to the OFLC today; it’d probably get through with an “MA”.

Speaking of classification, this disc is dual-coded for regions 4 and 2, and I did get a little concerned when I discovered that the run time of this disc was the exact run time of the UK cut version. We all know how the BBFC love to snip-snip.

But after getting some very helpful information from the BBFC, I discovered that this disc suffers NONE of the cuts imposed on the UK video version (all butterfly knife scenes intact). Good news for a change.

As for the movie itself, Action Jackson is very much a product of its time, with lots of action, big explosions, a few funny one-liners and little in the way of plot. It may not be the best example of the genre you’re likely to see, but Carl Weathers is a charismatic lead and helps provide the film with a certain appeal.

THE TRANSFER

Video:

Action Jackson is presented at 1.78:1 (very close to its original theatrical aspect ratio of 1.85:1) and is 16x9 enhanced.

For a 15 year old film, it looks pretty decent. In fact, it’s better than I expected.

Things do look a little dodgy early on with a healthy smattering of small film artefacts, and some rather drab colour reproduction. That doesn’t last long though and the majority of this transfer shows a good level of colour, along with a nicely clean and clear image, revealing a source print that contains an impressive lack of film artefacts overall. Grain may be omnipresent but it’s never so distracting that it intrudes. Black levels are pretty solid too.

There are even some instances when I’d say it looks rather wonderful with some nice bright colours and a real sharpness to the picture.

This movie is contained on a single layer disc, so no layer change to worry about.

It may not be quite able to compete with the video transfers of the latest blockbusters, but Action Jackson shapes up quite nicely on our lovely discs.

Audio:

Action Jackson is presented with Dolby Digital 2.0 audio at 192kbps.

At first glance I was disappointed to see a 2.0 track at such a low bit rate for an action movie such as this. But surprisingly, it’s not too bad at all.

Both music and action sequences actually sound pretty good. If you’ve got the right setup for it, the surround-encoded 2.0 track does redirect some bass to the subwoofer and audio into the surround speakers. There is some satisfying thud during the action scenes and the score is often audible in the rears. Quite nice.

There does appear to be one trade off for this however, and that’s dialogue. It’s not only lacking in fidelity, but it’s also very quiet in the mix leaving some of the actor’s lines a little hard to discern. Action Jackson himself Carl Weathers isn’t too hard to make out, but for some of his co-stars you may want to find the subtitle option on your remote. That's not so nice.

It’s certainly not a bad audio track (especially where music and action is concerned), but I think we could have at least hoped for a slightly higher bit rate and cleaner dialogue.

THE EXTRAS

The rather generic Warner Brothers main menu reveals nothing to speak of.

SUMMARY

Action Jackson is a perfectly reasonable example of the “big action film” that was so dominant in the late 80s – early 90s. The video is surprisingly good, the audio pretty decent for a low bit rate 2.0 track, and the extras as impressive as Vanity’s acting ability.

Along with the good video and audio, this title has a most impressive price point, making Action Jackson a popcorn movie well worth checking out.