Eye Candy #8 - "Megaforce"

Megaforce: You will believe a motorcycle can fly…Few movies resonate with “1980’s cheese” stronger and louder than “Megaforce”. I may have watched this movie 2 to 3 dozen times growing up, I lost count. It was silly, unabashedly jingoistic, with a paper-thin plot that read like a rejected GI Joe script. It was a happier time when capitalism was king, knowing was half the battle, and good guys could wear silk headbands without looking silly (how the hell else will you tell who he is if everyone wears the same helmet?). Megaforce is a multinational force of soldiers who ride souped-up dune buggies and motorcycles into battle against the forces of evil. It is a comic book come to life staffed by 80’s stalwarts like Barry Bostwick, Persis Khambatta, Edward Mulhare, and Michael Beck. They spout terrible, terrible dialogue, including some of the most obtuse, clumsy sexual innuendo ever to fly over my 7 year old head and some bad jokes I can quote to this day. Even the venerable Henry Silva is here, as the Guevara-like Guerera. They are a Republican’s wet dream, able to go anywhere and dominate any enemy through the power of righteousness and their very white teeth. Megaforce operates out of a secret base in the American desert. Unsurprisingly, to make the best use of their Nevada shooting locations, they fight all their enemies in what appears to be the American desert, too! The special effects are laughably bad. When we get a flying motorcycle, we also get some of the worst blue screen footage EVAR. When they need to run the vehicles in “stealth mode”, what do they do? They just TURN THE SOUND OFF THE FILM. If you watched this and “Red Dawn” on a double bill, you will learn why the Soviets never bothered to invade the US. Don’t get me wrong - I LOVE this movie with every fiber of my being. It may be my favorite Hal Needham movie, above “Hooper”, above “Smokey and the Bandit”. Someday if we’re lucky, we may finally see this on DVD. Woodchuck sez, “Oh, you have to see this train wreck.”