Review of Cobra (1986) by Harry W — 06 Sep 2014

Although it was not one of Sylvester Stallone's more favoured films, I figured Cobra would be an interesting look back at his earlier career.

With a film like Cobra, all you can really hope for is the possibility of maybe some good action scenes and some gimmicks surrounding the fact that Sylvester Stallone plays the lead role. I remember having seen the film many years ago and recognising it as the first Sylvester Stallone film that I particularly disliked. That carried on to this day but even stepped it up.

Cobra is Sylvester Stallone's attempt to turn Beverly Hills Cop into a serious action vehicle, and it shows because there are moments where it is difficult ot tell whether Cobra is a legitimate action film or a cheesy 80's tale. Part of this is because of the 1980's feel that the film presents due to its atmosphere a lot of the time, and more specificalyl because of what the soundtrack of the film brings. While it features some good pieces such as John Cafferty's "Voice of America's Sons", they never really make a presence which seems appropriate. To add to the 1980's feel of the film, there are too many scenes edited to seem like music videos while these out of place 80's musical pieces play out in the background. Cobra ends up being really just a mix between some of the elements from the Paula Gosling novel Fair Game and elements of Beverly Hills Cop channeled into a Sylvester Stallone vanity project, and it shows because the focus is scattered and does not legitimately focus on being a film which is singurlarly one of the aformentioned genres. It's serious intentions clash with its atmosphere, and it makes the experience unsteady without being entertaining.

The antagonists in Cobra are a group called the "New Order", defined by Wikipedia as "a group of social darwinist psychopaths that despise modern society and believe in killing the weak". Any sensible person watching Cobra would realise that such a label is actually just a ridiculous ruse for a group of nameless and faceless characters who stand in the sewers and clang their weapons together to make noise instead of actually getting out and commiting criminal acts with any sensibility. Even a bad movie villain requires a justifiable purpose to be antagonising his or her enemies, but in Cobra there are none except for the fact that the enemies are a senseless cult of people who hate weakness and hypocritically target those who cannot defend for themselves. The enemies that challenge Sylvester Stallone in Cobra are arguably the worst and least creative that he has pitted himself against in any film. The enemies in the film park motorcycles in the handicapped spots, prey on people who are no threat to any sort of society and as I mentioned, hide underground and smack weapons together senselessly. The enemies in Cobra combine with the tone of the film to essentially render it all a self-parody, but unfortunately it is not bad enough to classify as good-bad entertainment.

In terms of writing, Cobra comes up short in every area. Usually for an action film I have no trouble looking past the lacklustre qualities of a bad story if it can justify itself with enough positive elements, but the film is entirely overrided by its poor writing. Cobra is ridden with cheaply sketched characters, antagonists with ridiculous intentions, a generic screenplay and an excessive reliance on the tropes of the genre. In the 1980's, action films experienced a breakthrough, but Cobra is not one of those films which assisted that in happening because it is not thrilling and cannot be taken seriously, but above all it is distinctly lacking in the appropriate fun that fans will hope for.

The product placement in the film is obvious as well, with the references to Coors beer and Pepsi being so blatantly clear in the intro scene. It's kind of funny in that sense because it adds to Cobra's dedication to being an unintentional comedy, combining with the elements it maintains from being an overly 80's film.

Really, the only element of the film which comes off as being really that enjoyable is the fact that Cobra has a broad colour palette to it. There is a lot of subtle life in what is captured thanks to strong scenery, the only problem is that it is buried beneath plenty of other shoddy elements.

What usually saves a film like Cobra from being a complete bore is the action, but Cobra does not make use of any that is really that good. The majority of the action in Cobra is quintessentially shots of characters firing weapons cutting straight to what they hit. Essentially everything that every bullet hits in the film is shown. Little actual impact is made by all the action, and while it has some minor fin moments, as a whole the style is not good looking and is way too repetitive with insufficient cinematography and slow editing which really does not give any kind of exhilerating atmosphere to the film whatsoever. The action in Cobra is not fun enough to live up to the standard that Sylvester Stallone usually sets and is more reliant on shady camerawork and too much slow motion than on the fun of seeing bullets fly and knock enemies down. So Cobra already fails as a film, but as an action tale, it is not good either.

Cobra features one of Sylvester Stallone's lowest quality performances. The film requires him to be at his most shallow and monotonously agressive in the role of Marion "Cobra" Cobretti, and so that is essentially al lhe brings to the part. His involvement in the film is really half-assed. Even in his many other shallow action vehicles he actually makes an effort to be involved in the material by mixing intense line delivery with physical involvement. Sylvester Stalloe simply seems like most of what he does in Cobra is just loitering as he is so emotionless that he is nothing short of a hulk. The thing is that usually a Hulk puts up a good fight, and in Cobra Sylvester Stallone simply does not do that. Sylvester Stallone does not give a strong performance in Cobra or make a compelling hero whatsoever, and so the question of how much he really tried comes into play because the entire film looks like it comes off as a chore for him as everything seems tacked on. Sylvester Stallone does not have enough charisma or passion for the material this time around and it seems as if he just trying to pass through the film and get a paycheck. Everyone does it at some point, and Sylvester Stallone could do a lot worse than Cobra, but either way his lead performance does not satisfy.

As Cindy Crawford would later repeat in the following adapdation of Fair Game, the female protagonist of the story can really never be played well. Brigitte Nielsen is not convincing enough to play the damsel in distress. She has a certain attractive quality to her in the real world, but in Cobra they do nothing to emphasise it whatsoever. And since the character she plays is also an extremely thinly sketched one, there is really no other value that her presence would make aside from her sex appeal. And despite scenes with minor elements of appeal as they depict her in skimpy clothing, there is not appropriate emphasis on it. Briggite Nielsen does not have the appropriate look in Cobra to really supply sex appeal, and her abilities as an actress extremely limit her ability to convincingly portray a damsel in distress. Brigitte Nielsen has rarely ever given a good performance in her life, with the one positive one of her career coming from her role as one of the central antagonists in Beverly Hills Cop 2. In Cobra however, she reminds us why she never was able to build a career off of that. Her marriage to Sylvester Stallone helped progress her towards a nepotism ridden career which was short lived, much like their marriage. Brigitte Nielsen does not make Cobra any better than it already is, and her poor performance just reminds us all why she is no longer active in films.

For a married couple, Sylvester Stallone and Brigitte Nielsen have minimal chemistry. The entire concept of the romantic tension between them is ridiculous as it is, but the fact that for two people who are married they are so uninvolved with each other that it is pathetic. No spirit comes from the two lead actors in Cobra because neither of them make a good effort, and so it is no surprise that they fail to make an effort with each other.

So thanks to indifferent performances, a terrible script, an excess of reliance on every cliche in the book, poor action scenes and some of the dumbest antagonists to ever cross into the world of cinema, Cobra is a spectacular failure.