Hooo boy.
This 1986 actioner starring the iconic Sylvester Stallone as Marion “Cobra” Cobretti was a favorite of mine when I was a kid. It was a “too young to watch” staple for me along with films like Predator, the Lethal Weapon films, the Die Hard films, and the Rambo films among others. I can track most of my cinematic preferences back to a movie I saw as a child I had no right seeing at the age I saw it. Ahhhh, the days of cable and channel surfing unsupervised…
The film is about the titular hero tasked with protecting a woman who has been targeted by a gang or murderous cultists who have been terrorizing the streets of L.A. for weeks with a seemingly random, violent killing spree.
Having not seen it for years and years, watching it on Blu-Ray thanks to the Shout! Factory release from some years back was liking discovering it all over again.
It’s always fascinating what time does to old cinematic favorites once the sheen of childhood wonderment wears off. Some films hold up and you find new things to appreciate about it. Other films sadly crumble into dust before our more cynical and jaded eyes and are best left in the junk drawer of hazy, halcyon memories.
Where does Cobra land on that spectrum? That’s tricky, because I still love it, just not in the same way I did as a kid.
Through the undiscerning and youthful eye, this film was just one hell of a cool, badass watch. It was dark and violent and awesome. As an adult, the sheer self-serious nature of the film lends an unintentional humor to it that is impossible to ignore.
Cobra can almost work as a satire of 80s action films it’s so on-the-nose. Stallone (who wrote the script) and director George P. Cosmatos (who also directed Rambo: First Blood Part II) craft the titular character almost as if they wanted to lampoon the genre. Cobra is a stoic, no-nonsense, tough as nails cop who doesn’t play by the rules. He’s cool under pressure. He rocks badass shades, drives a custom hot rod, and is pretty much never without a matchstick in his mouth — which replaces the more stereotypical toothpick other protagonists of other films always have in their mouths.
Cobra is a badass who can get the job done like nobody else. Which also means he’s constantly butting heads with his incompetent bosses. Oh, and he pretty much mostly speaks in one-liners. Seriously, around 50% or more of Stallone’s dialogue here could be the cool tagline on the poster of VHS box art.
The film hits so many cliched beats we’ve seen in dozens and dozens of films of its ilk that it takes on an irony so complete, yet so completely unintentional that you can’t help but admire it. It’s like a McBane film come to life.
Despite all of this, what makes Cobra work, and ultimately hold up is the confident hand of Cosmatos and the oddly vulnerable at times performance by Stallone. The latter half of the film does some much needed legwork in humanizing Cobra when he’s not spitting out zingers and barbs to the his bosses or partner. He’s a hardass. He’s a one man army. But dammit, he’s sensitive! Awww! They even attempt to give him a genuine sense of humor.
Cosmatos is something of an underrated director. He infuses Cobra with real, tangible mood and tension. The first half of the film almost comes across as a straight-up slasher film, as The Night Slasher (played by the perpetually sweaty Brain Thompson) and his cohorts victimize the helpless citizens of the L.A.
The film is slick and loaded with atmosphere. The extended hospital stalk and chase sequence is genuinely suspenseful. The horror and action elements work surprisingly well together and never feel disparate. Cosmatos also does the legwork in giving L.A. a personality here, it’s not the bright side of the city. Here, it’s all dark underpasses, and looming, vaguely menacing skyscrapers.
The action is bombastic in the typical 80s way. Lots of bullets, fire, explosions, and stunt people flipping, falling, and flying about. The highlight action set piece is the car chase centerpiece of the film and the moody as fuck final showdown in a foundry. It’s very reminiscent of the ending of Terminator 2, now that I think about about. And T2 didn’t come out until 1991.
The cast in the film is also game, which makes the cornball datedness go down smoother. Stallone is in top form and can handle goofy one-liners the like nobody else. Brigitte Neilson (who was married to Stallone at the time) is somewhat underappreciated here as Ingrid. While not given much to work with, she really goes on all in on her Final Girl-esque role and sells the fear incredibly well. She’s also smart enough to get herself out of a jam, which helps give her character a bit more agency than the premise of the film would seemingly allow. She’s also the one to initiate the obligatory romance with Cobra, not Cobra himself.
The aforementioned Brian Thompson is awesome as The Night Slasher. A maniac of few words, he’s all brawn, sweat, and intense staring. He’s an intimidating baddy that is integral to Cobra’s lasting cult appeal.
Oh, and it also has an amazingly cornball soundtrack to boot. Angel of the City by Robert Tepper slaps hard.
I usually hate this phrase, but with Cobra it’s apt. This film is all style, no substance. All it’s concerned about is being a slick, badass 90 minutes of 80s bravado. And boy does it encapsulate 80s action film bravado — maybe even moreso than a film like Commando -which seems to be the go-to “Omg look at how ridiculously 80s this 80s action film is!” conversation starter. Its Reagan era machismo is astonishing to behold in this day and age, which makes Cobra a relic of a bygone era that many fans of action cinema lament the absence of.
I don’t. I’d rather these films remain time capsules. They’re more special that way.
