I knew better. I freaking knew better! After the debacle I
put myself through with Dan Haggerty and Elves, I knew I should have stayed the
hell away from One Man War (formerly Macon County War). The release from
Retromedia looks as good as it possibly can but the disc is as light on special
features as good ol’ Grizzly Adams is on willpower. I didn’t learn anything
from my fellow Head Cheesers. I should have recognized the name Bret McCormick
from Peggy Christie’s review of Repligator but, like always, I ignored the
signs in front of me and put this freaking disc into the player and,
subsequently, have had nothing but mush-mouthed thoughts of apathetically
delivering lines, poorly done action scenes and a plotline that would make
Doris Wishman snort in derision. Oh and the title… I’ll get to that later. Damn
you, Dan Haggerty, damn you.
Plot synopsis: Cole Jackson (Dan Haggerty) comes into his
hometown a broke folk musician (not broke enough to stop shoving Krispy Kremes
in his face, but broke nonetheless). He hooks up with his brother, Nathan
Jackson (Benton Jennings) and his beautiful, platonic life partner (Malinda
Bryant). Yeah. This flick has the sex appeal of Santa Claus. Moving on.
Haggerty gets shot and is in a hospital bed for the majority of the film. His
brother, meanwhile, involves himself in stopping some pollution, moonshining,
making a deal with duplicitous Federal agents, solving the mystery of the dead
animals, getting into truck chases, getting shot himself, being kidnapped and
tortured and, finally, getting set up to be murdered. Meanwhile, the platonic
life partner wakes up Dan Haggerty, gives him a shotgun, and they go and ‘rescue’
the brother, who, while handcuffed, kills the bad guys, saves the day and keeps
Haggerty from dying. Yeah, this was a One Man War, but it was Grizzly Adams’
slightly better-looking, and thinner, younger brother that waged the war. Shit.
For the limited amount of time Haggerty was on screen,
though, he never fails to disappoint. Every line was delivered as if he was at
the tail end of a booze and coke bender… which he probably was. Add to that
McCormick’s brilliant direction and you’ve got yourself a redneck action film
that not even rednecks would enjoy. Half of the cast has to be locals
interested in seeing how them thar Hollywood homos make them movin’ pictures!
At least Benton Jennings went on to a pretty successful character acting
career. He cut his teeth on this one!
Did I like it? Of course I liked it… you can’t intentionally
make something this bad. That is a special gift that only a few filmmakers
possess (and I am guilty as well).
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