“Remo Williams” was one of my great guilty pleasures of the 1980’s. When I was younger I used to read a lot of ‘The Executioner’ and ‘The Destroyer’ series. They were wonderfully violent and bloody, not that they did anything to warp my young mind. (By then it was a little too late.) It was a Saturday afternoon back in 1985 when I went to the theatre to see “Remo Williams”, which was based on the aforementioned ‘Destroyer’ series. Well, loosely based. I enjoyed the film so much that I went back to see it 3 times. I almost immediately bought Tommy Shaw’s (STYX) second solo album because it had the “Remo Williams” theme song. Then when it came out on video, well, take a guess. Was it a great movie? Not really. But I enjoyed the heck out of it, nonetheless. In “Remo Williams”, Fred Ward plays a streetwise cop who is saved from death, and given a new face and identity as part of his recruitment into an ultra-secret government organization whose purpose is to ‘remove’ the trash and corruption, as it were from amongst the rich and powerful.

He is placed under the training of an aged Korean martial arts master with an affinity for soap operas, played wonderfully by Joel Grey. His performance is hysterically funny and the rapport between the two is terrific. The makeup job on Grey, by the way, is perfect and makes him almost unrecognizable.

The film also stars Wilford Brimley as the head of the organization, and a pre-Star Trek Voyager, Kate Mulgrew as an Army Officer who becomes Remo’s unwitting ally in his first mission. Watching the movie for the first time in over ten years, I was also surprised to catch a cameos by the then unknown Reginald VelJohnson as an ambulance driver who gets his rig stolen.

When “Remo Williams” first came out, the idea was that it would be the start of a series of movies. When I left the theatre that first day, I was totally jazzed that there were going to be more adventures. Sadly, it was not to be. The movie did poorly at the box office and critics panned it. (What do they know?) This was to be the first, and only Remo Williams adventure.

Even after all these years, it stayed on my DVD wish list and when I saw that MGM was finally going to release it I was ecstatic. I actually sat down with my wife to watch it the day it arrived, making sure to tell her little about it. I was curious to see if she would enjoy it as much as I did, which I felt would legitimize my love for it.

As it turns out, “Remo Williams” still gave me that same kick I felt as a kid, and in spite of some of it’s dated technology (computers and such) was still one heck of a fun movie. My wife enjoyed it, as well, so now I know I’m not crazy. I’ll grant you that it’s not the greatest movie ever made, and parts of it are even kind of silly, but I viewed it like one of those old pulp novels of the 30’s and 40’s where the hero could do things that were right on the border of unbelievable.

The one other thing that makes me feel a little better about liking the movie is that regardless of how many people said it was awful, there’s a whole legion of fans out there who, like me, would still go see a sequel if they made it today.

If I have one disappointment with MGM’s release, it’s in that it is in full screen with no extras except for an original theatrical trailer. But I understand that it might not be a big seller, so it wouldn’t have been a good idea spending a lot of time and effort to put out a more extensive set. The good thing about this, though is that the disc is priced low enough that maybe, just maybe enough people will see it and realize what a cool little movie “Remo Williams” really is.

Directed by: Guy Hamilton
Starring: Fred Ward, Joel Grey, Wilford Brimley, Kate Mulgrew
Extras: Original Trailer
Specifications: Full Screen,
Studio: MGM
Release Date: 7/15/2003
Region 1
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Website

We'll give Remo Williams a B-.