Canon Films was a sensation in the movie industry during the 1980s. The ailing company was acquired by partners Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who quickly brought to the screen an eclectic array of low-to-middle range budgeted films. The company was not interested in producing high art and their range of product ran from exploiting the latest trends (i.e break dancing) to action movies aimed squarely at audiences that weren't too discriminating and who just wanted some fun flicks to indulge in. Sometimes their films sank at the boxoffice but more often than not they returned a good profit. Occasionally, they hit paydirt, as in their successful efforts to make Chuck Norris into a bankable leading man. The studio also became a one-stop employment agency for the aging Charles Bronson, whose glory days with the big studios were over. Cannon Films gave Bronson a new lease on life with a seemingly endless string of urban crime thrillers. Some were lousy (the "Death Wish" sequels) while others proved to be rather good and that Bronson still had the power to attract audiences. Golan and Globus weren't chasing Oscars, just good return on investment. By the late 1980s, however, the formula was showing signs of stress. The partners decided to go a bit upscale by securing the screen rights to famed adventure novelist Alistair MacLean's 1981 novel "River of Death". The film sank at the boxoffice but, like many Canon films, has enjoyed popularity through home video and streaming. MacLean, who passed away in 1987, was, for a while anyway, a surefire name to attract movie audiences via such high profile titles as "The Guns of Navarone", "Ice Station Zebra" and "Where Eagles Dare".
"River of Death" is set in the mid-1960s and presents Canon's in-house hunky action star Michael Dudikoff as John Hamilton, a freelance adventurer-for-hire who is engaged by a disparate group of suspicious people to help them find a legendary lost city deep in the inhospitable Amazon jungle. His primary client is Heinrich Spaatz (Donald Pleasence) who presents himself as a Holocaust survivor who lost his family in the Dachau concentration camp. However, due to a dramatic prologue, we know that "Spaatz" is actually a surviving member of the Nazi high command. Ostensibly, the group is supposed to be investigating the outbreak of a mysterious disease that is devastating a tribe in the jungle. In fact, Spaatz is trying to locate his old nemesis and fellow surviving Nazi big wig Dr. Wolfgang Manteuffel (Robert Vaughn) who had schemed with Spaatz to abscond with treasures of the Third Reich during the hectic final days of the war. However, Manteuffel double-crossed him and left him for dead. Spaatz suspects that the mad doctor is with the tribe, where he is unleashing his quack medical experiments with deadly results. We won't belabor the plot other than to say that the group Hamilton is leading includes two gorgeous blonds and a local American ex-pat Eddie Hiller (L.Q. Jones), who is an expert helicopter pilot who can deliver the group to where they will embark on the Amazon up river by boat. Needless to say, there are plenty of revelations along the way and the streetwise Hamilton is suspicious about the group's motives. They also meet the local corrupt police chief Col. Ricardo Diaz (Herbert Lom), who is determined to find out what the group is really up to.
I have not read MacLean's novel but it becomes clear that it was inspired in part by Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", as was "Apocalypse Now", which explains why there are similarities between this film and Francis Ford Coppola's classic. Under the competent direction of Steve Carver, the production is better than most Canon fare. The movie was supposed to be shot in Brazil, but the penny-pinching Golan and Globus decided they could shoot it in South Africa for lower costs. That's because South Africa was an international pariah at the time due to its unspeakably cruel apartheid practices. Major movie studios refused to shoot films there, but Carver, claiming his was "non-political" took the job and ended up getting sanctioned by the Director's Guild of America. Carver came to rue his decision before that happened simply because of the inhospitable locations he had to film in. He would later say they were so dangerous that it was amazing no one in the cast and crew was murdered. Nonetheless, this particular Canon film has some higher production values than most of the studio's fare. It also has some genuine suspense and impressive cast. Dudikoff makes for a suitable leading man and he can actually act. The film also benefits from the likes of Pleasence, Lom and Jones, all of whom have meaty roles. Although Robert Vaughn gets second billing, he only appears briefly in the prologue and again at the finale, filling the role of the Colonel Kurtz-like figure who has managed to preside over a tribe of savage warriors. In Manteuffel's case, however, he isn't regarded as the god-like figure Kurtz was. Rather, he enforces his control over the tribe with an army of heavily armed neo-Nazis.
I don't want to overstate the merits of "River of Death" because when one reviews a Canon production, your thumb has to firmly placed on a scale in terms of comparing it to most of their films. However, the movie moves at a brisk pace and contains some genuinely exciting action scenes. In the finale, you get to see an iconic T.V. hero, Napoleon Solo (Vaughn) squaring off against an iconic Bond villain, Ernest Stavro Blofeld (Pleasence). For that memorable moment in pop culture alone, the film is worth viewing.
("River of Death" is currently streaming on Amazon Prime and MGM+.)
