Firewalker (1986) Cannon/Action-Adventure-Comedy RT: 105 minutes Rated PG (language, some action/martial arts violence) Director: J. Lee Thompson Screenplay: Robert Gosnell Music: Gary Chang Cinematography: Alex Phillips Jr. Release date: November 21, 1986 (US) Cast: Chuck Norris, Louis Gossett Jr., Melody Anderson, Will Sampson, Sonny Landham, John Rhys-Davies, Ian Abercrombie, Richard Lee-Sung, Zaide Silvia Gutierrez. Box Office: $11.9M (US)
Rating: *
The action-adventure-comedy Firewalker wastes no time at all in establishing how stupid its two main characters are. In the opening scene, treasure hunters Max (Norris, Missing in Action) and Leo (Gossett, Iron Eagle) are staked to the ground in some unnamed desert by a cartoonish Asian villain referred to as “The General” (Sung, Dynamite Brothers). He leaves them to bake in the hot, burning sun with Max holding a bottle of Perrier water. They can’t drink it because their hands and feet are tied to the stakes. What do they do? Max breaks the bottle so he can use one of the shards to cut through the bindings. Wouldn’t it have been easier to just slip the bindings off the stakes? That way, they would have had the Perrier for their long trek out of the desert. A smart person would have thought of that instantly. Evidently, we’re not dealing with smart people here.
The opening is just one of many blunders made by Firewalker, a dopey Indiana Jones knock-off that almost makes Cannon’s Allan Quatermain movies look good, emphasis on the “almost”. The plot, such as it is, has the two incompetent adventurers seeking a fortune in hidden treasure at the request of Patricia (Anderson, Flash Gordon), an attractive woman with an old map that leads to a cave on a Native American Reservation. There, they find a magic dagger that leads them to the fictional South American country of San Miguel. That’s followed by a few near-death experiences on a plane, train and automobile until they finally reach the temple where the cache of golden treasure lies.
The villain of the story is a large, Native American named El Coyote (Landham, 48 Hrs). He’s described as a “cyclops” because of his eye patch. In the most noticeable continuity error, the eye patch switches back and forth between eyes throughout the movie. Sometimes it’s on the left eye; other times the right. Didn’t anybody involved in the production of Firewalker, at any time, notice this? Did they really think we wouldn’t? Wow, just wow. ANYWAY, El Coyote is insane. He believes himself to be directly descended from the Aztecs and needs the dagger to become a “firewalker” or some such nonsense. I gave up on the plot about a third of the way in. Finding coherence in Firewalker is even more of a challenge than finding gold in some remote area of the world.
The man partly responsible for this mess of an action-adventure-comedy is J. Lee Thompson, the director of such classics as The Guns of Navarone and the original Cape Fear and, in later years, non-classics like The White Buffalo, The Greek Tycoon, Happy Birthday to Me, King Solomon’s Mines, Murphy’s Law and Death Wish 4. He also did a couple of Planet of the Apes sequels. I checked the list twice and not a one of his lesser movies is as bad as Firewalker. Watching it is painful. It’s never easy watching a movie as inept as this. By way of example, let’s pick up right after Max and Leo free themselves from their binds in the desert. We see them walking away, talking about having a beer at some bar in Arizona. In the very next scene, they’re sitting in that bar in Arizona having a beer. How did they get out of the desert? Did they walk hundreds of miles without water? Did somebody rescue them? We’ll never know because it’s never mentioned again. When an action-adventure film opens this badly, there’s little hope anything that follows will be any better. Then there’s the stupidity of it all. It doesn’t even have the courtesy to get its facts straight. For whatever reason, the writer thinks the terms Aztec and Mayan are interchangeable. They’re NOT! Gossett’s character is a former professor; he should know this.
If there’s any lesson to be learned from watching Firewalker, it’s that Chuck Norris is NOT funny. My theory is the studio thought it would be a great idea to soften the martial arts action star’s image by casting him in a PG movie that requires him to be funny on purpose. It doesn’t come through. It isn’t even amusing when he calls Leo a “dadgum sissy”. The only saving grace regarding Norris is that he gets to show off his fighting skills. In the only scene that could arguably be considered exciting, he single-handedly takes on the rough clientele of a seedy South American bar. It’s a good thing he fights so well because, in a lame running gag, he’s useless with a gun. He couldn’t hit the side of a barn if he was standing two feet in front of it. Given the level of humor in Firewalker, I’m relieved they didn’t address his aim in the bathroom.
Norris and co-star Gossett have no chemistry whatsoever. Their jokey banter sounds forced. In his defense, Gossett is a little better than Norris. He merely looks like he’s struggling to retain his dignity as he goes through the motions. I can only surmise this is a paycheck movie for the Oscar-winning actor. Norris has even less chemistry with Anderson. Their blossoming romance is more unbelievable than the magical mumbo-jumbo surrounding their quest. The only thing she has going for her is she’s easy on the eyes. She can’t act, read lines or even scream in a convincing manner. She’s as bad as Sharon Stone in the Allan Quatermain movies.
The supporting actors in Firewalker are of little consequence. With the exception of Landham (who really hams it up), they show up briefly and disappear quickly. Sampson, noticeably ill in his final film role (he died after open heart surgery in June ’87), does typical Native American things like perform a ceremony and tell our heroes about a legend. John Rhys-Davies, who also co-starred in Raiders of the Lost Ark and King Solomon’s Mines, plays an old friend of Max’s named Corky (?!). He wears a hat with corks hanging from it. He leads a group of freedom fighters who try to cut off our heroes’ heads before Corky reveals himself (hey, it was just a joke!). He’s around for maybe five minutes before exiting the movie. Ian Abercrombie (Army of Darkness) stops by quickly as a sweaty, white-suited American who provides valuable information in the aforementioned South American bar. Where have we seen his type before? As for Landham, at least he gets to show up a few times to threaten and/or try to kill Max and Leo. Predictably, he also tries to make a human sacrifice of Patricia in the climax.
Whereas the Indiana Jones movies never moved at a pace less than breakneck, Firewalker is slow-moving and dull. At 105 minutes, you can’t wait for it to be over. If it had merely been ridiculous, that would have been okay. Who doesn’t like a goofy Saturday matinee adventure? Instead, it’s idiotic to the point of insulting the collective intelligence of the audience. It’s terrible on every level. It has no entertainment value unless you want to see a group of actors make dadgum fools of themselves in a sorry excuse for a matinee picture.
To its credit, its production values are a little better than one would expect. It doesn’t mean Firewalker still isn’t cheap. If you look closely at the golden treasure, you can tell that somebody collected a bunch of random objects and spray-painted them gold. I thought I spotted a couple of Tupperware containers in the pile. That might be the funniest thing in a movie where any and all attempts at deliberate humor hit the ground with a resounding thud. Clearly, Norris should stick to violent action pictures and never again try to do comedy. It’s clear to everybody but the star who tried (and failed) again nearly a decade later with Top Dog, his version of K-9 and Turner & Hooch. If that one is a dog, Firewalker is a dud.
