Leofwine_draca COUNTER MEASURES is a cheap DIE HARD rip-off from prolific B-movie director Fred Olen Ray. That it was filmed on an actual submarine - the USS Nimitz, in the Atlantic - is a highlight of an otherwise lacklustre movie which nonetheless turns out to be quite good for a Fred Olen Ray movie. It's certainly not the worst I've seen from the director and some of the fight scenes are quite enjoyable.The film sees former American Ninja Michael Dudikoff playing a good guy trapped in a Russian submarine with a bunch of terrorists. There's the usual stock footage here, but for the most part COUNTER MEASURES offers up goofy, non-stop, martial arts action. It's hardly well choreographed, but it passes the time and some of it is quite violent. A bit of a 'meh' film, then, this one; neither the best nor the worst you'll see, and B-movie fans might enjoy it.

Comeuppance Reviews More madness from the mind of Fred Olen Ray! Can anyone confirm he and Jim Wynorski are two different people? Has anyone ever seen them together in the same place at the same time? Anyway, in this underwater escapade that is highly reminiscent of Under Siege(1992) ... When Navy medic Captain Jake Fuller's brother is murdered by Russian spies, Jake goes underwater to investigate. Even though Jake is a pacifist and doesn't want to fight, evil Russians take over the supersub Odessa and plan to blow up/take over the world. Only he and Lt. Swain (Wendy Schumacher of skinemax softcore fame, here strangely credited as "Alexander Keith") can save the day, so they both board the sub. The Russians and their special gas that makes people vomit yellowish green liquid are no match for these two. Will Fuller and Swain be able to stop "Operation Hailstorm" and prevent a new cold war? Remember the Wynorski vehicles Desert Thunder (1999) and Stealth Fighter (1999)? Just change the fact that those had to do with planes, and switch that to a submarine, and there you have it. It even has the trademark stock footage we've come to know and love. The Dolph Lundgren classic Agent Red (2000) is basically a remake of Counter Measures and uses some of the same footage. But where did Counter Measures get their stock footage? The world may never know.One of the funny things about Counter Measures is that it is solely cast with celebrity lookalikes. Besides Dudikoff and Schumacher, the rest of the cast resemble Tim Roth, Michael Imperioli, Bob Newhart and Christopher Titus, who, strangely enough, was actually in Crash Dive (1997), the movie to which Counter Measures is a sequel. But the lookalike in Counter Measures plays a different character than the one Titus did in Crash Dive, so it must be a weird coincidence.Also in the weird department, on the back of the VHS box (released in the U.S. on Avalanche), Michael Dudikoff's character is said to be "Zach Silver". Seeing as his name is Jake Fuller in the film, where did this name come from? Apparently someone just made it up. Did they not watch the movie? You don't see that type of error often.Dudikoff turns on the charm when he could easily go on autopilot and let his cool hair do all the work. Instead, he brings some funny body language and interesting mannerisms to his character of Jake Fuller (NOT Zach Silver). He is as animated here as he was in the awesome TV show "Cobra" where he played Robert "Scandal" Jackson.On the negative side, there is some jumpy editing, as well as some jumbled plotting and cheap-looking sets, but all that is to be expected and the presence of Dudikoff (and the rest of the cast, whoever they may look like) smooths it all over. you will probably be entertained by Counter Measures.For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

truetimes The movie has a good story line, the action is good in some parts, but not all of them. Some of the parts, I just felt like the bad guys wouldn't have dosed off yet, from my experience from taking Martial arts. Some are the actions are long, like always mostly for the boss, but for the least important ones, they were killed or dosed off with a few hits, but some where quite unrealistic or could have done a better job at.The least important actors or stunt people were the right picks for the movie, my girlfriend started to have a crush on them that she started to watch the movie more than she spends her time with me.The movie is good, that is all I can say.

Angus I don't know if there's an aphorism to put to this type of movie, but there should be, because this flick reminds me a lot of Steel Sharks. And the similarities are unexpected. Both movies are set on subs, both movies involve terrorists (of a sort), both movies are very cheaply done, and critically unrealistic. What've those links got to do with each other? You've got underwater listening devices that can identify screws among wreckage, an American submarine commander who has way less battle-sense than his Russian counterpart, and bad guys with ridiculously unrealistic, paranoid objectives. Anyone in any military service anywhere in the world could probably expand vastly on that list. They'd probably start with: instruments that do not register with military accuracy, but icons and labels that are marketed to American civilians.