Tango & Cash (1989)

After watching Escape Plan I was reminded of another movie where Sylvester Stallone ends up in jail, Tango & Cash. Escape Plan felt a bit like an eighties action movie, but lacked action. Tango & Cash is an eighties movie and offers plenty of action. It starts out with two big chases and introduces the main character Tango (Sylvester Stallone) and Cash (Kurt Russell). They are two of the best cops in the force (who don’t always follow the rules and who don’t get along that great) and with them being the best they both have a lot of enemies. One is a huge drugs and arms dealer who frames them for a murder. They are sentenced and stuck in a jail with corrupt prison guards and criminals they previously sent there. Survival and escape become necessities and if they succeed they will have to find out who is responsible.

This is one of those movies which I vividly remember seeing at the cinema and seeing again some days later together with my father and it was pretty much what I remembered about it. It ticks all the boxes when it comes to this type of movie. The characters themselves are exact opposites. Stallone’s Tango is a cop who dresses like a banker and is very interested in the stockmarket, Cash is the tough guy. As the main characters they each have wisecracks ready for any situation they are in (for example: “Lucky for me this place is soundproof. That way nobody gets to hear me beating the truth out of you.”) and the bad guy just wants to do get rid of the two men, which is as deep as that character gets.

The movie wastes not a lot of time getting to the action and it’s a very amusing ride. During the climax of the movie every possible vehicle is used (you want monstertrucks and explosions? It has got them). It’s very over the top, but the exact reason to watch it. I would not call Tango & Cash an action movie classic, but I enjoyed it a lot more than Escape Plan.