Synopsis
Platoon To Hell!
POW's rescued from tiger cages in Vietnam are brought into a secret mission by an Army Captain. However when the group finds a cache of gold, greed sets in and the mission goes awry.
Dog Tags
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Alternative Titles
Dog Tags - Platoon to Hell, Platoon to Hell, 义胆军魂
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Theatrical
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Italy
Releases by Country
Italy
11 Dec 1987
- Theatrical
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"Dog Tags" is a 1987 Namsploitation film directed by Italian director Romano Scavolini. As this genre always seems to stick to the same construction-based activity of blowing up grass huts up in the Philippines at a constant and filming in assembly line form, "Dog Tags" easily fits the mold of accompanying films. There is plenty of recreated war action, with explosions and jungle traps, and as much as those are fun, "Dog Tags" gives some difference within the genre making their film a bit of an adventurous drama with some twists and turns. Reason I just want to bring this up is because I incredibly enjoy the hell out of most of the Bruno Mattei productions like, "Strike Commando" (1987)…
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super violent, very cheap, Italian version of Three Kings shot in the Philippines in the mid 80s and every bit as insane as that sounds -- even as someone who is plenty jaded, this is palpably grim, they don't make 'em like this anymore!
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I expected the sleaze to be laid on thick of this Namsploitation number when I saw it was directed by Romano Scavolini of NIGHTMARE IN THE DAMAGED BRAIN fame, but I didn't expect the film to be so ambitious! It's got moody cinematography, a great "THE AMERICAN MILITARY COMPLEX IS EVIL!" theme, and even a few suspenseful sequences involving bombs in the spirit of WAGES OF FEAR. It's a death march film without an ounce of action, but I appreciated how the big set piece was a guy getting his leg amputated (in agonizing detail). I even enjoyed how the production clearly ran into some issues in the back half because the finished project collapses in on itself as it…
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Hallucinatory, paranoid 'Namsploitation caper movie, SIERRA MADRE with CIA gold over the Laotian border, shot for peanuts in the Philippines. So yeah.
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I thought this would be typical late 80s Italian exploitation, very cheap and barely trying, but it takes the 80s Vietnam B movie formula for some surprising ambitious ends, and it actually makes the best out of its small resources. The plot deals with pows and some gold, and it anticipates in a few ways Woo's Bullet in the Head, although it is shot in a way that mostly made me think of Hill's Southern Comfort. Director Romolo Scavolini is an uneven guy whose work is markedly unpleasant, and this follows through. Lots of emphasis on pain, on the forest as trap, on bodies left behind. It is nasty and hysterical and the war space become this large stage of greed.
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Shortly after rescuing prisoners of war from tiger cages in Vietnam, a group of Army commandos is tasked with a secret mission to retrieve classified information from a downed helicopter. When they discover that the helicopter actually contains a cache of gold, the soldiers begin to question their allegiances to their superiors and to one another.
The 1987 war film, Dog Tags, helmed by the Italian B movie director, Romano Scavolini (Nightmare), combines the Missing in Action/Rambo action aesthetics of its era with heist story mechanics, coming across like a more rugged prototype of the popular 1999 feature, Three Kings with a bit of The Treasure of the Sierra Madre thrown into the fold. While the end result is hardly…
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Nothing at all like the cheesy post-RAMBO/MISSING IN ACTION knockoff you'd expect, DOG TAGS is a bizarre, surreal, nihilistic oddity in the subgenre from Italian director Romano Scavolini, best known for 1981's NIGHTMARE, one of the scuzziest slasher movies ever made. Combining some gnarly, grueling violence (with a gangrenous leg amputation scene that seems to last 20 minutes) with a jungle gold heist adventure that turns unbelievably grim and cynical, DOG TAGS is a situation where you go in expecting Margheriti or Mattei and get something that feels like Herzog or Jodorowsky ghost-directing a Cirio H. Santiago joint. The acting is a tad overwrought at times (especially by NIGHTMARE's Baird Stafford), but the surprisingly ambitious DOG TAGS has a strangely hypnotic, hallucinatory vibe and honestly feels like nothing else in the '80s Namsploitation craze. It's almost like the UNIVERSAL SOLDIER: DAY OF RECKONING of Namsploitation.
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Not as sleazey as I anticipated. Dog Tags actually has a lot of quality merit for the type of film it is and the lower production value. The psychological horrors these soldiers face fighting in Vietnam feels genuine as they face some absolute bleak situations. Story-wise it feels a little convoluted and flat though there's enough action and dark shit happening often enough Dog Tags redeems itself as a worthy watch.
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Scavolini really was leagues ahead of some of his late-period Italian peers, showing a sense of high-class filmmaking while still having to work in the genre trappings he was given. For a poverty row budgeted Nam flick, the way the camera moves and frames the same jungles of the Philippines that dozens of euro-schlock was shot in makes this feel far more cinematic than just about any other such Italian Rambo riff. The colors on this really pop too, with its blaring and high contrast greens and reds making this visual candy, a testament to both the talents behind the camera as well as those who restored this for bluray, one that looks better than many of the catalog 4k…
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Grim, cynical, disgusting, filthy, mean ‘namsploitation about POW’s forced to find CIA gold in Laos. Part of me wants to say it is better than it has any right to be but Scavolini had proved himself between this and Nightmares.
Deliverance in Vietnam with the spirit of Treasure of Sierra Madre hanging heavy.
Recommended to those on my wavelength.
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Watched August 6th
On the Vinegar Syndrome Archive Blu-ray release (VSA-33)
Directed by: Romano Scavolini
Written by: Romano Scavolini
TSPDT: Unranked150 minutes. An Italian genre cross between Three Kings and First Blood Part II where Scavolini shows off his ability to hold a story together on a tiny budget.
It’s a POW movie and a gold heist movie, and it is also a deeply nihilistic film. I find the namsploitation movies odd because there’s a fetishization of suffering. In some ways I get it, I think the Vietnam conflict represents a way for creative people to work in a macabre playground. People are shitty to each other and loyalties are tenuous. It some ways it is a great environment…
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Those expecting a Phillipines shot, action packed Rambo clone will be disappointed (as we also have regular actors from those productions), as Dog Tags (AKA: Platoon to Hell) is a bleak and grim take on the survival aspect of the Vietnam War: Enemy gunfire and vietcong traps aren't the only source of harm, increasing the stakes is a hostile nature and the mental degradation that is bred in violence.
The low-key production values add to a degree of realism, which shouldn't come as a surprise, as director Romano Scavolini himself witnessed the Vietnam conflict as a reporter.
Surprisingly well acted and with a documentary like-feel, there aren't many detractors present, aside from a underdeveloped subplot and a conclusion that arrives abruptly, but despite these flaws, Dog Tags is a movie that should be rediscovered and deserving of an HD restoration.