Red Heat: Solid Action, Familiar Buddy-Cop Friction

Red Heat offers old-school action with an unmistakable eighties attitude. Its familiar buddy-cop formula works in moderation, although the central partnership never becomes one of the genre's great duos.

Arnold Schwarzenegger plays Ivan Danko, a stern Soviet policeman chasing a drug boss from Moscow to Chicago. There he teams up with James Belushi's noisy, hotheaded American cop Art Ridzik. Two opposing personalities and political systems have to work against a common enemy. Originality is not the selling point.

Schwarzenegger plays Danko like a cross between the Terminator and a concrete mixer: cold, stubborn and almost expressionless. That suits the role but limits the dynamic. Belushi supplies jokes and chatter, some funny and some merely loud. Their chemistry is acceptable, yet it lacks the wit and emotional grounding of better-known partnerships.

Walter Hill's direction gives the film its value. The action is punchy, physical and uncluttered, with the final bus chase delivering pressure, speed and style. Grainy, dark camerawork and James Horner's brooding synthetic score reinforce the atmosphere.

The Cold War setting adds flavor, but the film keeps its politics on the surface. It prefers tough remarks about communism and capitalism to exploring the contrast between its protagonists.

Red Heat is no milestone. For viewers who enjoy muscular action and Cold War nostalgia, though, it remains solid entertainment from an era when a punch could apparently settle an argument.