| Universal Soldier | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Roland Emmerich |
| Produced by | Mario Kassar[1] Allen Shapiro |
| Written by | Richard Rothstein Christopher Leitch Dean Devlin |
| Starring | Jean-Claude Van Damme Dolph Lundgren Ally Walker Ed O'Ross |
| Music by | Christopher Franke |
| Cinematography | Karl Walter Lindenlaub |
| Editing by | Michael J. Duthie |
| Studio | Centropolis Entertainment Carolco Pictures |
| Distributed by | TriStar Pictures |
| Release date(s) | July 10, 1992 |
| Running time | 103 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $23 million[2] |
| Box office | $102,000,000[2] |
Universal Soldier is a 1992 American science fiction action film directed by Roland Emmerich and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren as soldiers who kill each other in Vietnam but are reanimated in a secret Army project along with a large group of other previously dead soldiers.
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In 1969, during the Vietnam War, an American military squad receives orders to secure a village against North Vietnamese forces. Private Luc Devereaux (Jean-Claude Van Damme) discovers members of his squad and various villagers dead, all with their ears removed. The culprit behind the mutilations is revealed to be leading officer Sergeant Andrew Scott (Dolph Lundgren), who has gone insane. Deveraux finds Scott holding a string of severed ears and also holding a young boy and girl hostage. Devereaux, who is near the end of his tour of duty, tries to reason with Scott, saying that the war is over and that he just wants to go home. Scott becomes infuriated and shoots the boy. He then orders Devereaux to shoot the girl to prove his loyalty. Deveraux refuses and stops Scott from shooting her. The girl attempts to escape but Scott kills her with a grenade. Devereaux turns on Scott and both shoot each other to death. The next morning, a U.S. Special Forces squad finds their bodies. The commanding officer orders the bodies to be bagged and iced and to officially cover up their deaths as "missing in action".
In 1992, terrorists have taken over the Hoover Dam and the police agencies are ordered not to intervene or make any attempt to rescue the hostages. Instead, the "Universal Soldiers" (or "UniSols"), an elite counter terrorism unit, are brought in. Among the team are the long-dead Luc Devereaux (now designated "GR44") and Andrew Scott (now designated "GR13"). They are wearing high-tech computer equipment over their left eye and have apparently been reanimated with no memory of their previous lives. Devereaux and Scott are sent in to dispatch several of the terrorists, with Devereaux using efficient means, but Scott using excessive force. Their camera feeds sent back to the command post causes concern among the project technicians that even though the UniSols are supposed to be emotionless, Scott is enjoying it. As the team infiltrate the area, they demonstrate their superior training and physical abilities against the armed terrorists, as one of them (Ralf Möller as GR74) is shown surviving close-range automatic gunfire. After the area is secured, Devereaux begins to regain patches of memory from his former life after witnessing two hostages who strongly resemble the villagers he tried to save back in Vietnam. Turning around, he looks at Scott (who is also experiencing the same memory) but as a UniSol, he cannot say anything. This causes him to ignore radio commands from the control team and become unresponsive.
Back in the mobile command center, the Unisol technician team is trying to figure out what happened at Hoover Dam with Devereaux. They reveal that the UniSols are genetically augmented soldiers with enhanced healing abilities and superior strength but also have a tendency to overheat and shut down. They are also given a neural serum to keep their minds under control and their previous memories suppressed. All of the UniSols are ordered to go back into their cooling units and inject themselves with the serum. As a result of the glitch, Woodward (Leon Rippy), one of the technicians on the project, feels it may be better to remove Devereaux from the team until he can be further analyzed. However, Colonel Perry (Ed O'Ross), the commander in charge of the UniSol operation, disagrees with the suggestion. TV journalist Veronica Roberts (Ally Walker) tries to get a story on the UniSol project in an attempt to get her job back, since she was fired while covering the Hoover Dam incident. Speaking with representatives from the project, she only gets evasive answers. She later sneaks onto the base with a camera to investigate, only to discover GR74, immersed in ice, who is still alive despite normally-fatal injuries.
When she tries to escape from the complex, Devereaux and Scott are ordered to bring her back. She gets to her cameraman's car, but they crash and overturn while trying to escape. Scott mercilessly executes the cameraman, against the orders of his superiors, while Devereaux intervenes, preventing him from shooting Roberts. Together, Devereaux and Roberts both escape in a UniSol vehicle. After escaping, Scott mumbles about Devereaux being a traitor, but no one on the UniSol team heard it. Colonel Perry wants to chase Roberts and Devereaux down to prevent knowledge of the UniSols from getting out, not only to the public, but to the Pentagon, who does not know the true nature of the project. As Devereaux and Roberts flee and try to get evidence of the UniSol program to the media, they arrive at a motel. Roberts turns on the television and discovers she has already been framed for the murder of her cameraman. Scott's previously insane personality begins to emerge, causing him to kill innocents. Perry and the technicians are killed as they attempt to stop him. Scott then takes command over the UniSol team, ambushing a truck stop and a supermarket in his search for Devereaux. The remaining UniSol scientists try and fail to subdue Scott and are both killed.
Devereaux continues to rebuild his memory and realize that he is truly alive. Roberts tries to find more information about the UniSol program. They meet Dr. Christopher Gregor (Jerry Orbach), the creator of the program. He informs them that the UniSol project was started in the 1960's in order to develop the perfect soldier. Although they learned how to reanimate dead human remains, they were never able to overcome the bodies need for constant cooling. The other major problem is that the memories of the last moments of life are greatly amplified. In Luc's case, he still believes he is a soldier who wants to go home, while Scott believes he is still in Vietnam fighting the insurgents. When Devereaux and Roberts leave the doctor's office, they are caught and arrested by the police. On the way to jail, the police convoy is ambushed by Scott and GR74. After an intense chase, they barely manage to escape when the police bus and the UniSol truck both drive off the edge of a cliff at Grand Canyon and explode. Presuming that Scott and GR74 are all dead, Devereaux and Roberts head to Luc's family's farm in Louisiana.
After Devereaux reunites with his family, Scott tracks them down and takes the family and Roberts hostage. A brutal fight ensues, and Scott's use of muscle enhancers enables him to mercilessly beat Devereaux. Roberts manages to escape from her bonds only to be seemingly killed by a grenade thrown by Scott. He continues to dominate until Devereaux grabs the muscle enhancers Scott used and injects himself with one. With their strengths now matched, Devereaux fights back and is able to impale Scott on the spikes of a hay harvester. Devereaux then starts the machine up, grinding Scott to death. Finally, Devereaux checks on Roberts, who survived the explosion and the two embrace.
The Special Edition DVD release features an alternative ending which takes place shortly after Scott takes Deveraux's family and Roberts hostage. As Deveraux grabs a shotgun in the kitchen, the front door opens and he sees his mother before Scott shoots her to death. In the final fight between Deveraux and Scott, Deveraux does not use Scott's muscle enhancers. Shortly after grinding Scott to death, Deveraux is shot by his father before Dr. Christopher Gregor and his men appear.
Gregor explains that he had Deveraux set up to get to him and Scott, and that Deveraux was living with people posing as his parents. He then has his men shoot down Deveraux, but before Deveraux dies, police and Roberts' news crew arrive. The news crew douse Deveraux with a fire extinguisher to stabilize him while Dr. Gregor and his men are arrested. Roberts is given the microphone to cover the arrest, but she loses all composure while on the air, dropping the microphone to comfort Deveraux.
Several days later, Deveraux is reunited with his real parents. The film ends with a eulogy narrated by Roberts, who explains that Deveraux rejected all life-prolonging medications before dying a natural death.
At the 1992 Cannes Film Festival, Van Damme and Lundgren were involved in a verbal altercation that almost turned physical when both men pushed each other only to be separated. On his website, Dolph Lundgren confirmed that it was just a publicity stunt to promote the film.[3] It was the last film that used the multi-channel surround sound format, Cinema Digital Sound.
Universal Soldier opened in theaters on July 10, 1992 where it grossed $10,057,084 from 1916 theaters with a $5,249 per screen average and taking #2 behind A League of Their Own's second weekend. From there, it made $36,299,898 in US ticket sales, becoming a moderate hit. Overseas, it was much more popular, mostly opening at #1, making over $65 million overseas, which earned the film a total of $102 million worldwide, on a $23 million budget.[2]
Despite being a box office hit, it was not well-received by critics. Mainstream critics dismissed the movie as a Terminator 2 clone, or as a typical, mindless action film.[4][5][6][7] The film currently holds a 21% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
On the VNV Nation CD Advance and Follow the songs "After Fire" and "Outremer" contain audio clips from Universal Soldier.
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