МегаФорс: Секретная армия и дерзкий побег

1982 film by Hal Needham

Megaforce (or MegaForce) is a 1982 action film directed by former stuntman Hal Needham and written by James Whittaker, Albert S. Ruddy, Hal Needham and André Morgan based on a story by Robert S. Kachler. The film starred Barry Bostwick, Persis Khambatta, Michael Beck, Edward Mulhare, George Furth, Evan C. Kim, Ralph Wilcox, Robert Fuller and Henry Silva. The film was poorly received by critics, bombed at the box office and was nominated for three Golden Raspberry Awards, including Worst Picture.

The story involves two fictional countries, the peaceful Republic of Sardun and their aggressive neighbor Gamibia. Unable to defend themselves from a Gamibian incursion, Sardun sends Major Zara and General Byrne White to ask the help of MegaForce – a secret army composed of international soldiers from throughout the western world, equipped with advanced weapons and vehicles. The MegaForce leader, Commander Ace Hunter, will lead a mission to destroy the Gamibian forces, which are led by his rival, and former military academy friend, Duke Guerera. While Hunter composes an elaborate battle plan to destroy Guerera's forces, Zara tries out to become a member of MegaForce. As she executes the various tests, Hunter's feelings of affection toward her grow. And while she passes the tests, he is unable to allow her to participate in their raid, because her presence, as an outsider, would disrupt the trust and familiarity of his force. Eventually, MegaForce successfully para drops its attack vehicles into Gamibia and Hunter mounts his sneak attack against Guerera's forces. Although they manage to destroy his base, they are told by General Byrne White that Sardun has decided they will not be allowed to cross the border into their country because they consider MegaForce too dangerous a global organization. At the same time, Guerera has set a trap for them at the team's only means of escape – a dry lake bed where the cargo planes will pick them up. Guerera sends his tanks to secure the lake bed while Hunter comes up with a plan to attack Guerera from behind by crossing over a mountain range the enemy tanks had turned their backs toward. The plan succeeds, and MegaForce manages to break through Guerera's tanks, but one of MegaForce's cargo planes is damaged in the process. Having to abandon their high tech vehicles (which they program to self destruct), the team successfully makes it on foot to the last plane, except for Hunter. The commander, instead, makes his own dramatic escape on his motorcycle after it deploys airfoils and a rocket motor and catches up with the cargo plane in midair. Although he has lost the battle, Guerera shows admiration for Hunter's cunning, and he gives his old friend a thumbs up.

An album was released on Boardwalk Records, with the theme song done by the group 707, which was released as a single reaching the mid level of the charts in the United States and Canada. The soundtrack was released on Compact Disc in 2011 by BSX Records.

Mattel produced Vertibird and Hot Wheels playsets based on the Megaforce theme. A video game based on the film was released in 1982 on the Atari 2600.

In the DVD introduction to the season two South Park episode, "The Mexican Staring Frog of Southern Sri Lanka", Trey Parker graphically describes Megaforce as if it were the plot for what the viewer is about to see. Matt Stone stops Parker mid sentence and reminds him that he is describing the movie Megaforce and not their episode. A disappointed Parker remembers and says, "We should have done Megaforce, that was a sweet movie, we should have done that." Their film Team America: World Police includes a number of apparent references to the film, including similar scenes of a flying motorcycle and an underground base where the hero meets various specialists.