''When Eagles Strike'' (released in the Philippines as ''Operation Balikatan'') is a

2003 2003 was designated by the United Nations as the International Year of Fresh water, Freshwater. In 2003, a Multi-National Force – Iraq, United States-led coalition 2003 invasion of Iraq, invaded Iraq, starting the Iraq War. Demographic ...

war War is an armed conflict between the armed forces of states, or between governmental forces and armed groups that are organized under a certain command structure and have the capacity to sustain military operations, or between such organi ...

action film The action film is a film genre that predominantly features chase sequences, fights, shootouts, explosions, and stunt work. The specifics of what constitutes an action film has been in scholarly debate since the 1980s. While some scholars such as D ...

co-produced and directed by Cirio H. Santiago. The film stars ex-bodybuilder

Christian Boeving Christian Boeving (born June 5, 1969) is an American actor, writer, producer, fitness model, personal trainer, and former bodybuilding supplement spokesperson. He grew up in Missouri, United States and resides in Los Angeles County in Southern ...

Stacy Keach Walter Stacy Keach Jr. (born June 2, 1941) is an American actor, active in theatre, film and television since the 1960s. Keach first distinguished himself in Off-Broadway productions and remains a prominent figure in American theatre across his ...

, Davee Youngblood, Nate Adams,

Eddie Garcia Eduardo "Eddie" Verchez Garcia (; May 2, 1929 – June 21, 2019), colloquially known as Manoy, was a Filipino actor, television personality, and filmmaker. Widely regarded as the greatest Filipino actor of all time, Garcia appeared in nearly ...

Rey Malonzo Reynaldo Oliver Malonzo (born May 17, 1952), professionally known as Rey Malonzo, is a former Filipino actor, film director and politician in the Philippines. He was a famous action star doing mostly martial arts in his films during the 1970s up ...

, and

Monsour del Rosario Manuel Monsour Tabib del Rosario III (born May 11, 1962) is a Filipino actor, martial artist, producer, businessman, and politician. He is popularly known as a Filipino taekwondo champion and actor who starred in several Filipino and internat ...

. The film received mostly negative reviews, and the response for Boeving's portrayal of a classically written action hero has been mixed.

Plot

A group of American commandos go on a mission to save American politicians who were kidnapped and held on a forgotten Malaysian island. Tough-guy lieutenant Andrew Pierce commands the group. During the mission it's revealed there's a traitor in the ranks of the team. Consequently, American soldiers are betrayed and captured by the opponents, who then interrogate and brutally torture Pierce.

Cast

as Lieutenant Andrew Pierce *

as General Thurmond * Davee Youngblood as Private First Class Tyler Owens *

Jesse Vint Jesse Lee Vint III is an American actor, film director and screenwriter. He acted in the films ''Silent Running'' (1972), ''Macon County Line'' (1974), ''Black Oak Conspiracy'' (1977) and ''Forbidden World'' (1982). Life and career Vint was b ...

as Captain Spencer *

as Lieutenant Rodrigo Gomez * Nate Adams as Darren, the military medic *

as General Espino *

Jess Lapid Jr. Jesse Lloyd Flake Lapid (born March 22, 1962), commonly known as Jess Lapid Jr., is a film and television actor, film and fight director, scuba course director of CMAS Philippines, and underwater director of photography. More popularly known ...

as Salek *

as Ahmed * Joe Mari Avellana as Ibrahim, a leader of Al-Qaeda

Production and release

The film was shot in the

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

(including

Manila Manila, officially the City of Manila, is the Capital of the Philippines, capital and second-most populous city of the Philippines after Quezon City, with a population of 1,846,513 people in 2020. Located on the eastern shore of Manila Bay on ...

and

Subic Bay Subic Bay is a bay on the west coast of the island of Luzon in the Philippines, about northwest of Manila Bay. An extension of the South China Sea, its shores were formerly the site of a major United States Navy facility, U.S. Naval Base Subi ...

) early in 2003, with shoots starting on February 4.Mayor Rey Malonzo, binalikan ang pag-aartista
''Pilipino Star Ngayon''. Philstar Group. Retrieved on March 18, 2020. American as well as Filipino actors were cast in the film, with ex-bodybuilder

taking the lead. Boeving makes his own stunts during the filming, and he stated in the interview for ''AHF Magazine'': "I get my ass severely kicked in the movie, which is something I'm sure a lot of people would like to do to me."Christian Boeving Makes Movie Magic For 2004
''AHF for Men''. Canusa Group, Inc. December 2003/January 2004. Retrieved on March 18, 2020.

Oscar Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to: People and fictional and mythical characters * Oscar (given name), including lists of people and fictional characters named Oscar, Óscar or Oskar * Oscar (footballer, born 1954), Brazilian footballer ...

-winner

Jack Palance Walter Jack Palance ( ; born Volodymyr Palahniuk, , ''Volodymyr Ivanovych Palahniuk''; February 18, 1919 – November 10, 2006) was an American screen and stage actor, known to film audiences for playing tough guys and villains. He was nominat ...

was supposed to appear in the movie but is not seen in its final version. ''When Eagles Strike'' was released on June 11, 2003, in the Philippines. Then the project was released directly-to-DVD in such countries as Russia (under the title ''Когда орел атакует''), Brazil (as ''O Ataque dos Águias''; the film was tagged as based on a true story), and Japan (as ''Codename Eagle''). In Turkey, it was distributed under the title ''Kartal Darbesi''. In April 2004 the film was released on DVD in the United States. The movie was released as '' Black Hawk Down'' sequel in Taiwan.

Reception

The film received mixed to generally negative critical reception, currently holding 33% fresh on

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

. Scott Weinberg from eFilmCritic.com concluded: "One might be tempted to classify this movie as 'ripped from the headlines' when in fact 'ripped from the trash heap' would be an infinitely more accurate assessment. (...) If (...) you're looking for a solid war movie, just keep on walkin'." Weinberg called his review of ''When Eagles Strike'' "Where's

John Rambo John James Rambo is a fictional character in the Rambo (franchise), ''Rambo'' franchise. He first appeared in the 1972 novel ''First Blood (novel), First Blood'' by David Morrell, but later became more famous as the protagonist of the film serie ...

when we need him?", and awarded the film one star out of four. ''MonsterHunter'' believed that characters in the movie are "noisily dull," and named Christian Boeving's lead "

Uncle Sam Uncle Sam (with the same initials as ''United States'') is a common national personification of the United States, depicting the federal government of the United States, federal government or the country as a whole. Since the early 19th centu ...

on steroids," saying that "his massive arms are the only real development his character has." An editor of ''Actionfreunde'' called Boeving "a walking muscle", a man "as charismatic as a slowly drying wallpaper piece." In ''The German Lexicon of International Films'' it is stated that ''When Eagles Strike'' is a clichéd, stereotypical action movie riddled with references to the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

. A reviewer from action cinema-related website ''Yippee-ki-yay, Motherf*cker!'' believed that the movie lacked the element of surprise but praised Boeving as its sole positive aspect. "Boeving is refreshing as a

macho Machismo (; ; ; ) is the sense of being " manly" and self-reliant, a concept associated with "a strong sense of masculine pride: an exaggerated masculinity". Machismo is a term originating in the early 1940s and 1950s and its use more wi ...

-type commando. (...) He's a resurrected 80s action movie hero—dripping sweat, super handsome, running through the jungles in a tight undershirt." ''Prime News'' listed "When Eagles Strike" among the greatest war movies of all time (it received an honorable mention).

Sequel

A sequel, ''When Eagles Strike 2 − Mission: Survive'', was written, and was supposed to have been filmed in 2004 as a television film, but the project was canceled. Lieutenant Andrew Pierce was the main character once again.

References

External links

* {{Cirio H. Santiago 2003 action films 2003 direct-to-video films 2003 films 2000s action war films 2000s war adventure films American action war films Cultural depictions of bodybuilders Films about the United States Marine Corps American war adventure films Films shot in the Philippines Films set in Malaysia Premiere Productions films Films directed by Cirio H. Santiago 2000s American films English-language action war films English-language war adventure films