Bullet Points: The Elite

The word elite conjures up thoughts of the very top. When you think of the best of the best in a field or profession, you are thinking about the elite. For example, when I think of a police officer… boom RoboCop. Vigilante… Paul Kersey.  Truck driver… Jack Burton. I think you get the idea. Now when a movie decides to call itself The Elite it better either be at the top of the movie game or feature the best of the best in their field. The 2001 movie The Elite will never be considered at the pinnacle of cinema, but how about the government team that is tracking down an international terrorist? Wait, the terrorist group is known as the Elite? This sounds intriguing and I could use some more details on The Elite and I want them now… and I want them with Jürgen Prochnow. Ask and you shall receive.

• News You Can Use – After an explosive heist to start the movie, The Elite opens with news stories that give us the background on world famous terrorist Avi (Jürgen Prochnow, Interceptor) and although lots of the news is inaccurate and silly, it does a good job of introducing us to the levels of madness for Avi. When told about his craziness, Avi responds in the coldest badass method possible: “You’re insane.” “Yes, I thought you knew.” Of course this is said while shooting the fool who doubted Avi. Maybe this guy is elite. The news exposition is not done because we learn about an older terrorist attack, the bombing of a plan filled with important business leaders. The thought was that nobody survived the crash. Those idiots that thought everybody perished were dead wrong.

• Model Spies – Five children survived the crash and instead of relocating the kids to their nearest relatives, the government decides to raise the kids and train them to be a covert counter-terrorism team. Maybe The Elite is the zenith of film? The team was trained by McKay (Steven Williams, Crash and Byrnes) and he becomes the man who gives the team all their missions. The team is played by a mostly novice cast who were probably hired based off looks and not talent. Why do I say that? Four out of five character names are the same as the actor. Jason Lewis is a model turned actor and plays Jason. Joel West plays Joel. Identical twins Keith and Derek Brewer, both only in two films, played Keith and Derek… although Keith could have played Derek and vice versa and I would have been none the wiser. Only Maxine Bahns (Cutaway) switched up the names and played Lena.
• The Action Elite – I knew I would like The Elite when an early action set piece features Jason and Lena getting captured and handcuffed to the top of a giant missile like in a cartoon. Except it is not played for laughs, it is completely serious. Another action set piece features a car chase down a mountain  with an RV that has a plow on the front. You better believe that the plow means they will be going through things and not around. Just like a cherry on top of a sundae, the RV ends up with a deer head… and the largest pair of panties among the debris. The panties are played for laughs.

• Plane Silly – The anti-terrorist team has a pretty nifty headquarters as their base is in a plane so they can jet set off to whatever hotspot they need to stop the world’s baddies. While the mobile base is pretty darn cool, I find it hard that team members having the constant reminder of the horrible crash that left them without their parents is an easy thing to overcome.
• You Stole My Battleship – The Elite being released in 2001 has Avi steal a retired naval ship that was being used to promote a totally 2001 video game. The ship is the perfect platform for Avi to launch some missiles that he stole at the beginning of the movie. One of the better chases in The Elite features a boat being chased by motorcycles. How does that work you ask? Well the boat has to stay next to the shore? And why wouldn’t the boat just turn away from the shore? Reasons.

• The Gift That Keeps on Givens – Joel decides he needs to go to his ex-girlfriend for some help and that turns out to be Ashe played by Robin Givens and she turned out to be a pleasant addition to the cast. While watching her give Joel a hard time was fun enough, I never knew how much enjoyment I would have gotten by watching Robin Givens hanging out of a helicopter and mowing down terrorists with a machine gun. That is not something you go into any movie planning on seeing.
• Nobody Saw That Coming – The anti-terrorist team is ordered to take down Avi, but they soon find out that Avi is the son of the man who took down the plane that killed their parents and turned them into orphaned governmental killers. McKay and the government knew about this all along and the team is angered and does not want to work for the government anymore. However they do have the chance to take down the family responsible for their lot in life. Vendetta!

The Elite is a surprisingly entertaining movie. The action and locations are impressive and Jürgen Prochnow never disappoints. Most of the heroes are not the most convincing international spies, especially the Brewer Twins, but as they all were probably hired for their looks I can overlook any acting deficiencies… especially considering the parallels to my BPA hiring. Elite might be a strong word to use when categorizing The Elite, but I enjoyed the experience and maybe you will too. No Bullet Points experience is complete without sampling some Bonus Bullet Points.

• L.A. Reunion – Wolf Larsen has a small role as Griffin which means The Elite teams up Steven Williams and Wolf Larsen again after their run on L.A. Heat and in Crash and Byrnes.
• Quote Heard On the First Meeting Of BulletproofAction.com – “You ain’t got game unless you got a domain.”
• Best Racist Quote – “Pretty fly for a white guy.”
• Take That, Jürgen! – “I think all you pock-faced terrorists with your bad teeth are all smoking the same crack.”
• Best True Life Moment – James attempts a self-defenestration move to escape a boat as seen in so many movies, only to bounce right off the window.