Call the COBRA in 4K

COBRA Limited Edition (4K UHD)

1986 / 87 min

Arrow Video

Review by Mr. Bonnie, the Blaster😼

Rejoice, action fans…one of the 80s’ greatest comedies (second only to Endless Love) is finally on 4K.

Of course Cobra is a comedy. Its titular character (Sylvester Stallone) is an exaggerated amalgam of every rogue cop to blast his way across the big screen since Harry Callahan invited punks to press their luck. More of a cartoon thug than flesh & blood, Cobra’s character is completely defined by how he looks, dresses, kills, drives and slices pizza.

The movie’s villain, the Night Slasher (Brian Thompson), sweats, snarls, spits, growls and flares his nostrils big enough for Marion Cobretti to drive his Awsom 50 through. He’s aptly named, too. Stalking the streets of LA and killing victims at random (with help from his cult of axe-clanging minions), the only real difference between him and Jason Voorhees is that he speaks (sort of) and doesn’t wear a hockey mask.

The tone is set early-on when Captain Sears (Art LeFleur) ominously says “Call the Cobra” to deal with a shotgun-weilding maniac in a supermarket. Cobra roars up in a nitro-fueled, Titanic-sized hot rod. Decked-out in a skin-tight T-shirt, even tighter jeans, boots, mirrored shades, leather gloves and a toothpick in his jaw, Cobra strolls into the darkened store, cracks open a beer, tosses out a casual one-liner (“You're the disease...I'm the cure”) and blows the guy away. At no time does he remove his sunglasses. Afterwards, of course, he’s berated by his superior (Andrew Robinson) and the press for saving the hostages.

After another productive day of blowing folks away, Cobra retreats to his Malibu apartment. He turns on the TV so it can inform us of the movie's plot (the Night Slasher’s handiwork), and while cleaning his gun, Cobra grabs a slice of leftover pizza from his freezer and uses a pair of scissors to cut off a little triangle for himself...still wearing his gloves. Then he eats it frozen. 

The Night Slasher cult makes a serious mistake, leaving a living witness to one of their killings, Ingrid (Brigitte Nielsen), who’s established as a model by the hilarious photo shoot where she poses with robots that appear to be built from shit kids find in their garage. Fearing the Night Slasher will come after her, Cobra and his junk-food junkie partner, Tony (Reni Santoni), are assigned to protect her. 

It’s at this point that Cobra achieves a level comedic genius I never really noticed until revisiting the film for this review. Tony reassures Ingrid that no one is better than Cobra at catching psychos, yet the guy doesn’t actually do any catching (or much detective work). Cobra spends the entire movie running away from these psychos with Ingrid & Tony in-tow, destroying half of L.A. in the process. In fact, the Night Slasher appears to be far more adept at finding his quarry than Cobra is. 

Stallone and co-star.

Conversely, this cult of faceless followers is utterly fearless (or clueless), best exemplified in a scene where dozens of them are chasing Cobra & Ingrid on motorcycles. Cobra's in the bed of a pick-up, spraying machine gun fire at his pursuers, who start dropping like flies. Yet none of the others make any attempt to avoid a bullet (or even swerve out of harm’s way). They just keep coming, like my annual battle with ants in the kitchen. No matter how many bugs I dispatch with spray, traps or the good-old-fashioned fist, they keep coming out of the woodwork to march across my counter.

But it's not all mayhem. There's a tender moment when Ingrid is watching Cobra play with his guns. When she tries to get close, he warns her, “Not a lot of people like the way I live.” I don't know if this statement is supposed to signify his dedication to his job, his loner status or his penchant for using office supplies to cut food. I guess it doesn't matter, because they end up bumpin’ uglies anyway. It might actually be the film’s defining moment…the love scene is tastefully and romantically presented, whereas Cobra assembling his weapons is served-up in voyeuristic detail.

If it was Leslie Nielsen in the title role, almost the entire movie could be viewed as a parody without changing a single frame or line of dialogue.

But I genuinely do love Cobra, perhaps even more now than I did 40 years ago. Not only does it feature Stallone at his Stalloniest, its MTV aesthetic is like travelling back in time to an era when neon glitz, musical montages and studly cops defined action in the 80s. In that sense, Cobra is sort of a greatest hits album. And while most of the comedy is undoubtedly unintentional, there are brief moments of clever self-awareness here and there, such as some obvious homages to the Dirty Harry franchise, or better yet, a gravity-defying car chase that achieves a level of brilliance through its sheer outlandishness.

Though critically reviled when first released, the look, sound and campiness of Cobra has rendered it a cult classic, embraced over the years by fans who find it thrilling, funny or a combination of both. Arrow Video’s new Limited Edition set gives the film a great visual and audio facelift, with a 4K restoration that’s a big improvement over older releases, as well as three audio options (lossless stereo 2.0, 4.0 and DTS-HD MA 5.1). There’s also a big batch of new and archival bonus features, though the best ones are carried over from Shout Factory's previous Blu-ray edition. Whether one thinks Cobra is great or gaudy, this is an excellent new release.

EXTRA KIBBLES

NOTE: Free Kittens Movie Guide was provided with a promo disc for review purposes. Physical supplemental material included with the final product (booklets, artwork, inserts, etc) were not available for review.

THEATRICAL & TV VERSIONS - The latter features alternate scenes and is not in HD.

VISUAL ESSAYS - White Line Nightmare is by critic Martyn Conterio, who does briefly suggest the film is a parody; Dark Glasses, Violence & Robots is by critic Abbey Bander, who discusses Cobra as the quintessential 80s film, both narratively and aesthetically. Both of these essays afford the film more serious cultural importance than it actually deserves.

NEW INTERVIEW - With film composer Sylvester Levey.

ARCHIVAL INTERVIEWS - Individual interviews with actors Brian Thompson, Art LaFleur, Lee Garlington, Andrew Robinson & Marco Rodriguez. These are all entertaining and occasionally candid. Thompson, in particular, is pretty critical of ‘director’ George P. Cosmatos (and for good reason).

3 AUDIO COMMENTARIES - 1) By Kim Newman & Nick de Semlyen (NEW); 2) By Josh Nelson & Martyn Pedler (NEW); 3) By director George P. Cosmatos.

MAKING-OF FEATURETTE

TRAILERS & TV SPOTS