Fire Birds 4K 1990 Ultra HD 2160p

When an international cocaine cartel turns to high-tech weapons and employs top-notch professional pilots, the U.S. Army deploys the “Apaches”—elite helicopter combat units specially trained for aerial combat. It’s reminiscent of “Top Gun” starring Tom Cruise.

User Review

By 1990, Nicolas Cage was, if not a top-tier star, certainly not just some bit player in the film industry. True, all of his significant roles up to that point had been either with his uncle—Francis Ford Coppola, who, though he called his nephew “an actor with no future,” still gave him his big break in the film industry; or with renowned directors (Alan Parker, the Coen brothers)—amidst constant rumors of his uncle’s possible patronage—he nonetheless deservedly earned a Golden Globe nomination in 1987 for his role in the film ‘ Moonstruck, which he deserved—his characters were complex, at times even to a fault (one need only recall "Kiss of the Vampire", which demonstrated Cage’s ability to elevate a mediocre film to a watchable level through his wild acting performance).
How, with such a careful selection of roles, could he have ended up in a cardboard-thin, mass-market film called "Fire Birds", which makes no secret of its derivative nature and, for the most part, even openly flaunts it?
Perhaps his famous uncle briefly took his All-Seeing Eye off his nephew’s career, allowing him to indulge in wooden toys on his own, but Cage’s very next project was David Lynch’s "Wild at Heart", as if hinting that Nicholas was quickly brought back to his senses.
Be that as it may, "Fire Birds" can confidently be called one of the actor’s worst projects of his first decade in film—if not his entire career.

An enemy ace with a Serbian appearance and a massive beard, resembling a poor version of Boris the Razor
(and yet a razor wouldn’t have hurt him—what an irony of fate), wipes out an entire squadron of brave American pilots from his superhelicopter, after which their surviving commander decides to exact a terrible revenge and learns to fly “Apaches.” What a plot… Will he be able to get revenge on the villain—a bearded one, no less? Will he find common ground with his stern instructor? Will he get his ex-wife into bed? All of this is sure to make your jaw drop more effectively than a Mike Tyson punch, because the yawn induced by such a plot will be monstrously huge. At 44, Tommy Lee Jones is already playing seasoned old instructors; Cage becomes a bad version of “Maverick”; and Sean Young is supposed to exude sex appeal, but even helicopter blades do a much better job of it.
And just when it seems like these characters couldn’t possibly get any sillier, they start talking—and that’s when you realize just how much you miss silent films. The dialogue feels like pure improvisation—but the kind that makes you want to bury your head in the sand, because it’s both terrifying and laughable. It’s a good thing that at least the main villain stays completely silent (which is definitely somehow related to his beard), without provoking any aversion—thanks for that, at least.

The film could very well have been saved by the well-shot helicopter battles, since that’s probably the only thing in the movie that looks even remotely fresh. But the cinematographer stubbornly refuses to treat the audience to wide shots of the aerial battles, focusing most of the time on the pilots’ tense faces and their fingers clenched on the triggers—which ultimately buries the film for good. And at this point, it’s even silly to complain that there are only two full-fledged combat scenes in "Fire Birds"—that fades into the background because absolutely everything in the film is terrible: the characters, the sex between the characters, the characters’ sex with helicopters, the flights, Cage’s glasses, and his character’s degenerating narcissism.
The filmmakers didn’t just fail to reinvent the wheel—they also made the existing one square, just to be sure.

Info Video

Codec: HEVC / H.265 (63.6 Mb/s)
Resolution: Upscaled 4K (2160p)
HDR: HDR10
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1

Info Audio

#English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1
#English: FLAC 2.0
#German: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1

Info Subtitles