Only the fact that this Rambo knock-off somehow beat Rambo III to the punch with its Afghan setting does little to lift this absolutely dull and routine action movie with lots of action but not the budget or energy to make any of it exciting.Basically another "mercenaries in the jungle" flick, minus a jungle, Days of Hell follows the adventures of a group of four soldiers of fortune bumbling around Afghanistan and blowing things up. It's honestly only about half as fun as it sounds, as much of the footage of the said killing and exploding is itself recycled over and over. Conrad Nichols plays the group leader of course, obediently followed by his friendly underlings Michael J. Fox-lookalike Ottaviano Dell'Acqua and Jorge Rivero-lookalike Howard Ross, while Werner Pochath is of course the overbearing loose cannon of the team. Officially their mission, as relayed by corporate bigwig Stelio Candelli is to rescue some Japanese woman and her father from Afghanistan. Of course the whole thing is just a big setup to hide some sort of international conspiracy to ship chemical weapons to Iraq or something, but it's nothing too big for our stalwart seemingly infallible and invincible heroes to crack. The most entertainment comes in trying to decide whether they kill more Russian soldiers or Afghan rebels. Oh yeah, one particular little Afghan boy joins the group and proves his mettle by killing Russians. Also, Riccardo Petrazzi pops by as the requisite scummy assassin who (of course) double-crosses the group and (even more of course) gets killed. (stretch) (yaaawwnnn….) Well, I have nothing against action movies. In fact I prefer to watch movies with a relatively high number of explosions and people getting shot and falling down. But for Pete's sake, would it be too much to ask for a little variety with this premise? This movie contains absolutely zero tension, surprises, or climaxes. There are several action scenes with plentiful gun-play, but they quickly grow repetitive and tiresome. It's pretty obvious that the "Afghan" locations are actually the Italian woods, and it's curious that no matter where the heroes are, they still seem to be stuck in the same field near a very Alpine-looking forest. It's also pretty obvious that only one of the voice dubbers (Ted Rusoff) actually spoke Russian, as every Russian in the movie speaks with the same distinct voice, as do a couple of the other characters!The funniest thing about the action scenes has to be Conrad Nichols (AKA Bruno Minniti) and his hilariously underwhelming enthusiasm. He seems to sleepwalk through his role until he whips out a gun and starts shooting, at which point he never fails to open his mouth making the weirdest "shooting face" that I've ever seen. He basically just stares forward with his jaw gaping EVERY time he fires his miniature CAR- 15. He looks like Charlie Sheen perpetually saying "booga booga!", of course minus the audio. The rest of the cast looks pretty bored, except for the many extras who die over and over again. Bland photography and unremarkable synthesizer music supposedly by Francesco De Masi don't help things either. Days of Hell is a decidedly rare action movie that will probably stay that way. While it's perhaps somewhat more unintentionally funny than most of Ricci's other efforts, the sheer dullness on display sinks it into the realm of forgettable action.

Conrad Nichols a.k.a. Luigi Mezzanotte stars in this frankly tedious flick as captain of a group of mercenaries who are assigned to sneak into Afghanistan to retrieve a doctor and his daughter who have been seized by rebels. Unbeknown to our heroes however, they are being set up and the mission as requested by the American government (with the Russians in cahoots) is intended to be their very last. The reason for this decidedly snide treachery is that the father and daughter have been compiling evidence against the manufacture and utilisation of chemical weapons. The insidious idea is that after our mercenaries have accomplished their mission they will be eliminated along with the father, the daughter and any incriminating evidence present.Sadly the above plot sounds far more exciting than has actually been implemented on screen and what we are in fact left with is a boring 90 minutes of our heroes driving around in a jeep punctuated by the occasional poorly executed fire fight.No scenes stand out as of any particular interest and acting, as might be expected, is pretty dire. A fair number of explosions throughout fail to lift the proceedings any either. Formulaic and mundane in the extreme, skip this one is my advice.

Badly produced film in the endless Italian action genre. This film scrapes even the barrel of 80s Italian cinema. Unconvincing in every respect, the acting is almost as bad as the dubbing and the production values are almost as bad as the European locations posing as the middle east. A movie which seems to be utterly useless, a complete waste of time and cannot be recommended. Not even fun, it is simply tedious and boring from start to finish and doesn't fit into the so bad it's good category. Footage of Miami was actually shot for an earlier film "Thunder Squad" directed by Umberto Lenzi. Luigi Mezzanotte (here credited as Conrad Nichols) worked with director Tonino Ricce (here Anthony Richmond) on the equally terrible "Thor: The Conqueror". Thankfully, both seem to have crawled back into the woodwork of Italian cinema and haven't bothered us since.A truly awful film, not worth any amount of money. There are many fun Italian B-pictures, but this is not one of them. This is a grade Z movie and is just as bad as it sounds.If there was a 0 out of 10, this would get it, but I'll have to settle for a complimentary 1 out of 10.

Boring Italian commando rescue mission film.Elite group of three commandos are given the mission of rescuing an old professor and his daughter from the Russian forces in the middle east. They are meant to work in co-op with the local islamist rebels.Nothing in this one to recommend. Uninspired acting, the most basic plot, no budget, no innovation, "no nothing".Bottom of the barrel.Released on video in Finland.