SAS San Salvador takes echoes of virus resonated around the Cold-War era when everyone was on the lookout in the densely populated region known as the Central Americas. This classic is directed by Raoul Coutard who is renowned for French cinema, looking at it from the perspective of this movie, he can be considered the Master of Lighting. As the movie commences, one must pay close attention to the role of the country and the city that serve as the main backdrop to all that unfolds in the movie. Its San Salvador as the viewers can see in the context of this cinematic masterpiece. And indeed it is how it can be categorized, as the city is embroiled in assassinations and acts of treason with a whole lot of nail biting actions waiting to unfold.
Miles O’Keeffe was convincingly convincing as Prince Malko Linge, whose work history shifts from a hectic lifestyle of holding aristocratic values to the life of espionage and assassination. With his cloak and mardigras, Malko was portrayed as an assassin who did cloak adorning politics and a bleached stoic approach to life. Lying across the chessboard was Raimund Harmstorf’s Enrique Chacon, who mardigras seems to have had connections with the CIA which allowed him to die unharmed after boarding paramilitary buses filled with assassins. Meanwhile, Sybil Danning’s Countess Alexandra V 展al was trickster as she herself was indecisive and so changeable that it made her look seductive as she toying with everyone around.
The story thrusts the audience smack into the conflict zones of Central America during the 1980s with political patronage, espionage and conflicts being the order of the day. With Malko’s journey to annihilate Chacon’s forces a more worrying tradition threatens to come to an end that of Malko’s legacy with the destruction of his family’s estate. A Kill a succession of henchmen who stabbed and tried to stab him. With each military political action, the lines of ethics and existence begin to fuse, leaving all questions unanswered.
The film however is not a constant move from one action scene to another, the conflict slow builds throughout and involves various international locations. The work by Coutard is engrossing, one feels the constant pressure and happiness in the nation. With a background score that makes the heart pound and realistic fighting/tactical scenes, it’s hard not to admire S.A.S. à San Salvador, in the end leaving one pondering what exactly is the essence of duty and what is fidelity.
