Short Film Review - The A-Team

Anyone of a certain age will have grown up watching programmes like the Six Million Dollar Man, Knight Rider and of course, the A-Team. They are cherished childhood memories. The problem is whenever Hollywood decides to revisit one of your icons and update it a feeling of dread grows within you. It did for me when I heard there was a new A-Team coming.

He backstory is updated, with the team’s framing taking place in the Iraq War rather than Vietnam. They are imprisoned separately in various security prisons, and in the case of Murdock a high security mental health unit. That is until they are broken out of prison to undertake a covert operation to…

To tell you the truth the plot is about the least important part of this movie. If you’re like me, remembering your 80s childhood self the things that are important are the characters, the silly, over-the-top, gung-ho actions and the implausible gadget-building. And they are all here.

Liam Neeson is excellent as Hannibal Smith, hamming it up to perfection and capturing that same glint in the eye George Peppard. Bradley Cooper captures Face’s vanity perfectly and Sharlto Copley is as mad as a bucket of frogs as Murdock. Even Quinton Jackson manages to almost make you forget the incredible Mr T (not quite though, that really would be asking too much).

Leave your brain at the door, you won’t need it, settle down and prepare to be entertained.