Satellite ran this stinker late last night and, what seemed on the surface an interesting premise was lost quickly in the poor writing, stiff and otherwise horrible acting, mute extras, and overall lack of direction. Here are but a few examples: there are no colonels in the US Navy; men on the disabled sub were having difficulty breathing, but they were not breathing "carbon monoxide" as the med staff suggested unless their exhaust was leaking into the compartment; lifting off from an arms seller's supposedly isolated base of operations, the Nighthawk rolls along a clearly marked runway, then passes a VOR station, a type of navaid that would assist in identifying the location of this base. How about a GPS receiver that we're to believe also transmits its location, despite it being noted in the dialogue as simply for finding one's position?

Most of the dough must have been blown on the really cool opening sequences that hooks the viewer, these scenes depicting Navy fighters roaring through and taking out an urban area, 'cause from there on out, it's the movie itself that proved stealthy.

"The Ultimate Street Fight At 50,000 Feet!" As if Desert Thunder (1999) wasn't enough, from the team of Jim Wynorski, Lenny Juliano, some stock footage, miniatures, and a green screen comes Stealth Fighter, the tale of Ryan "Iron Man" Mitchell (Mandylor) a Harry Connick Jr. lookalike who is a member of a special ops team who reports directly to President Westwood (Hudson). When his former buddy Owen Turner (-T) starts working for evil terrorist mastermind Roberto Menendez (Divoff),bad things start to happen.

They sink a submarine with a full crew on board, initiate the killer satellite Thanatos to blow up the world, and on top of that, Turner steals a stealth fighter jet. Meanwhile Mitchell is trying to repair his family life with his wife Erin (Eleniak) and daughter J.P. (Dampf). So he offers to go on this one last mission to save the world.

You know Menendez is evil because he sports an ascot. Lister plays his muscle named Berg. All he does is bug out his eyes. The best actor in the movie is Sarah Dampf as Mitchell's precocious daughter. The code name "Eagle One" makes another appearance just like in Desert Thunder. The movie is filled to the brim with silly slang and you have to activate the closed captioning to understand the dialogue: "You've just been splashed!", "The Bird", The usage of "SAMS", etc. There's also the funny mission names such as "Black Raven" and "Operation: Clean Sweep".

A tongue-in-cheek scene occurs when William Sadler, as Mitchell's commanding officer Frank Peterson, sits behind his desk and yells "You're a wild card!" Also in that scene, Sadler calls him "Kenny" for some reason. Strangely, his daughter claims to have a boyfriend named Kenny. In that same scene, his wife offers Mitchell some iced tea. Of all drinks, why that? Speaking of the man, he wears some funny shirts and spits out his lines in his own inimitable way. He's part tough, part goofy. Somehow he doesn't seem like an expert with planes. In the final battle between him and Mitchell, we even get to see his martial arts stylings, or Ice-Fu if you will.

Many things in Stealth Fighter are prescient. Ernie Hudson is cast as the President, predating Obama. They talk about Electro-magnetic Pulse attacks, which have been in the news recently.

The title has two meanings: Mitchell himself, and the plane in question. The submarine subplot wasn't substantial, it was pretty subpar.

In all, if you like cardboard planes, goofy DTV action, Jim Wynorski, or Desert Thunder (which is superior to this) and you want slang-filled, utterly brainless action, then watch Stealth Fighter.

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it's amusing to read the reviews that complain about the bits pinched from other films? who-cares, just suspend one's usual criteria and go with the ...flow. did anyone really expect Oscar potential?

Jet fighter pilots at the start, murder, faked death, then some guys steal a stealth plane! lots of bodies already. Then there has to be a rescue. Enter the big hero, at first he has a whole bunch of Seal- types with him, but they ALL get killed, so, it is up to him to save the world. But alas, even he can't save the 141 guys in the submarine.

and guess what... he does too. and gets back home in time for the parent's day at the (over)cute daughter's school.

The story is passable-fantasy-hero stuff, the acting varies, but is not as bad as some reviewers claim, hey what do you expect from a 9- year-old? I was impressed with the scenes showing the planes... until I read how they "did" them. They didn't, they borrowed the footage.

My only real complaint is that the plane and submarine interiors look too big. Both those things are so cramped?