Arnold Schwarzenegger fights to save Vanessa Williams and stop an arms deal with terrorists in Eraser. The big guy is John Kruger, a U.S. Marshal who specializes in working the Witness Relocation Program.

The opening sequence sets up his abilities and the aspects of the job which see him erasing Johnny C (Robert Pastorelli) to keep him safe from the mob. Once that’s taken care of we are introduced to Lee (Williams) who is working with the FBI (hey look there’s John Slattery and K. Todd Freeman!) to bring down an arms deal, employing a new EMP rifle.

She confronts her boss, Donahue (hey look, there’s James Cromwell and oh! there he goes) and soon finds herself on the run from those who would kill her to stop her from getting the secrets out and stopping the deal.

Enter Kruger, who teams up with DeGuerin (James Caan) after getting his new assignment from Beller (James Coburn) and obviously with that kind of casting you can figure out pretty quickly who the villain is, and what they are up to.

So the action beats and the gunfire begins as the film tries to deliver something above the standard paint-by-numbers film that it becomes. There are some really ridiculous and over-the-top moments including Kruger shooting at a plane as he dangles mid-air from a parachute.

So as Lee and Kruger race to stop everything the film throws huge set pieces and a lot of ridiculous (even for the time) VFX at the audience.

Things are helped out by a solid score by Alan Silvestri but overall, even for Arnold, this one isn’t so wonderful. There’s a solid idea here, the whole witness protection thing could have really led to something, but wanting to put all these big beats into the film, something that these types of films require, just wasn’t done well enough.

All I remember when this one first came out was all the stuff in the trailer which featured the zoo and the alligators amidst a gunfight.

I like the cast, though there’s nothing like telegraphing who the villain is, but this one ended up being more silly than blockbuster action and this one kind of seemed to vanish almost after it was made.

Sorry Arnold this one didn’t entertain as much as I wanted it to. Maybe this idea could be revisited and explored anew with a better story and budget. Hey, they can’t all be winners.