In this ongoing SHOCK column, journo Trevor Parker sifts through discount stores for the cheapest and coolest DVD?s and Blu?s he can find and lives to tell the tale.
Last year, moviegoers could be forgiven for thinking that they had bumped their heads and somehow been transported back to 1984. New installments of STAR WARS, MAD MAX, TERMINATOR, and ROCKY again lit theater marquees, to a mostly positive reception from picky fandom, internet critics, and box office cash registers. The one downside of these new-millennium franchise revivals will be the absence of what followed the original films? success?namely the raft of entertainingly weird rip-offs and cheap foreign-lensed simulacra bobbing up in their wake. Fortunately, there remain a number of little-seen leftovers from those good old days that can be dusted off and enjoyed, four of which can be found on the 4 DISC SCI-FI MOVIE MARATHON, released by Shout!Factory
Start with ELIMINATORS (1986). It?s a title culled from the prime years of Charles Band?s Empire Pictures, when staff writers Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo steered a number of entertaining kid flicks into production before graduating Band camp and going off to write THE ROCKETEER for Disney. ELIMINATORS plays like a cybernetic A-TEAM episode (cue Bob Summers? opening military snare-drum music) where a time-travelling cyborg (known as the ?Mandroid? and played by Patrick Reynolds) is double-crossed by his conniving creator and sent fleeing from his fortress home. The betrayed bot then assembles an assault squad including a charming rogue, a brilliant scientist, and whirling-dervish ninja to confront his haughty, disfigured daddy before his manipulations of history alter time?s flow forever.
ELIMINATORS quotient of fun will hinge on the viewer?s personal cinematic maturity level, with the filmmaking alternately childish or child-like depending on precisely where one?s development was arrested. It?s a movie that seems to have been conceived in the aisle of a 1980?s Toys-R-Us store, with scenes built around Mandroid?s interchangeable weapon arms and tank body, a baddie?s wrist mounted laser gun, and a cute robot flitting around for comic relief. There are frequent spates of explosions and geysers of sparks, sure to thrill ten-year-olds of any era, and the film does manage to echo STAR WARS? swashbuckling feel through comedic bar-brawls and its overloaded, kitchen-sink ambitions (Ninjas! Cavemen! Robots!). Taking ELIMINATORS on more grown-up sensibilities is more of a slog, with the film?s choppy editing, hissing sound, and understandably broad performances. The exception there being a hoarse, haunted Reynolds wisely underplaying the tortured Mandroid and able to work with a subtle theme of ?will over programming? that presaged similar questions asked by the following year?s ROBOCOP. Other than Director Peter Manoogian wedging in an inappropriate sequence of STAR TREK?s Denise Crosby, as the accomplished scientist, in a wet tank top, the film?s middle section is unbearably saggy?it honestly has more scenes of aimless river-boating than APOCALYPSE NOW.
ELIMINATORS? ending is even worse; it?s abrupt and unsatisfying, as though the paychecks bounced on the final day of shooting and everybody just packed up early. Despite finishing with a pronounced limp, the watchable ELIMINATORS is still one of the era?s few movies to deliver exactly what its enticing and frenetic poster art promised.
For ARENA (1988), Band paired the Empire starting roster of Bilson/DeMeo/Manoogian with producer Irwin (HALLOWEEN) Yablans to create a rousing mash-up of sci-fi and sports movies?and no prizes for betting any cliché from either of those genres will go un-milked. On a space station that serves as a kind of intergalactic Ellis Island, lowly snack bar waiter and lanky amateur fighter Steve Armstrong (Paul Satterfield) must settle a debt by competing in an interplanetary prizefighting league called The Arena, overseen by the despotic Commissioner Rogor. Alongside his manager/confidant (Hamilton Camp), Armstrong works his way up the rankings while avoiding crooked promoters, femme fatales, and a standing champion just waiting for his chance to knock the tousles out of Armstrong?s Michael Bolton-esque hairdo.
ARENA is yet another Empire feature perfectly attuned to the tastes of ten-year-old boys; it?s colorful and lively, with the undeniable appeal of a Rock ?em Sock ?em robots game set in outer space, and its kiddie humor (?I?ve only got four hands!?, quips an overwhelmed alien bartender) is none too taxing. There is much to amuse adults here as well, whether coming intentionally or not: hilariously amplified punch sound effects to sell whenever a poorly-choreographed blow lands, the identical death-metal growl of various aliens when speaking as done by voice-over expert Frank Welker, a dancing hologram girl belting out cringingly ?futuristic? torch tunes, constant insert shots of wild overreactions from the clownishly-costumed Arena audience? and let?s not overlook Armstrong?s fight attire, made up of kneepads and some sort of golden leotard. Also in ARENA?s corner is a wonderful menagerie of creatures and aliens, provided in such abundance that it makes ARENA feel like a ninety-minute long STAR WARS Cantina scene. John Carl Buechler?s creature work here is superb; the designs are occasionally derivative, say with the Admiral Ackbar clone in the snack bar, but can also be downright breathtaking, such as with one of Armstrong?s enormous and insectile opponents (that guy built by Screaming Mad George and company). The cast is filled out with game STAR TREK and BABYLON 5 regulars, and unlike ELIMINATORS? stumble to a confusing half-finish, the conclusion to a sports flick like this may be awfully predictable but it makes for a much more satisfying finale.
AMERICA 3000 (1986) is a Cannon Films obscurity recently thrust back into public consciousness through Mark Hartley?s 2014 documentary ELECTRIC BOOGALOO. During one choice BOOGALOO interview clip, 3000 star Laurene Landon demonstrates her undying dissatisfaction with chintzy Cannon producers by turning to Hartley?s camera and burning her personal VHS copy of the film with a cigarette lighter. This moment is easily the most compelling thing ever having to do with 3000; the film itself is a bore enamored with what it?s certain is a radical and clever conceit?that of a post-apocalyptic matriarchy where scruffy herds of men are enslaved to female warlords centuries after a nuclear conflict. 3000 certainly has the wasteland aspect down?there?s nothing here of any note, unless women with humongous teased-up hairdos and pasty neanderthals cavorting through the desert in deerskin loincloths, raiding each others camps with crummy laser gun props and ?thunder rocks? (grenades) comprise your idea of compelling cinema. Writer-director David Englebach has a irritating habit of jamming nonsensical jargon representing a future vocabulary into the dialogue; words that must then be explained anyway via a golly-gee narrator. There?s but a single laugh to be had, at the expense of a pair of bongo drummers with a sign reading ?Rolling Stones Farewell Tour 1989? attached to the front of their kit. As 3000?s go, this movie is far more MYSTERY SCIENCE than it is AMERICA.
Finally, a wacky little Aussie number from 1987 called THE TIME GUARDIAN, operating on the regional moviemaking formula of peppering a couple of American name actors in with local talent to bolster global appeal. GUARDIAN is the tale of a city in the future, at war with an army of robots and moving throughout time to try and evade their attacks. A surly soldier (Tom Burlinson) is zapped to the Australian Outback of 1988, teaming up with a travelling geologist to prepare for the imminent arrival of the city and help it stand against the invaders. Supporting Burlinson are QUANTUM LEAP?s Dean Stockwell as the city?s leader and Princess Leia herself, Carrie Fisher, in a thankless sidekick role. Fisher has since gone on to become an acclaimed screenwriter and novelist, wielding a cutting wit worthy of the Algonquin Round Table, but in ?87 she was still being crammed into humiliating outfits?this time a sort of bronze breastplate half-shirt with protrusive nipples. Director/co-writer Brian Hannant previously served as co-writer and AD on George Miller?s mighty ROAD WARRIOR, and does manage to imbue GUARDIAN with a shadowy style. Also, speaking monetarily, GUARDIAN plays like BEN HUR next to the other three cheapies in this DVD set. It might have served as another decent watch for the youngsters, if not for the inexplicable inclusion of some nudity and a brief gore moment.
The 4 SCI-FI MOVIE MARATHON has no hidden classics or undiscovered gems, but with only ELIMINATORS below par and AMERICA 3000 the one outright dud, ten bucks is more than justified should you come across this set. Snap it up.
