PRIMITIVE SCREWHEADS

Threads 1984

Threads 1984 Written by Barry Hines and directed by Mick Jackson. It's a British and Australian co-production. Barry wrote the novel A Kestrel For A Knave that got made into the film Kes by Ken Loach. Not a book or a film that I've been interested in but both the novel and the film are widely liked and respected. Kes failed in the US, withdrawn within days of opening. Roger Ebert wrote a 4 star review praising the film, he blames the Yorkshire accents for it being pulled.  Suddenly, I'm interested. I love a good Yorkshire accent .

It's a post apocalypse story that ends really badly for Britain. The war starts in the Middle East and turns much of Europe into a wasteland with most of the population dead. We see most of story from the town of Sheffield. We meet several locals, some die and others aren't so lucky. By the end of the movie Britain has a tiny population who only have one working VCR to keep their children occupied while they starve to death.

The movie is totally bleak but well made for the time. The editing is the star here. The film cuts back and forth between the Sheffield locals and what's going on around the country and Europe. Information is dolled out in voice overs and title cards, images flash by in short snippets. The scenes with the locals are longer.

The movie gets an 8 on the IMDb and that's with 20,000 votes. Thirty percent are an 8, I can't disagree. I really enjoyed it despite not liking a bleak sort of story very much. Of course, the Post Apoc story is an exception. I would prefer a Mad Max sort of film than  a bleak sort of drama about a couple of twenty somethings who've ruined their lives by taking the wrong drugs too often or a bleak family drama filled with anger and people staring into the distance.

There's a decent copy on YouTube, link above. The 1080p video looks pretty good. I thought it was worth a look and I think there are a few out there who might be interested. Others might like to avoid it if they don't care for bleak stories.

Cannibal Mercenary 1983

Cannibal Mercenary 1983 Written by George Lam and directed by Hong Lu Wang. A Thai picture.

A cop called Wilson takes a team into the Vietnam jungle to find a war criminal who heads a tribe of cannibals. They don't have a very good trip, just about everyone dies. There's plenty of action, with jungle fighting, some torture and a bit of cannibalism.

I didn't think it was more than average, it's like an Italian cannibal film but not as well made.

I found a copy on YouTube but it's gone already. I found another that has a fun trailer for Cobra Thunderbolt, that looks like it might be better than what I just watched. At least there was a jet pack, there's no jet pack in Cannibal Mercenary. There's also a trailer for a Thai film called Mercenary, it looks like it's a bit of an Apocalypse Now rip off.

Science Fiction Sunday 601

Robowar 1988 Another poor effort from the fine folks of Italy. Bruno Mattei used a pseudonym, Vincent Dawn, to try to trick audiences into believing they might be seeing an American made film. They aren't fooling anyone with half a brain. Rosella Drudi and Claudio Fragasso wrote the screenplay using their real names, pointing out that no one really gives a fuck who writes this shit. I watched it on Amazon Prime and put a link to the movie on YouTube in the title above. Not the greatest upload but watchable. Not that I'm recommending that.

A special cyborg killer goes nuts on a mission to kill some guerillas on a jungle island. That's the band of soldiers, in the picture above, who are sent to stop the cyborg. The woman was someone they rescued along the way to their dooms. The guy, third from left, is the developer of the cyborg and he's a real dirt bag. He doesn't tell anyone anything until it's too late and one by one they get picked off. I couldn't hardly wait to see him get his.

It's all walking through the jungle, shouting cliches at each other, with occasional fire fights. It's dull and I don't need to see it again. At least I get to complain about it, maybe save someone from buying the Severin Blu-ray. My good deed for the day.

Transmophers 2007 Another Amazon Prime film that shares the cyborg battlebot idea with Robowars. I decided to watch it, even though it's from the dreaded film production house The Asylum. Occasionally it's good to be reminded how poor they are at making films. Leigh Scott is the writer and director. He's written a story about a robot invasion of the Earth, something that happened in the past, the remaining humans have hidden themselves underground and fight back as they can. The movie depicts the battle to take back the surface.

This movie shares something else with the previous film. It's script is also a bag full of cliches. Both films have nothing original going on in them. The acting is all over the place, a couple of people have slightly more skill than the rest and it stands out. It's even duller that Robowar, nothing much happens for nearly the first half the 86 min movie, I was forced to flick through the dull scenes with the 10 second jump button to stave off boredom. Not surprising, movies from The Asylum have a lot of talky scenes, it's cheaper than action and they have little money. Occasionally they shot scenes of people walking and talking in a corridor. That still doesn't make the films more interesting. Another one I wouldn't need to see again.

Inglorious Bastards 2 Hell Heroes

Inglorious Bastards 2 Hell's Heroes is an Italian sequel to 1978 film The Inglorious Bastards. Both are heavily patterned after The Dirty Dozen but neither are as good. It's packaged with three other Italian War movies, four movies all on one disc. It gets better. All are full screen pan and scan with so-so quality video. Apocalypse Mercenaries is a 1987 film, dubbed into English, with Japanese subtitles burned into the image. You can't shut them off, same goes for War Bus II, an 1989 movie also known as Afghanistan: The Last War Bus. The last movie is the 1986 film Bridge To Hell.

Most of them have an American star to help sell the movie. Miles O'Keeffe and Fred Williamson in Inglorious Bastards 2: Hell's Heroes, John Vernon in War Bus II, and Andy J Forest in Bridge To Hell.

All have groups of Allied soldiers behind Nazi lines to tackle a mission. They shoot the shit out of the Nazis, slowing down only to blow up more Nazis. Then there's plenty of walking about and hiding from the Nazis. Even those bastards seem to know that you can't shoot all the Nazis at one time.

None of them are particularity good but they do blow up a lot of stuff. It was only $4.95 over at Hamilton Books, more on Amazon, but hardly worth that. Doubtful that I'll watch them all again.