Fortress

A word of advice: if you're gonna have more than one kid, do so before your country becomes a totalitarian society where you get arrested for having a second child... so, China.

That's the fate that falls under our hero John Henry Brennick (the always awesome Christopher Lambert!) and his wife, who get caught on their way to Mexico to give birth to their second child, and are instead sent to a maximum security prison, because, you know, parents rank alongside serial rapists and tax evaders. Now there's a major flaw with this charge against Brennick and his wife: see, their first child died during childbirth, but according to the law that still counts and they are still not allowed to have another child. Now I know this is an abuse of power that even the Taliban would find too harsh, but don't worry folks, Christopher Lambert is here to save the day!

It's life in the Fortress where things get interesting. First, the prison is a giant high tech death trap controlled by a very angry computer with a shrill female voice. Second, the warden is Red Forman. Third, all prisoners are injected with a chip into their intestines that cause incredible pain when the computer is commanded to "intestinate". It looks like all hope is lost, but remember, Christopher Lambert will show Red Forman who's in charge.

Low budget, ultra violent, and completely over-the-top, Fortress is one bad-ass sci-fi film of the 'b' kind! Directed by Re-Animator director Stuart Gordon and also starring our favourite mad scientist Jeffrey Combs, it's a whole bag of fun with low production values and a short runtime. Did I mention Christopher Lambert?

Final Mark: 4/5



EXTRA CRAP
The Good: Kurtwood Smith remains one of the best villains in the business.
The Bad: Extra wires and solarization can't cover up a low budget, no matter how hard you try.
The Ugly: How does one poop with a chip in their intestine?
Food of Choice: Cheesy Sausage Nachos
Drink of Choice: Extended Jail Sentence
Useless Trivia: This nearly starred Arnold Schwarzenegger in the lead role, until he dropped out and was replaced with Christopher Lambert. I think he's a suitable replacement, no?
Favourite Quote: D-Day - [Explaining the volatile nature of the Intestinator device] It's like T.N.T on PMS.

Starcrash

You got to hand it to the Italians: they know how to make good trash.

Every once in a while a film comes along that is so big and so popular it spawns some really bad imitators. Us b-movie aficionados have found appreciation in big blockbusters for this exact reason. One such film was Star Wars which spawned a plethora of ridiculously bad imitators. Enter the Italian film industry, notorious for producing big Hollywood blockbuster knock-offs, who jumped on the Star Wars bandwagon to make their own sci-fi action epic... with a limited budget of course. Put all these ingredients together in a blender and puree on high, and you get Starcrash, a deliciously bad film of gigantic proportions.

What makes Starcrash so amazing is that there is so much that is bad, not just one or two things. We're talking about the acting, the set pieces, the writing, the special effects, the piss-poor dubbing, the redneck robot... everything! Mind you this is all because the incredible speed these filmmakers worked at to get this out and capitalize on the Star Wars craze, not to mention working with a budget so low Roger Corman would be ashamed. Even Caroline Munroe running around in practically nothing can't help this fabulous train wreck. But it doesn't hurt either, and frankly she doesn't need to: Starcrash is amazing the way it is. That's right kids, this is a textbook case of so-bad-its-good disorder.

As I said, there isn't just one or two things that stand out in this flick, but there are a few worth mentioning. Akton is quite possibly the most annoying and ugliest hero-slash-Luke Skywalker wannabe with an abundance of powers, including seeing into the future. L is a robot sheriff programmed with a southern US accent. Count Zartharn, the evil overlord hellbent on ruling the universe, travels through space on a giant claw that can transform into *gasp* a fist! Yes, that really is Christopher Plummer. In case you are wondering, they are called "light swords", not "light sabres". And finally, when all else fails, stop time! This is only a sample of what makes this a classic.

Starcrash is a real treat for b-movie fans. This is a treasure trove of crap cinema and, like a fine wine, only gets better with age. When it comes to ripoffs and films that are bad from start to finish, Starcrash is top-notch. It exists at the same plateau as Plan 9, but has the distinction of starring people that maintained a decent career afterwards, a rare b-movie trait. It is truly an amazing film, with a very appropriate title, and is worth multiple viewings! So good, in fact, that it deserves a loyal fan base like Star Wars or Star Trek. And for that fan base, I propose a name for them, similar to Trekkies or Deadheads. How does "bonehead" sound?

Final Mark: 4.5/5



EXTRA CRAP
The Good: Caroline Munro and her interchangable sexy outfits.

The Bad: Someone watched this and gave David Hasselhoff a career.

The Ugly: Those special effects are something else...

In A Nutshell: Hey, Christopher Plummer, what's that black spot on your resume?

Useless Trivia: This was nominated for an award... a legitimate award too! It was nominated for a Saturn Award for Best Foreign Film. And that is the sound of your head exploding!

Favourite Quote(s):

• The Emperor: You know, my son, I wouldn't be Emperor of the Galaxy if I didn't have a few powers at my disposal. Imperial Battleship, halt the flow of time!
• Stella Star: So you see into the future. All these years you never told me. Think of all the trouble I might have avoided.
  Akton: You would have tried to change the future, which is against the law. So therefore I can tell you nothing.
• L: It's so nice to be turned on again.
• Stella Star: Get ready to ease out of orbit.
  Akton: This doesn't make you nervous, does it?"
  Stella Star: Well, leave it to me.
  Akton: Build up maximum energy!
  Stella Star: OK, I'm ready.
  Akton: All system prepare for full power!
  Stella Star: Let's lock in these controls...
  Akton: Let's go!

Robot Holocaust

With a title like Robot Holocaust, you’d expect to see a lot of robots, right? Well, not only is there a serious lack of robots, the only robots you get are really stupid ones. Is this really what the future hold for us? Our world ruled by sub-par intelligent robots? Is this the long lost sequel to Transformers? I guess I better start learning how to telepathically talk to machines before it’s too late.

It’s the epic story where a band of warriors, lead by the mysterious drifter Neo (whoa!), who rise up against the robots who have turned on their masters and taken over the world. It’s kind of like post-apocalyptic film meets action film meets road movie meets musical… or something like that. But really Robot Holocaust is a perfect case study in how important a budget is to a film production. In this case, you shouldn’t try to make an epic sci-fi action movie with less than a million. That is what the filmmakers tried to do here, and boy are the results catastrophic! This film is gloriously bad, right down to the b-movie bone!

It seems to have everything you desire in a b-movie: a dreadful script chock full of dumb lines, shoddy set and costume design, a horrible synthesizer soundtrack, mind-boggling special effects, astonishingly bad acting (one of the best things about this movie, the performance of Angelika Jager as Valaria is priceless!) and even worse directing. And there so much nonsensical shit going on here it’s incredible, and not in a it’s-sci-fi-and-they’re-making-up-words-so-it-must-be-cool way either: zombies come out of nowhere, humans can read robot minds, a mute in a loincloth has to disable a bomb, poison air that strangely some people can breathe, interpretive dance… It’s almost brilliant in its crappiness if it wasn’t for its lack of decent robots.

This is a problem many b-movies have: they promise something in the title but not deliver in the story. It’s like. Here they promise a film with a lot of robots, possibly fighting to the death. You gotta admit the title is pretty cool. Instead we get a group of humans looking to take back their world now ruled by the robots. In fact, the opening narration tells us these events take place after the forthcoming robot holocaust, so we’re let down from the start. And throughout the film you get to see three or four robots, and that’s it! What a letdown. There are more humans than robots here; that just isn’t right. I think there should be a mathematical equation for situations like this to assure a film lives up to is promise. In this case, it should be a 3:1 ratio; there should be three robots for every one human in this film. Then it probably wouldn’t be so disappointing.

Robot Holocaust reaches incredible heights of crapiness; just talking about what they pull off here can take up a few pages. But it falls short of brilliance for its serious lack of robots. You know what this film needs? A remake. Give it a bigger budget, better, smarter robots (and more), better special effects, better action, and it will… wait a minute; a story is about humans fighting back against artificial intelligence after they have taken over the world, an uninhabitable earth where humans are forced to live underground, humans are being turned into robots for fuel, a hero named Neo… holy shit! It’s already been remade! Whoa indeed!

Final Mark: 2.5/5



EXTRA CRAP
The Good: A lesson for filmmakers: if you want to make the city you shoot in ruins from a major war without any costly special effects, just shoot at tall buildings with dirt and garbage in the foreground. Trust me, it will work.

The Bad: With so few robots, how is it they act better than their human counterparts?

The Ugly: Sock puppets and plastic spider legs are really quite vicious.

In A Nutshell: Needs a lot more robots.

Useless Trivia: The man behind the costume for the villain robot Torque is Rick Gianasi, best known as one of our favourite b-movie hero Sgt. Kabukiman.

Favourite Quote(s):

• Jorn: I am but a simple man, Dark One. A man who is, clearly, no match for your powers.
  The Dark One: And yet, you breathe the poisoned air.
  Jorn: I have no explanation.
• Nyla: The first thing we do when we find one of you [males] is to remove your tongue...men chatter so.
  Airslave Fighter: Your cowardly bitch!
• Nyla: If we wake up dead, we'll know who to blame!