Spacehunter: Adventures in the
Forbidden Zone (1983)
The poor mans Han Solo, that's what
this is. Although instead of a Wookie he starts out the movie with
his own Cherry 2000.
This was a rushed into production movie
that was trying to capitalize on the current popularity of science
fiction films at the time. Which of course was caused by the StarWars franchise blowing everything up at the time. Then, part of the
way through filming, they decided to also capitalize off of the
current 3D movie trend at the time. That trend I'm not sure what
caused as most 3D effects at the time were pretty crap and most of
the movies using it weren't much better.
One of the first thing noticeable is
the music. Oh the damned music. The loud obnoxious music that is
supposed to be 'adventurous' sounding or something. Instead it's very
grating on the nerves and repetitive so much I think it may have
inspired the electronica house bands. You get a really good dose of
it right off the bat during the second thing you will notice.... the
really long stream of credits at the beginning. They give the
Superman movie a run for it's money but at least the man from Krypton
had a much better musical score.
The basic story is pretty straight
forward. Three survivors of a spaceliner explosion get stranded on a
hostile planet and a reward is put out for their return. Thus Han
Solo, no wait, I mean Wolff (that's right to f's in there cause he's
bad ass) rushes over to save them and collect the reward. Problems on
the planet ensue, we get a plucky young sidekick, a gruff old buddy
and then we set off to save them from the planets big bad guy aptly
named Overdog (what no two g's on dog?) and save the day.
Highlights among the cast are a young
Molly Ringwald playing that plucky young sidekick named Niki. Ernie
Hudson as Lando Cal... wait sorry did it again, as the gruff old
buddy Washington. Peter Strauss as Wolff trying to climb out of
television movies with this film but failing and falling right back
into them afterwards. Micheal Ironside, the man who knows just when
to chew on the scenery, as the planetary bad guy Overdog. Also I
will admit my male gaze did enjoy Andrea Marcovicci for the short
time she was in the movie as Chalmers the android replacement for a
wookie.
This movie takes one of my biggest
scifi movie complaints and turns it back around on me with a slap on
the face for good measure. I dislike it when they make movies sets
all shiny, new and almost untouched by human hands instead of lived
in and a bit rough around the edges. In this movie they decided to
make it all look like a junkheap in space. Everything, even Wolff's
ship looked like a jumbled heap on the inside. While the planet is
supposed to be all nasty and rough they went overkill with it so much
that it looked like garbage instead of a set. They went to far with
the trashed out look.
As I said earlier, this thing was done
up for 3D effects. So you get some really cheesy shots in here that
look out of place for any other kind of movie. The slow motion bad
guy pushing a needle towards the screen. The same mad max style
bladed up car coming towards you. But thankfully they are kept in
rather low doses.
All the negatives aside. This movie was
actually kind of fun to watch.
The action starts up rather quickly and
it keeps going. You get a tabletop RPG in the 80's feel from the plot
line as they travel from one strange ass situation to the next each
with a new creature to encounter each and every time. But you don't
get bored and you just wonder what the hell crazy ass thing is going
to happen next. The dialogue is cheese more often than not and the
main character evidently walks around wearing a pouch with shampoo
and soap in it on his belt but it's all in good fun.
So in the end I recommend this movie
for scifi fans but to be watched with a group of fellow scifi
enthusiasts preferably with beer and pretzels in plentiful amounts.
Nothing here is to be taken seriously at all. Just set back, toss
back a few cans and laugh with your buddies while it plays out.
Just wish there was a way to cut out
that damned music.
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"Hey Wolff I'm just going to hang out back here with the rest of the garbage m'kay"
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