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Review
by
Brian Lindsey
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5
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7 |
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10
= Highest Rating |
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Typically
lumped with the many "post-apocalyptic" Road
Warrior rip-offs cranked out by the Italian film industry
in the '80s — the DVD packaging declares it as part of Shriek
Show's Post-Apocalyptic Collection, in fact — 1990:
The Bronx Warriors really has nothing to do with survival
in the dystopian aftermath of a nuclear holocaust. It's actually
a rip-off of John Carpenter's Escape
from New York rather than a Mad Max film, with allusions
to A Clockwork Orange and bits
of Walter Hill's The Warriors thrown
in for good measure. Though well-directed for a low budget knockoff,
the film is saddled with a ludicrous script and a completely
vacuous non-actor in the lead role, a supposedly super-tough
guy who walks like he's got a corncob shoved up his ass. That
a lot of this turns out to be unintentionally funny is the flick's
saving grace.
By the not-too-distant "future" of 1990,
crime had become so rampant in the dilapidated Bronx section
of New York that the district was declared "No Man's Land" by
the authorities. Cops no longer enter it. The vicious street
gangs that remained have carved the Bronx into their own separate
territories. It would seem a strange place indeed for an attractive
young woman to seek refuge, but Ann (Stefania Girolami, daughter
of the film's director) flees across the Hudson River to seek
sanctuary there. Her family owns the powerful Manhattan Corporation,
the world's biggest arms conglomerate, which also controls New
York City via some kind of corporate-fascist regime. (A forerunner
to Robocop's O.C.P., I suppose.)
Ann fled because she fears that, when the time comes for her
to assume ownership of the company, she'll become nothing more
than a puppet under the collective thumb of the sinister Suits
who really run it. She's right. The Manhattan Corporation wants
her out of the Bronx at any cost. The lives of the "scum"
that inhabit the desolate borough are of no consequence whatever.
Ann hasn't penetrated far
into the Bronx when she's jumped by one of the gangs, the Zombies
— guys who wear white-painted Nazi helmets, dress like rejects
from a bad Doctor Who episode, carry hockey sticks as
weapons and use roller-skates to get around. (I couldn't make
this up if I tried.) Luckily for our fugitive heiress her capture
is thwarted by the Riders, tough dudes on motorcycles commanded
by their young, long-haired leader, Trash (Mark Gregory). Trash
takes a shine to Ann and invites her to stay with him at the
Riders' Day-Glo graffitied HQ.
Meanwhile, the Manhattan Corporation sends an agent into the
Bronx, a ruthless enforcer named Hammer (Vic Morrow, in his
last role before being killed on the set of The
Twilight Zone). His mission is to recover the girl but
also eliminate just about everybody else. To do this he sets
the gangs against one another, aided by a traitor among Trash's
lieutenants. But Trash finds a powerful ally in The Ogre (Black
Caesar's Fred Williamson), rival
gang leader and self-styled
"King of the Bronx", who teams up with him to take on both Hammer
and the Zombies.
The script of this movie is not just terrible, it's stupid
— it's surprising that director Enzo G. Castellari (Keoma,
The New Barbarians) was able
to do as much as he did with it. (He co-wrote it, too, so for
that he must take some share of the blame.) Since there's no
sign of apocalypse, nuclear or otherwise, how come there are
pasty-faced subterranean mutants living beneath the Bronx? (If
not mutants, are they supposed to be a gang whose members act
and dress like troglodytes?) And this is America, dammit...
Where the hell
are all the guns? Unbelievably none
of the gangs carry firearms, preferring spiked iron bars and
hockey sticks instead. (The well-armed Hammer has no such 2nd
Amendment qualms.) Two moments of surreal silliness really stand
out: For a meeting between Ogre's
gang and the Riders (many of whom
are actual New York-area Hell's Angels), drum beats meant to
emulate John Carpenter's Escape from New
York music (The Duke's theme) accompanies their entrance...
Only the drums aren't just heard on the soundtrack — a guy is
actually sitting there playing the drums as the rival
toughs assemble. The
real jawdropper, though, comes when Trash and his buds encounter
a gang of tap dancers all decked out for a Bob Fosse
musical. And yes, they actually tap dance as they fight.
This simply had to be some kind of attempt at humor,
though ironically it's hilarious precisely because it's not
funny — just incredibly retarded instead.
Throw in some truly dumb dialog ("It
could be a pile of shit out of somebody's asshole!"
says Trash, explaining that the situation might not be as it
appears) and —
well, you get the picture. The entertainment value of 1990:
The Bronx Warriors has little or nothing to do with its
quality as an action film. It's all about whether movies like
this —
ones "so bad they're good" —
appeal to your palate. This is the genuine fake thing: unadulterated
exploitation cheese, professionally prepared Italian-style.
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A
division of Media Blasters, Shriek Show has released a number
of interesting Euro-Cult titles over the past couple of years.
The label has also been plagued with defective discs, canceled
and/or continually postponed release dates and rampant typos on
packaging, insert materials and menu screens. Happily, I can report
that the new, uncut edition of Bronx Warriors
suffers from none of these deficiencies. Maybe — just maybe
— Shriek Show is starting to get their shit together.
A/V:
The disc looks terrific, especially in comparison to those dark,
muddy VHS editions from the days of yore. A 2.35:1 widescreen
transfer presents the film in its correct aspect ratio for the
first time ever on North American home video, and is enhanced
for 16x9 TVs. Audio quality, long a shortcoming of Shriek Show's,
isn't up to the visual standards but is serviceable. On occasion
the flat-sounding mono track suffers loud "thumps" —
akin to someone bumping into a live microphone —
and displays noticeable hiss in the quieter scenes. (I deducted
two points from my overall DVD score on account of the audio.)
Extras:
In addition to a still gallery and four trailers (for Shriek Show
releases Flesh Eater, Flesh
for the Beast, Jess Franco's
Faceless and 2019:
After the Fall of New York), the disc offers an audio commentary
with director Castellari and two featurettes. The commentary has
Castellari discussing (in
hesitant but usually understandable English) the film's production,
location filming in/around New York and Rome, his three-camera
technique for shooting action scenes and on-set relationships
with stars Gregory, Williamson and Morrow. Aside from a few passing
mentions of Keoma, he sticks firmly
to the movie at hand. The director also appears in one of the
featurettes, a 6-minute videotaped
interview in which he offers more generalized input about 1980s
Italian exploitation movies and his own filmmaking style.
The disc's second featurette is a nice treat
indeed. (For one thing, it's much more professionally produced
and edited than any previous Shriek Show docs I've seen.) Fred
Williamson —
looking like he's hardly aged in more than 20 years —
holds forth for 40 minutes on his transition from pro football
to show business, the cultural differences between European and
U.S. movie sets, working with stunt men in fight scenes, his decision
to become a producer/director in his own right and the philosophy
of his personal lifestyle. (He also disses Lucio Fulci as an incompetent
director.) Much like the too-cool characters he's portrayed on
film, Williamson is one cocky dude to be sure —
yet likable and undeniably charismatic as well.
3/08/04 |
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