• Directed by Harley Cokliss
• Written by Irving Austin, John Beech, and Harley Cokliss
• Starring
  • Michael Beck
  • Annie McEnroe
  • James Wainwright
  • Randy Powell
  • John Ratzenberger

I’ve been trying for days to get around to writing this review. It’s not necessarily that I haven’t had the time (though heaven knows, if I could find a way to live without wasting six hours a night staring at the inside of my eyelids, I would); it’s simply that I’ve not been able to drum up much enthusiasm either for or against this movie. There was nothing especially good or especially bad about it; it’s simply there, inert, a movie that slides smoothly over your brain for ninety minutes without leaving much sign of its passing.

One of the first things you notice is that this movie was shot in New Zealand. It’s kind of obvious; while the American actors imported for the leading roles speak with whitebread American diction, the rest of the cast has quite a bit of the Southern Hemisphere in their voices. Given that location, it’s almost inevitable to compare it with it’s immediate predecessor from Down Under, The Road Warrior (1981). Yes, I’m fully aware that Australia and New Zealand are separate and separated countries, but while an Aussie or a New Zealander might make a great fuss about the differences between their two countries, from a distance, they’re much more like than unlike, much like Canada and the U.S.

Anyway, what was my point, aside from that long paranthetical comment? Oh yeah, about comparing this one to The Road Warrior. Don’t. Aside from using some common elements (such as the importance of petroleum products), there’s very little in common between these movies outside the most common tropes of the post-apocalyptic subgenre.

Let’s begin at the beginning, shall we? And as you surely know if you’ve seen even a handful of these movies, the beginning is usually some kind of preamble or exposition detailing how the world got the way it is. In this case, we hear a radio news broadcast detailing how the current gasoline shortage has caused the accompanying collapse of society, food riots, martial law, etc., and since law enforcement efforts are concentrated on the urban tinderboxes, the rural areas are being left to fend for themselves. Oh, yeah, the announcer also mentions a renegade colonel named Straker who’s kind of playing the bully in those outlying areas.

It doesn’t take long before we meet Straker (James Wainwright); his schtick is driving around in a huge armored truck called the Battletruck with a score of motley “soldiers,” imposing his own kind of fascism on the land. He enters stage right as he runs down a converted truck being pulled by horses (later on we hear a character refer to such a contraption as a “truckboard” — how clever!), carrying two barrels of diesel fuel in the back. Straker shoots one of the two drivers to convince the other to lead them to the hidden depot — a rather improbable pump that rises out of the floor of a desert basin, beneath a camoflaging boulder. He then orders Corlie (annie McEnroe), a twentyish girl in his band, to dispose of their guide — and when she turns the gun on Straker, we sense there may be a teeny bit of animosity here. Alas, the gun is empty; Straker was testing her.

During the night, Corlie sneaks away from the Battletruck; by mid-morning, walking along the desert roads, she’s easily tracked down by a band of Straker’s goons in a dune buggy. But as she fends them off, we finally meet our hero — a young prettyboy named Hunter (Michael Beck), clad in leather with plates sewn to it for armor, and driving a SuperDirtbike. (Well, not really that super; it’s got a sheet metal contraption in front of the handlebars, but it doen’t do anything like shoot lasers or launch grenades; in short, it’s nowhere near as nifty as Streethawk. He probably borrowed it from the props department of Megaforce, which was his acting job immediately previous to this one.) He rescues Corlie, and speeds her off to his little mountain retreat.

This is where you really realize that, whatever else this movie may be, it’s not an out-and-out imitation of The Road Warrior. It’s a veritable homestead that Hunter’s got, a comfortable little house with a barn and some livestock. He fuels the bike with methane derived from the chicken poop. (Gee, just think, if everyone were smart enough to do that, we’d avoid an awful lot of the unpleasantness in this particular future.) He’s also a willful loner; after patching up a knee injury she got in the chase, he ferries her down to Clearwater Farm, the standard post-apocalyptic utopian democracy rising from the ashes. Her welcoming committee is Hunter’s only real friend in the Farm, Rusty, is played by none other than John Ratzenberger, and we know he’s the smart guy the same way we can always identify a smart guy in a post-apoc movie: he wears glasses. (If you doubt me, I refer you to the same feature visible in Solar Force.)

Corlie is brought in and voted into the community, above the suspicions of Judd (Randy Powell), whom we can immediately identify as the eventual traitor to the Farm for three reasons:

• He questions where Corlie’s loyalties would lie, if forced to choose between Hunter and the Farm. It’s pretty standard that the person so concerned about others’ loyalties usually isn’t too clear on his own.
• His name is Judd. Judd=Judas. See?
• Sad but true, he’s the only distinctly Semitic-looking person at the Farm. (“I tried to make Judas the most Jewish…”)

Of course, happiness at the Farm is short-lived, as the Battletruck rumbles out of the desert, through the Farm’s flimsy fortifications, and right over its few defenders. Corlie manages to slip out, grab a horse, and ride off for Hunter while Straker is giving the assembled locals the speech about how his fascism is good for everyone, no really, it is — punctuated by the obligatory shooting of the stupid fellow who steps up and says, “Hey, you can’t just come in here and **BLAM**.” (You know, those guys are always so accomodating in providing the Evil Overlords with a demonstration of how much They Mean Business; you almost wonder if they’re some kind of paid shill, except they always end up dying to prove the point.)

Sure enough, Straker discovers a distinctive-looking locket that Corlie gave to one of the Farm’s little girls, and sure enough, Judd immediately volunteers that Corlie had been there but left, probably to get Hunter, and also that Rusty is the only person there who knows where Hunter lives. We also get an odd little reticence on the filmmakers’ part to go the distance: All the women are rounded up and herded out to Straker’s men, for reasons which we can only guess too well — except nothing ever comes of it. There’s no indication whatsoever that the women have been mistreated; when a later character lists Staker’s offenses against them — defenders killed, crops ruined, possessions stolen — he never mentions, “Oh, yeah, and all of our female residents raped.” Somehow it doesn’t really engender respect for the filmmakers if they’re not ready to get unpleasant after a setup like that.

So. Corlie makes it to Hunter’s place, they have the obligatory Deep Musings scene (“Why do men fight?”, “It must change,” etc.), which morphs immediately into the equally-obligatory Two Last Attractive People In The World Making Out scene.

Later, in the wee small hours, the Battletruck demonstrates a heretofore-unknown ability: Though it can be heard coming from several miles off during daylight hours, it apparently can move silently after midnight. This allows Straker’s goons to creep almost up to Hunter’s place before he wakes and starts picking them off. Corlie joins in and takes out another handful, assisted by the fact that Straker has given orders that she not be harmed. (You try capturing a fiery young woman with an automatic weapon without harming her. Go ahead.) They escape, thanks to Hunter’s improbable supply of ammunition and grenades, but not before Straker destroys the homestead in frustration.

Now here’s where we find out that the real shortage in the future is not of gasoline, or water, or law enforcement: It’s simple grey matter. Because Hunter and Corlie flee back to Clearwater Farm to hide — and it works! Straker and his men have returned to their diesel-based camp (one supposes they will make rounds to Clearwater to collect their tribute occasionally), and Straker has his men scouring the countryside to find the two fugitives, but absolutely no one thinks to look back at Clearwater. Which is fortunate for Hunter, because he can then recruit Rusty to help him come up with a more impressive assault vehicle than his MegaForce bike. Rusty’s brainstorm?

A Volkswagen.

No, no, wait, it gets better: a pieced-together Volkwagen, with random grills and fridge doors replacing the missing parts.

It’s okay; laugh all you want. I’ll still be here when you finally dry your eyes.

Back? Okay. As the Volkswagen nears completion, Judd makes his move again. See, he’s been playing all nice, helping Rusty with the “BattleBug”, but now, when Hunter’s out salvaging from his homestead, he kidnaps her and drags her off toward Straker’s camp in one of those “truckboards”; and when Hunter comes back and gives chase, Judd shoots him with a crossbow. Th ebolt fits right in between those nifty metal plates sewn onto Hunter’s jacket, and he and his bike roll off the road. Judd stupidly assumes he’s dead. (Yeah, right. He’s the hero, remember, Judd?)

When Judd brings his prize into Straker’s camp, he doesn’t get quite the warm welcome he expected; that’s because (wait for it, here’s the revelation they’ve been dancing around all through the movie) Corlie is Straker’s daughter! (Wow! Some surprise, huh? I mean, I certainly didn’t see that coming from miles and miles away.)

Meanwhile, Hunter drags himself back to Clearwater, where the BattleBug is, well, finished, I guess. (I mean, it’s not like you can tell by looking.) So exactly what you’d expect happens: Hunter drives into Straker’s camp, firing guns and lobbing grenades, and completely decimating Straker’s forces (including Judd). The coup de grace is the grenade he drops into the diesel pump. That makes for some big, pretty fireworks.

Straker and his remaining two goons (with Corlie dragged along) get the Battletruck moving, and start chasing the BattleBug up into the hills. This is where the final ingenious part of Hunter’s plan comes into play: The Battletruck is basically a souped-up semi, and (as you surely know if you’ve been trapped behind one of those things on the highway), semis can’t keep their speed up on hills. Straker pushes for enough speed to catch up, the driver gives the “Ye canna change the laws of physics, cap’n!” speech, and sure enough, little red indicators all over the dashboard start flashing. (I don’t know that having ten lights for “You’re Screwed” is more effective than just one, but then again, no one’s asked me to design a Battletruck.) And having Hunter toss back grenades (blowing the roof out of the carrier section) doesn’t help things.

Finally, Hunter exchanges the BattleBug for his MegaForce bike and manages the trick of landing it inside the gaping hole in the back of the Battletruck, there’s the obligatory hand-to-hand, Hunter and Corlie escape on the MegaForce bike, and Straker goes over a cliff in the Battletruck.

The wrap-up scene is pure factory issue: Hunter leaves Corlie at Clearwater because, even though he now has no home or possessions, he’s a loner. He promises that he’ll be back “someday” (sure — if every post-apoc girl had a dime every time she heard that, they could rebuild the economy), and off he heads, into the sunset.

So.

As I said, it’s not very much a rip-off of The Road Warrior, largely because Hunter bears little resemblance to Mad Max; he lives in a little homestead with chickens, after all.

Yet this is one of those movies where a little imitation couldn’t hurt. There’s an omnipresent “low-key” feel about everything, a subdued atmosphere, as if the filmmakers were trying to infuse a little realism into the genre by avoiding the excesses of costume and setting. But no one watches this particular sub-genre of fantasy for gritty realism, because the gritty realism of a post-holocaust lifestyle would probably be about as boring as the real lifestyle in the pioneering American West, as contrasted with the cinematic Western genre.

In the final assessment, Warlords of the 21st Century is neither original enough nor lavish enough in its imitation to inspire strong feelings one way or the other. I’ve rarely had to refer to my notes so much in writing a review as I’ve had to this time; the details of the movie refused to stick in my mind. I suppose the best I can say about it is that it was a fairly painless 90 minutes, and went by pretty quickly — and that certainly qualifies as “damning with faint praise.”

Some Notable Totables:

• body count: 25
• breasts: 0
• explosions: 13
• ominous thunderstorms: 0
• actors who’ve appeared on Star Trek: 0