Insel der Verdammten

Known everywhere in the world except the U.S. as TURKEY SHOOT (there it was accorded the dumb aka of ESCAPE 2000) this is trash Oz film-making at its best! You gotta see this flick! A truck-load of 'anti-establishment' personnel are sent to this insane privately run "conditioning camp" set up and operated by a futuristic corporation for the amusement and dubious scientific study by its patrons. Railsback is quite obviously a non-conformist and gives the authorities what-for in no uncertain terms. He is marked for extermination.

Yet another derivative of THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME, the voyeuristic bad guys like nothing better than a "hunt" of escapees, re-hashed yet again in the 90's with Jean-Claude Van Dumb as HARD TARGET! You might even like to reflect on similarities (in concept ONLY) with THE RUNNING MAN. If then you like grotesque violence, lesbian advances, excessive torture, guys with a hard-on for girl prisoners, yellow jump suits and girls shot through the breast, this is the film for you.

Incredibly, it was an enormous hit JUST in London at the midnight show in a theater in Leicester Square during the summer of 1982. They were queueing round the block for the privilege of watching Lynda Stoner and Olivia Hussey try to make it through the night. Damned if I didn't queue as well!

Directed by Anglo Australian filmmaker Brian Tenchard-Smith (most notably known for the Australian film that introduced Nicole Kidman to the world, BMX bandits, a kid/family movie, mainly remembered for the zeitgeist trend of the bicycle craze in the title), this post-Mad Max dystopian future movie tells the 'story' of a camp for retraining the 'deviates' of society, so that they may conform to the institutionalised norm as a whole. It begins with three people being taken in the back of a van to the camp of 'Re-Education and behaviour modification'. The camp looks much like the Nazi concentration camps of such films as SS Experiment Camp, or Ilsa: She-Wolf of the SS. The film begins as all of the usual 'nazisploitation' movies do, with a pinch of titillation and humiliation. This is not however a nazisploitation movie, as it appears to have a more communist edge; as the motto goes (in a quite comical sequence where 'chief' guard Rimmer picks out the smallest woman, and mock-punches to her face, whilst forcing her to recite it), "I am a deviate, lowest form on earth..."

The main 'heroes' of the piece, are Paul (Steve Railsback), and Chris (Olivia Hussey - also known for such genre films as It, and Black Christmas). These also constitute the ubiquitous love interest within the plot. Whilst the inhabitants of the camp are humiliated and ritually abused in almost gladiatorial fashions, the main plot stems from the concept highlighted by the films title (although this was altered both for the UK video market - Camp Blood Thatcher; and the US market, Escape 2000), where there are five prisoners who are set 'free' from the camp so that seemingly elite persons from society can game hunt them with no consequences. All this leads to utterly predictable outcomes, resulting in an attempted overthrown of the 'authorities'!

The film exploits the concept of game hunting with elements of gore (again ubiquitous of the times of production), but doesn't really explore the societal elements that the protagonists are trying to subvert. We know nothing of the 'societies' structural elements that may instigate any kind of revolution or revolt. What exactly are the protagonists subverting? What are the policies, or dogmas of this 'society'? We only see the camp, and are not given any knowledge of the non-diagetic world beyond this.

The rich hunt the imprisoned. That is about as political as this movie gets. OK, so all movies don't necessarily need to have a message, granted. But if you are going to make a film set in a dystopian future, the world needs to be constructed so that we may understand why this future exists. To add insult to injury - despite the finale having a touch of gore - it almost seems like an episode of The A-Team, only people actually get shot. I almost forgot to say; a certain 'thing' accompanies one of the rich on the game hunt that he "found in a freakshow", which is essentially a badly dressed wolf-man. It's as if someone turned up on set in the wrong costume, and the director thought "well, we'll make it work!"

If you love bad filmmaking, with no social commentary, and no element of surprise or suspense, then you may well love this. But, it is, and will always be a bore!

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It is no coincidence that "Turkey Shoot" a.k.a. "Escape 2000" has a prison camp warden named Thatcher. For whatever reason the film played big in Margaret Thatcher's England. A nice assortment of women and men political prisoners are brainwashed and routinely tortured in Prison Camp 97. Although apparently an attempt was made to market this as "black comedy", it is really some sort of hybrid women in prison, hunted in the jungle combination. It has the required nude shower scene, along with lots of meaningless shooting and explosions. The actual turkey shoot pits armed evil types against unarmed resourceful prisoners. Although the whole thing makes little sense, there is plenty of over the top action, and for some unknown reason "Turkey Shoot" is strangely entertaining. - MERK

Set in a totalitarian future society, this film has a bleak but quite vividly drawn vision of the world...for its first 20 minutes or so; then it turns into a straight action-chase adventure. The uncut 90-minute version is extremely gory, but some of the effects are rather lame. Nevertheless, it's a fast-paced, trashily entertaining film, and the actors are adequate for the little they're asked to do. (**)

This was so mindlessly entertaining, you forget about the constant weird inconsistencies in the script. Primarily people show up out of nowhere, even though, well, it SEEMS to be a big compound, wherever they are. Anyways, it's 1981 or so, and the people are so out of control they hold people in camps. One of the camps have decided to control it's prisoner population by holding hunts, featuring prisoners as game. It attracts a lot of big game hunters looking for the kill! Steve Railsback (!!) and Olivia Hussey (?!?!) are two of the prisoners in the game, and they and 3 others (we can pretty much assume their fate) run run run away from the hunters. The hunters seemingly have no problems finding them apparently (which is slightly strange... how did they do that?) and so they must fight to stay alive! Exploding arrows, deadly all terrain vehicles and, yes, mutant werewolf men are used! It's all pretty strange and goes along in a pretty wild pace. I'd highly recommend anyone who likes their movies bloody, fun, and cheesy.