Le Jeu du Tueur

My review was written in July 1989 after watching the movie on TWE video cassette.

"Deadly Weapon" is a failed attempt at a high-concept picture from Charles Band's late fantasy factory, Empire PIctures. Story of a bullied youngster who goes high-tech for revenge went unreleased, inherited, as a video, by TWE.

Debuting helmer Michael Miner exhibits technical skill but does not establish a consistent tone for this mishmash. Rodney Eastman is Zeke, a 15-year-old in the small town of King Bee, Arizona, who thinks he's a visitor from Outer Space, waiting for the Mother Ship to come for him. He finds an anti-matter pistol belonging to the army, lost in a train wreck nearby.

Zeke proceeds to blast his enemies (including his mean daddy) with the formidable revolver and comically rounds up the town preacher, sheriff and mayor, locking them up in the car trunk as he goes joyriding in the thrill-seeking Kim Walker's pink Cadillac convertible.

While the army mobilizes to carefully put Zeke out of commission (the gun's power source can explode like a 200-kiloton bomb), pic turns maudlin en route to a tragic finish.

Eastman displays convincing angst in the central role, with Walker, a beautiful blonde who was one of the "Heathers" in the recent New World release, making a solid impression in an underwritten part. Special effects and other the credits are fine.

The first twenty minutes of this film are rock-solid. It's delves into bullying, abuse, isolation, family drama, alcoholism, and so much more. Then, the tone of the film changes. It becomes less serious and puts the hero into some almost laughable circumstances, but Rodney Eastman, to his credit, plays it serious throughout. He's an amazing talent and this film is all about him. It's worth watching mainly for his performance.

Initially I also was reminded of Joey From Nightmare on Elm street part three but having seen it it was pretty good. I guess the movie was moving to me because I myself was a rebel when I was a kid. With the obvious exception of picking up a high powered plasma gun and blowing away all the bad guys, I was quite a bit like the main character in the movie. A definite two thumbs up, a must rent at least once.

I thought this movie was pretty good . The movie had a weird plot but the overall message or theme was good . You would just have to be opened minded.If your the type that you have to follow the usual movie guidelines were every thing is perfect then this is not the movie for you . If your the type who likes watching movies with a fantasy and real life, type angle then this movie is for you . It gets you guessing and like reading a book you can only be intrigued and relate to the character .

Deadly Weapon (1989) was another one of those badly made and low budgeted sci-fi films that came out during the mid to late 80's. This one actually had some promise but it was squandered after the first ten minutes. If you have a limited budget and a cast of small time actors at least direct the movie with some flair and have a decent script. Sadly this retread of Laserblast never gets off the ground. The film started out okay but it never went anywhere. The only thing cool about this movie was the video cover. If they spent as much time on the movie as they did on the cover, they could've had something instead of nothing.

Too bad...

Not recommended.

D+