Les chevaliers du futur

I tuned into this thing one night on a cable channel a few minutes after the credits ran, so I didn't know who had done it at first. The longer I saw it, the more I started thinking, "Jesus, this looks like an Albert Pyun flick." Wasn't quite sure, though, for two main reasons: the photography was quite good (and the Utah desert scenery was beautiful), and Scott Paulin gave an hilarious performance as Simon, a murderous cyborg, but with some style and a sense of humor. Paulin must have ad-libbed the many clever one-liners he shot out, because Albert Pyun hasn't written anything even remotely funny or coherent in his career. Unfortunately, Paulin doesn't have all that much screen time before he's gone, and the movie's the worse for it. Lance Henriksen, playing the evil head cyborg, growls his way through his part, as he's done in countless other movies like this. I don't know what the hell Kris Kristofferson is doing in this thing; maybe he wanted to see what the Utah desert looked like and get paid for it. He goes through the movie looking (and sounding) like he just woke up, and in fact spends most of the last half of the movie on his back in a tent. Kathy Long, the nominal hero, has a great body, is attractive, has a great body, fights extremely well, has a great body, and doesn't have an iota of acting talent, but that doesn't matter in a movie like this. This being an Albert Pyun film, it's full of the trademarks that we've all come to know and love: inane and idiotic dialog, choppy editing, and the impression that they lost a reel in the middle of the picture and figured, "Ah, nobody'll ever notice."

As bad as this movie is, however, it's a shade above most of Pyun's other efforts--this is "Citizen Kane" compared to his brain-numbing "Adrenaline: Feel the Rush", for example. The fights are pretty well done, if repetitive (after she knocks down eight or nine guys one after the other, you find yourself saying, "Alright already, go to something else"), and Long is very athletic (and, as a previous poster has noted, has a great derrière). It's not a good movie by any stretch of the imagination, but it's not anywhere near as incoherent and incompetent as Pyun's usual extravaganzas. You could do worse than rent this movie--not much worse, granted, but worse nonetheless.

What a sensational movie. The script-writers obviously have really taken their time here. The plot is fantastic and the director deserves credit for keeping it together so well. The acting is sensational with a lively mix of both well executed humour and a theme which is so very important. It underlines a woman's place in society as being just as important as a man's. It also helps us realise just how important family values are. Lance and Kris have both shown how their talents demand more screen time. The film was so well rounded. Such a complex and engaging beginning combined with well developed middle and truly classic and memorable ending. Of course i approached the film thinking it would be slap-dash tripe but not at all. The many sets (the desert, the outback and the..eh...des..er.t) really caught the eye. The costumes were amazing too. The idea of replacing cars with horses in an age of cyborg's and robots was very eh.....original. But the thing is that Hollywood has been crying out for a kickboxer/robot team taking on evil, blood-sucking cyborgs theme. The movie's lack of success can only be explained by bad timing. The fight sequences are never repetative and the dubbing and editing are obviously the work of a master technician. The dialogue i believe was written by the script people from 'Howard's End'. The original tag-line for this film was 'Poetry in Motion.'Apparently a sequel was cosidered however the film's producers had the old 'Sundance and Butch Cassidy' problem of the first film being too final and not open-ended enough. Probably the film's only major flaw. May i also say that Darth Vader(Star Wars), The Joker(Batman), Mum-Rah(ThunderCats) and Roy Batty(Blade Runner) pale into significance to the ultimate BADDY - 'The Master Creator'. And though we never see it you could just tell that the brilliantly titled 'Cyborg City' would beat the hell out of the 'Death Star'. Hats Off. Pure Genius. Top class. First rate. Numero Uno. Ten out of Ten. Best of the Best. Made in Heaven. All time classic. My A**e. It was $h!t with a capital SSSSSSHHHHHHHEEEEEEEE!

Every once in a while I will rent an action/adventure film just as a way to relax and occupy my mind with nothing important. This is why I own a copy of Charlie's Angels (2000) - not a quality film, but it makes me laugh and allows me to unwind for a while. One of these days I will probably buy copies of The Princess Bride and a few Monty Python movies for much the same reason.

In any case, I rented this film because I wanted to be entertained without being challenged. For the most part, I got what I wanted. The plot was something along the lines of a poorly written Xena episode, and the Kathy Long's acting was very community theater (not bad for a professional kick boxer and amateur actress). There were a few high points on the part of the cyborgs. Somehow they managed to get some pretty good actors to play the bad guys - unfortunately, most of them die pretty darned quick.

Like most martial arts films, the further you get into the movie, the more emphasis there is on action, and the plot (which wasn't strong to begin with) deteriorates almost as quickly as the acting. However, the more Kathy Long fights, the more time the director devotes to her backside. By the end of the movie I was seriously considering watching it a second time just to count the number of times Kathy Long's tight red shorts were center screen.

Unfortunately, there just wasn't enough meat to this film to make satisfying curiosity worth seeing the film a second time. If you are a hard core Xena fan in need of something to wile away a few hours - by all means, go to the grocery store and spend the .50 cents on the rental. There are some strong similarities between the show and this movie.

Just don't expect anything more than to be mildly amused for a few hours.

Unless, of course, you happen to like Kathy Long's derrière. THEN you might want to purchase a copy.

For its genre, I guess this film was OK. Post apocalyptic Earth, lots of deserts, dirty people in rags, fighting, even blood sucking cyborgs. The only beef with it is that it seemed to be made in the 80's. I even imagined myself commenting on IMDb about how Kris Kistofferson and Lance Henriksen made movies before Alien and Terminator. It turned out that this movie was made afterwards.

I must define the notion of OK. I knew it was trash, therefore I expected things like bad picture editing to make the fights look cooler, obvious stunt men instead of the real actors and ridiculous fighting. I also expected to see cardboard characters in a movie without plot. The only surprise was that the fighting was half decent, as the female star (also a good looking one) is an actual kick boxer.

If you see this movie on TV, it might be worth a watch. It's not too bad, so you can't rent it to make fun of it too much. So it's a bad idea to rent or purchase it, basically :)

I think that "Knights" is a great film. Well...it has many shortcomings but I like films of Albert Pyun. That movie is just like a vision of future and I like it. I've been saw "Knights" hundred times. There is many cyborgs. One of them is Matthew I very like him. You know, the best thing of that movie is that Jon Epstein was on that movie. He's so ... funny.