Il giustiziere del Bronx

I'm the post-apocalyptic Bronx, evil androids and humanoids engage in a war for supremacy.

Director Vanio Amici's Bronx Executioners, released in 1989 but feeling like a B-Movie from 1982, extensively uses footage from the 1984 film The Final Executioner. The Bronx setting, despite claiming a post-apocalyptic vibe, bears little resemblance to the actual Bronx. It lacks the fun, futuristic elements, and coherence found in films like 1990: Bronx Warrior, Rats: Night of Terror, and The New Barbarians, among others. The gunplay, dog attacks, staged fights, and severed heads contribute to the film's chaotic mix.

Woody Strode's reused footage as Sam from The Final Executioner now portrays the character Warren, while Alex Vitale, previously the Russian in Strike Commando, plays Dakar, aspiring to be human. Margit Evelyn Newton, known for Hell of the Living Dead, is the only actor from the first film with new scenes in the second. The inclusion of saxophone in the last act attempts to evoke a Blade Runner vibe. Notably, Paolo Rustichelli's music, borrowing much from The Terminator (1984), stands out as one of the film's highlights.

Overall, Bronx Executioners feels like a poorly assembled remake of 'The Final Executioner,' lacking coherence. It may appeal to those who enjoy sporadic scenes of men rolling and falling around.

A new sheriff in town helps a good hearted robot battle other cyborgs who are militant and kill crazy, where as some cyborgs are good and civilized, anyway the new sheriff sorts everything out after training with Woody Strode (The film's most famous cast member) in this crummy action flick which is pretty much what you would expect from the bargain bin. Bronx Executioner is one of the 4 titles you can have for the low price of 5 dollars and of course as the old saying goes, if something is too good to be true, it is. So with 4 movies for 5 bucks (6 with tax) This averages out to be a dollar a movie and when I got done watching this clunker, I started wondering if I hadn't paid too much. Another interesting thing is that the DVD promises a Michael Dudikoff introduction which sadly never materializes and instead we witness in horror as Italian actors run around and shoot at each other with no sense of who's really shooting who or for that matter who we should be rooting for. Still as these things go, there is some schlocky fun but it's not nearly as fun as say ROTOR or Future War which offer more bang (Read laughs) for the buck. Still i'm not complaining, after all I have nobody to blame but myself for buying this. And to think I could've used the five dollars to buy myself a Mad Magazine. A pity.

* out of 4-(Bad)

This is another film I happened upon at my local DVD rental outlet of which I had no prior knowledge; having watched a spate of belated Euro-Cult sci-fi outings over the last couple of years, I suspected I’d be in for a ‘so bad it’s good’ ride – but the end result, though certainly unintentionally hilarious, is a wretched piece of junk.

To begin with the plot doesn’t make a lick of sense: little wonder, since it lifted a good deal of footage – including Woody Strode’s entire performance – from THE FINAL EXECUTIONER (1983), a film directed by Romolo Guerrieri (hence his unofficial credit above)! Anyway, here we get a rookie sheriff in a futuristic New York – replacing Strode (dubbed, what else, “The Black Man”) – who has to quell an ongoing conflict between a colony of androids and one comprised of renegade humanoids (the script even makes some dumb comparisons between the latter’s fate and that endured by Native Americans over the years!); incidentally, don’t ask me to explain the difference between each faction of robots, because I sure as hell couldn’t tell them apart!!

As is usual for this kind of film, we’re treated to a crappy electronic score and characters who could best be described as scum; ironically, the would-be hero doesn’t do much of anything throughout (even if he’s relentlessly undermined by martinet Strode during his period of training). As a matter of fact, the lead is actually...er...the leader of the humanoids – a short-tempered beefcake wearing a ridiculously undersized sleeveless shirt and who’s supposedly fallen in love with a human; when she’s raped and murdered by rival androids, he sets out to infiltrate the latter’s castle base (having by this time befriended the cop). Margie Newton (from Bruno Mattei’s equally lamentable HELL OF THE LIVING DEAD [1980]) is the bimbo leader of the villainous robots – who, amusingly, gets an itch for lovemaking just as the final onslaught is about to begin!

While there are some undeniable howlers throughout – particularly the humanoid leader’s dumb monologues – the film is simply too poorly handled (in all departments) to be easily enjoyed; in fact, even if less than 90 minutes in length, I found it virtually unbearable...

Why ?? Why ?? Why ?? This movie starts out bad and ends up bad. It is bad all around. The first 5 minutes of the movie is saturated with images... images of video editing equipment. This is followed by the stock footage Circle Line tour of New York complete with narration (notice the Queensborough bridge panoramic pole shot - classic). There is no reason to watch this movie .. unless it is late night and you can't sleep, or your are completely wasted and want to lose some more brain cells. If this is not enough for you, how about the addition of veteran movie actor Woody Stode (aka black man - in this movie thats what he is referred to) to improve the movie. WRONG !!! It only gets worse. Woody was a pro-football star in his days, too bad he was 70+ years old in this movie. Not only that, but he does his own stunts. I have not seen fight scenes this bad since I watched a Jean-Claude van Damme movie. Truly horrific action. Action so boring, you may want to break out the coffee to stay awake through them. This movie was so cheaply done that they could not even afford fake blood for the death scenes. The sound effects are horrible. The Atari 2600 had better and the soundtrack sounds like it was ripped from a bad porn movie. This movie is so boring, "Margie" actually watches a scene from the movie (Spaceballs - save me). So in that scene we are watching the actors watch their own movie. There are endless scenes of "Dakar" driving and whining on his 2-way radio. There is a 2-second fully-clothed rape scene. And no thats how long it actually lasts - 2 seconds. Incidentally, that is the scene that "Margie" watches later. There are 2 scenes which stand out in my mind - the training of the new sheriff (which involves "white man" shooting at a film projection on a wall) and the sheriff shooting through the castle at the end (think Wild Gunmen for the Nintendo). If you want to watch a better movie ... try just about anything. If you want to see a post apocalyptic Italian exploitation movie about New York .. watch 2019: After the Fall of New York.

-Celluloid Rehab

Being some one who likes to catch a movie that features Woody Strode I decided to get this movie out. Well I could be forgiven for thinking that this was a sequel to THE FINAL EXECUTIONER (1984) that featured William Mang and Harrison Muller and also Margit Evelyn Newton. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085540/ The reason for this looking to like a sequel is because this movie , THE BRONX ECCUTIONER seems to start where THE FINAL EXECUTIONER finishes. But thats not the case at all ! What it is , is actually is footage from THE FINAL EXCECUTIONER has been put into this movie. I have to admit that this is pretty clever how they did it. If someone never saw THE FINAL EXCECUTIONER they probably wouldn't notice it. This in part is due to the storyline being pretty basic and confusing at times. Also with the dubbing you lose a bit of the plot too.

When The Final Excecutioner was released when Woody Strode would have been about 69 or 70 years old. The Bronx Excecutioner was released when Woody was 75 years old. But as I mentioned the footage was taken from The Final Excecutioner so Woody Strode didn't actually take part in this movie in actual terms. Never mind !

The scene where Woody Strode takes on some guys is fairly good and I have to say that for a man of his age probably 69 at the time , Woody could do all of the stuff and go through the motions. He also did his own stunts in the film too. I have to mention again that it was pretty clever how they inserted Woody Strode into the film but thats the main reason that this movie has any sort of worth. Other than that well there is some passable action and a story line thats pretty much senseless but with an occasional surprise . But besides that I have to say that I'd be flat out trying to find anything else good about this film.