Warrior of the Lost World

What do you get when you add Donald Pleasance, a cute girl, Jimmy Carter, and the Paperchase guy? A good movie, right? WRONG! You get an hour and a half of sleep. Although, there is a bright side to the film (surprised?): MegaWeapon!!! If you are a fan of MST3K than you'll love the riffs on this disasterpiece. "Frank, push the button."

This film comes to us from Italy, though a lot of the stars and the director are from the United States. I saw this film courtesy Mystery Science Theateer 3000 and it was something a bit different. Kind of an Italian take on the Mad Max films, but not very good. From what I have heard from interviews with the director who is a very cool guy who actually responds when you write him, he basically had to craft a movie with almost a nonexistent script and with more of just an idea. He also said that they were going to do a sequel and if they had, Donald Pleasence would be back and he was going to be ticked! The story is the main problem with this one as is the lack of budget. Also, they really should have went the route a lot of other Italian films and went into overdrive with things like gore, over the top action and some nudity! Instead, it plays out more like a direct to video film that seemed like it wanted to be a seriously weak version of Mad Max.

The story has a man riding his super motorcycle that has a very annoying voice (yes, it talks) through the very green wasteland. Yeah, Mad Max works because the desert scenery makes it look like a desolate wasteland. Here, it could not look nicer with lush trees all over the place. Well, first this rider runs afoul of this strange police force before then getting attacked by random dudes. Mad Max would have killed most of them and gotten their gas, rider simply drives around and takes bullets and arrows before crashing into a wall. He is then healed by these monk type people who have the ability to use light to heal and just forget about them as you won't see them anymore until the end as the rider meets a girl and they are soon trying to infiltrate the bad guy's place and then the guy is deserting the girl and then a scene where they are riding down the road and having an action scene fighting a garbage truck and soon everyone is happy though one guy who could have killed everyone and ruined all the plans is found out to be bad and the girl and rider mysteriously fall in love even though the film never had an area where they could find the time to get together and fall in love, they pretty much hated each other and then the rider deserted her!

This made for a very funny episode of MST3K as they had some great jokes. They also kept referring to Robert Ginty as the Paper Chase guy, in reference to the fact he was on that show. However, I thought they overdid that joke as Paper Chase was not exactly a well known show. It lasted maybe two seasons and I do not even think Ginty was a main player in it, I had never heard of the show before this episode. For the most part the jokes were great as I enjoyed watching that motorcycle get crushed also!

So this film was not all that good. It was kind of all over the place as it tried to be Mad Max, but failed miserably. They just had too many things that did not fit the Mad Max formula. They had car chases and a few vehicles and characters that one could sort of see in a Mad Max film, but then they had the greenery and nice landscape that did not work. The strange monk people that had healing abilities also did not fit. In the end just kind of a mess of a film and one of the reasons that you should have a complete script rather than just try to throw a movie together with a few ideas.

Elegantly, wonderfully, deliciously bad. The only way to truly appreciate this cinematic train wreck is to watch the MST3K version (less than a minute into the opening credits, Tom Servo asks, "Is it too late to kill myself?") Robert Ginty mumbles and grumbles his "dialog", Donald Pleasance reprises his many roles as the androgenous bad-ass, and a supporting cast of extras resembling Jimmy Carter, Saddam, Bluto, and Mimi keep things moving. One of the many films that makes an inexact science of ballistics -- no one with a gun can manage to even nick another character with a shot, even at point-blank range. Worth seeing, if only to watch in sadistic delight as "Megaweapon" runs over Einstein, the squeaky-voiced, talking motorcycle.

Somebody please explain this movie to me. What exactly was the plot again? What was "the Warrior" saying during the whole thing? What was that battle royal all about? If "the Warrior had just waited four seconds to pick up Persis Khambatta in the helicopter, would there have been a point in finishing the movie? Where did they find a black Nazi? What was the point of Megaweapon, which really seemed pretty weak (Oooh! A flamethrower!)?

Save yourself. Run from this movie and don't look back. The only way to survive this horror is the MST3K version, but it still hurts.

I pride myself in my knowledge and appreciation of bad films. Back in the late 1970s, Harry Medved wrote an amazingly funny and brilliant book called "The 50 Worst Movies of All Time" and it kicked off the craze to see and appreciate bad films. I actually found and watched all fifty of the films from the book and then went in search for more awful films and decided to try watching IMDb's infamous Bottom 100 list. Not all of them are available and several have no subtitles or dubbing, so I cannot possibly see them all. However, I've seen a huge number of them and have noticed an annoying trend--nearly all the American films on the list were skewered on "Mystery Science Theater 3000" and MANY really bad films were never on this show--mostly because they couldn't get the royalties for all the films. Plus, other bad films have come out since the show ended. As a result, many absolutely horrid films NEVER appear on the list even though they are much worse than those featured on "MST 3000"...such as "Plan 9 From Outer Space", "They Saved Hitler's Brain", "Robot Monster", "The Room" and ALL of the films of Larry Buchanan, William Grefe and Ted Mikels! Clearly this list is NOT even close to being the 100 worst films...just the lowest rated and apparently the TV show's fans vote!

I say all this because although "Warrior of the Lost World" is a terrible film, I've seen hundreds of films that are worse. But it is bad...really bad. Part of it is because they somehow decided to use Robert Ginty in the lead. I am sure he was a nice guy but he wasn't leading man material and his biggest claims to fame had been supporting parts on the TV shows "Black Sheep Squadron" and "The Paper Chase". Also on hand are Donald Pleasance (who would appear in ANYTHING provided it paid) and Fred Williamson (ditto). As for the film itself, it really looks like it was done with almost no script--just a broad outline and lots of guys running around firing the weirdest sounding machine guns I've ever heard in a movie. And, our hero and his babe escaping again and again from some ill-defined enemy.

The bottom line is that YES this is a bad film with an excruciatingly low budget and little to recommend it. But it's not THAT bad...at least not Bottom 100 bad.