Virtual Combat

Owww, man. This movie is funny. The villain Dante is probably one of the funniest villains I've ever seen in film. He can beat up anyone, he doesn't move his mouth when he speaks, makes feeble attempts to show emotion, has cheesy and hilarious lines. What more could you ask for? Probably a better movie, but we're looking at this one, right? Don "The Dragon" Wilson can take down almost anyone in this film, showing his energetic martial art skills but when it comes to the sex scene he provides the biggest laugh of them all. After taking down all sorts of evil punks, he sleeps with a beautiful woman he barely knows for 10 minutes, but lays there completely lifeless as she does all the work! Come on, Dragon, show a little energy next time! For a serious sci-fi movie, look elsewhere. For some laughs, you could do worse.

I actually liked this movie. Sure, the acting was flat, there was no plot, and the villain was the lamest that i've seen. Michael Bernardo as Dante is worth laughs in his own right, with an incredibly funny catchphrase and evil laugh. But its worth seeing, just for the WORST explosion you will ever see outside of the Power Rangers TV series. You'll know it when you see it. Honestly, this movie must have the budget of a low grade porno. I almost stopped watching after an hour, but i recommend watching through the whole thing; at the very least, there's plenty of eye candy for all to enjoy. Recommended for viewers with a high tolerance to poor movies.

Why is it that virtual "x-rated video game" women can speak through their mouths but virtual fighting game champion Dante has to use a combination of telepathy and over dramatic facial expressions? I feel that either they needed to cast someone who looked more villain-like (Michael Bermardo's big brown doe eyes don't exactly strike fear in the hearts of well.. anyone except for maybe casting directors who consistently cast him as either a villain or a heroic 'bad boy'.) OR they needed to just let him use his real voice (and move his mouth), and maybe give him a costume that would not make him stick out like a sore thumb when walking down the street. (but of course this is the future and we must assume that bad fashion taste is considered the norm.)

GRID RUNNERS is a straight to video action flick, directed by one-time star Andrew Stevens and starring Don "The Dragon" Wilson in what is a typically wooden role for the actor. Still, there's a whole slew of hard-hitting fight scenes in the movie, which is what it's all about.

The set-up is some quasi-sci fi background in which Wilson plays a cop tracking down a killer who's escaped from a virtual reality game. To add to the sleaze quotient (although it's more silly than sleazy) there are a couple of women from a cybersex game, which allows for the producers to incorporate a little sex and nudity into the narrative.

Your enjoyment of this movie will depend on how much you like seeing buff guys slugging it out for what occasionally seems like hours on end. Bad guy Michael Bernardo looks more like a cover model for a cheap romance novel than a real actor, but there are bit parts for genre staples like Stella Stevens, Turhen Bey, and Loren Avedon.

Don Wilson stars as a cop who enjoys the occasional virtual reality fighting game, however things go wrong when the people behind the game decide to take virtual reality to a new level by making real people from the video game, okay actually they make the cybersex models as prototype but the main bad guy from the video game awakens and starts killing people and now the only man who can beat the guy is Don Wilson, who in the mean time falls in love with the cybersex model. Actually with all things considered my biggest confusion was trying to understand if the people brought over from virtual reality land, were robots, human, cyborgs or just some type of unidentified computer program. It doesn't matter since this is all just an excuse to watch one of the worst actors ever butcher dialog as if he were running a deli. Don Wilson's complete lack of charisma is the film's biggest flaw since one just doesn't like the guy, he's too goody-goody, his voice is too high pitched and doesn't look very impressive in the action sequences. What saves this bore-fest from my lowest rating is Athenia Massey who looks super hot in high cut outfits and who gets occasionally naked. Also on-board is Loren Avedon (A good martial artist), Stella Stevens and Michael Dorn as the main voice of the bad guy but their efforts are in vain as they are all concealed by the very bad acting of Wilson. Another flaw which is the film's biggest mistake is a lack of action, as we are asked to watch the story unfold but aside from Massey's nudity and maybe some unintentional amusements due to laughably unconvincing acting, there really is nothing of interest. This also extends to the action sequences in which are flatly choreographed, badly directed and completely drained of all possible excitement. Making this virtually unwatchable.

* out of 4-(Bad)