Mestema, le maître du Donjon

.Jeffrey Byron stars as a computer technician who, along with girlfriend Leslie Wing, gets transported to another dimension to do battle with Mestema (Richard Moll from TV's Night Court). Mestema is a Satan-like evil wizard who wants to pit his magical prowess against the technology of the hero. He does so by transporting the newly-outfitted computer tech to various scenarios that he then has to escape from/defeat the monstrous villains in his way. These scenarios include an ice cave filled with random statuary (a wolfman, a witch doctor, Jack the Ripper) that come to life and attack him; a cave with a little horned troll on a throne who commands zombie warriors; another cave (sensing a trend here?) with yet another horned troll; another scene takes place in a nightclub during a stage performance by the hairmetal band W.A.S.P., because why not? Each segment was written and directed by different people, 7 in all, which helps explain the lack of tonal consistency. Fans of garbage 80's genre cinema may find something to chew on, but most viewers should avoid.

This movie is vastly imaginative. So imaginative in fact that it took 7 directors to make it! The sets costumes and monsters all work well together to paint a fabulous picture of a computer warrior overcoming adversity through 7 different evil worlds. One of which is an evil heavy metal concert featuring the band W.A.S.P.This movie is filled with marvelous special effects including dueling magical dragons, a stone giant, disgusting undead warriors and a score of fantastic weapons originating from the computer wristband worn by the hero. A very action packed epic by a team of excellent directors including the legendery Charles Band!

Part of the problem is the plot summary is innacurate; the idea is that the 'Dungeonmaster' is looking for a worth opponent. He sees the hero, the nerd, and sees his skills, he decides to pull him into his world and put him through the challenges, using the guys girlfriend as collateral should the hero decline. It was a good movie, especially considering that Empire pictures wasn't some huge company like Universal.

It contains a few interesting concepts notably the strap-on arm computer. I see in the real world that you can now start buying a commercial available model.

Considering the fact that the movie does originate from the 80's when computer based special effects were actually very few and far between. In general the story lacks 'n few elements but from an action perspective the movie did deliver the goods. I through that at the time the concepts was very unique even to this day this movie remains a favorite on my list.

The soundtrack was very much classic sci-fi and you end up with a good feeling of good vs evil at the end of the movie. Unfortunately the bad guy does not meet a satisfactory end and it leaves you with a bit of a disappointment as far as that is concerned.

Anyway if you are a sci-fi fan and like to see more or less original concepts this one should be on your list. Now if only they will get it out on DVD.

Sorcerer captures girlfriend of nerd. Nerd dons computer as wristwatch. Sorcerer makes nerd transport to different locations to unconvincingly fight creatures. Nerd finally beats sorcerer in last scene and rescues girlfriend.

Some friends and I *actually* paid $6.00 to see this in an empty theater on opening weekend - a saturday, I think, at the 9:00 p.m. show. The most interesting thing about it was they showed a 15 minute short film about extreme sports - in order to pad out the running time of the movie, which is just barely as long as your standard Disney animated feature.

I was surprised to see Richard Moll in it at first, but looking at his other body of works, I'm no longer surprised.

I laughed (at the movie), I cried (after I realized I paid to see it), it became a part of me (I can't get the memory of the damn thing out of my head short of putting a bullet in it).