Roadflower

I'm a huge fan of Christopher Lambert and I've wanted to see this movie for some time, I finally got the chance to see it this week.

When I first sat down to watch "The Road Killers" or "Road Flower" as it's known here in England, I wasn't to happy with it, Lambert looks out of place in this movie, it's not the kind of movie someone like Lambert should be in. As the movie "drove on" I started to enjoy it. I didn't expect this small low budget movie to be any good but it's a "time killer" all the same.

Craig Sheffer plays the eerie mentally-retarded psychopath whose after Lambert and his family when Sheffer kills Lambert's best friend, in a road rage incident. Sheffer is also accompanied with a gang of punks who drive around with him terrorizing everything and everyone. Sheffer plays Cliff, one f***** up son of a bitch, psychopath.

Not a bad movie but if your a Lambert fan there's better Lambert movies out there.

6/10

This one reminds me of the outer limits ultra-DIY stuff that Miramax was experimenting with in the '80s before they went "legit" with "respectable" art-house fare around 1989.

"The Road Killers" is from a few years after that but you can still see the yearning to be on the cool, cutting edge of the alternafence. It's also extremely interesting (at first, at least) because you get to see sneak peeks at very young versions of some of today's biggest actors (Josh Brolin, David Arquette, Chris MacDonald, a 7 or 8-year old Joseph Gordon-Levitt).

This film doesn't take itself seriously in the least, and that could very well have been intentional as it seems to deliberately ape the sadistic-teen-hoods-go-on-a-rampage genre ala "Hot Rods to Hell." The lead thug, Craig Sheffer (never a very good actor, unfortunately, and a very ham-fisted villain in many flicks) does and says all the hateful things at all the right times, but can't get beyond his ridiculous Motley Crue wig (I really hope it is a wig, for his sake). Brolin and Arquette have scant little to do, and the "good guys," with the exception of MacDonald, never get us very revved up to root for them in the first place.

The script is a complete disaster with long, intermittent stretches where there is no action whatsoever, and the characters are too shallow and boring to expound upon. This is supposed to be an action picture, but it ends up as more of an overlong parody of one.

A huge, wasted opportunity, as nobody had the guts to make deliberately different mainstream films back in the day, except Miramax. Now, they wouldn't touch this kind of stuff with a ten foot pole, unless it was to be helmed by Rodrigeuz or Tarantino.

From the ridiculous IMDb rating of less than 5.0, I had zero expectations for "The Road Killers". This movie is definitely one of the most underrated films I have reviewed. Craig Sheffer's psycho, Charles Manson-like performance, rivals some of the best bad guy actors out there, and instantly brings to mind several of Don Stroud's villainous characters. Christopher Lambert fans will no doubt be disappointed, as Sheffer completely dominates film. There are moments of dark humor throughout, some unexpected developments, and a bang up conclusion on the train tracks. The supporting cast is a real mixed bag, with the late Adrienne Shelly most memorable. I am definitely pounding the table for this unknown gem. - MERK

After a young boy is almost run over by a maniac on a highway, a re-encounter and confrontation by the boy's father with the driver sets off conflicts with a car full of maniacs.

Okay, so the opening credits are just a tad too long. And the Netflix version is full screen, despite the fact it is known the film was shot in widescreen (like most films). But let us look past these nitpicks.

What we get is a fun film with a solid cast: Christopher Lambert, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, David Arquette, Josh Brolin, Christopher McDonald. Some (like Arquette) part of the 90s zeitgeist, and some (like Brolin and Gordon-Levitt) who had yet to fully bloom. In retrospect, from 2015, this not only exemplifies the sort of videos that were fun to rent in the 90s, but provides a nice glimpse of some talented folks early in their careers.

Road Flower, Road Flower. A neat name, evocative and enigmatic, it just doesn't quite hook you in. Centred on a family travelling through the desert who p!ss off some travelling scumbags and end up in all sorts of trouble, it's a fun b grade joint with a few rewards for those with the patience for this kind of thing. And worth noting that this is one of those little seen b pictures that appear to have an eclectic cast through the passage of time, with Michelle Forbes, Josh Brolin, David Arquette and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, all of which have gone on to some kind of wider fame. Gordon-Levitt doesn't make much of an impression here, probably since he was pretty young at the time, but Brolin and Arquette both do well, with the latter being an infinity less irritating than he was in the Scream franchise despite here playing what on paper should be a very irritating character indeed, a sort of dopey idiot savant type in thrall to the main baddie, a wonderfully snarling and maniacal Craig Sheffer. Brolin is a conscience of sorts to the general villains, and pretty sympathetic too, off centre enough to be a little creepy, but with a scared likability to him. The nominal lead here is Christopher Lambert, who is pretty wooden, not especially good but has a certain presence, watchable enough. The film is at its best when dealing with its antagonists though, and the writing is often pretty entertaining, some dialogue made me chuckle out loud and I was generally smiling, there are even one or two surprises in amongst the formulaic set up too. The film moves at a smart pace, looks pretty nice and is even intermittently stylish, too many punches are pulled in terms of the violence but it still muster effective tension, it's a pretty fun ride while it lasts. Director Deran Sarafian clearly knows his way around this sort of film but the action is sometimes irritatingly edited and the film is too skewed in favour of its villains for the audience to feel much for the imperilled family. The directors dad Richard (Vanishing Point) pops up briefly and brother Tedi wrote the script, so its kind of a Sarafian family picnic. This film sure ain't a patch on Vanishing Point though. Anyhoo, this is worth a look if it turns up on late night TV or any other time where you have nothing better to do. Won't change anyones world, but it is kinda cool at times. 6/10 or something.