The Final Sacrifice

Like Crow said, I didn't think this movie was as bad as the usual fare. Still, that isn't saying much for MST3K movies. The best movie shown on MST3K is still pretty lousy. Anyway, Troy and Rowsdower make an odd pairing to say the least. I get the feeling that in real life, a guy like Rowsdower would beat the crap out of Troy and steal his money for booze. The cult was not very threatening, especially after they couldn't catch Troy in a car! I don't know how that guy who was the cult leader could talk like that. As for Mike Pipper, the man who can only be described as 'grizzled'- I was so surprised that Mike and the bots would decide that he sounded like Yosemite Sam, when he clearly sounded more like a Jim Henson character, Rowlf to be exact. This film actually had a story and some action (weak though it was), but instead of ending, it just kind of stopped. Anybody who has only this film to judge Canada by would feel exactly as Servo did in his song.

as bad if not worse than "overdrawn at the memory bank." There's no hero like Zap rowsdower. In fact there's no hero. No plot either. The ending where Zap looks at his tattoo and it is gone for no apparent reason is great !!!!

That is about the extent of the plot. This nerdy kid finds a map that belonged to his dad who was killed. Evil cult members in ski masks and tank tops come after Troy (the nerdy kid), because they want the map (which is to a supposedly lost city, but really a map to a great big pop-up book). They are led by a guy in a coat who doesn't have to wear a ski mask. Troy runs from the cult members and gets into the back of a truck belonging to Zap Rowsdower the hero of the flick (the most original name I have ever seen in a movie). The hero has a few health flaws and seems to have the hardest time running from one action scene to another because he is always out of breath. You get to see Troy and Zap uncover the ancient map room complete with leaking plumbing. You get to see zap and the bad guy fight with torches and grappling hooks (I always find grappling hooks just lying around). You get to see really bad car chases, bicycle chases, and 10k runs up a mountain. And you'll meet Yosemita Sam's older brother as well. If this sounds like your movie, feel free to check it out, but be warned it isn't as good as I made it out.

If it weren't for MST3K, I wouldn't have seen or known of The Final Sacrifice in the first place. While it is not the worst of their movies featured(Manos, Monster A-Go Go, Wild World of Batwoman, Space Mutiny and Hobgoblins), it is one of MST3K best and most entertaining reviews/riffs. Make no mistake, The Final Sacrifice is a dire movie but because it made me amused at times, partly because the review and partly because of the absurdity of the characters' names, I can't say that it had no redeeming qualities. Despite those patches of amusement, The Final Sacrifice is one of those movies that has more cons than it has pros. The camera work and editing are not quite as amateurish as Space Mutiny, but it is very slip-shod and continuity-ridden, never shrugging off the viewer's notions that it looks and feels like a first draft of a student film. The dialogue is awkward and laughably bad, I wouldn't be all that surprised if it was improvised often, while the story is ridiculous personified(like the cult knocking on Troy's door after he finds the map seven years after his dad was killed by the same cult) and due to the abruptness of the ending it feels unfinished also. The acting is terrible, with the fake voices it was very difficult to take them seriously, playing the characters for a laugh- as it seemed- didn't work as everything was far too amateur-hour-ish. The worst asset is the soundtrack, being badly recorded, annoyingly orchestrated, overpowering and hugely repetitive(it's literally only 3 pieces of music, all three of which sound as though they belong elsewhere). Overall, dire but I've seen worse, on MST3K and generally. 2/10 Bethany Cox

As far as abysmally crappy movies go, The Final Sacrifice isn't so bad. Sure, it's technically inept in just about every way, features horrible dialogue, and doesn't have a character in the entire film with a realistic name (the fact that the director signs his checks "Tjardus Greidanus" goes a long way towards explaining this phenomena), but it's got something most films in its class lack: heart. I'd say Greidanus is akin to the famous Ed Wood, in that he shows not a shred of talent but at least seemed to believe in what he did. Rather than slapping a recycled costume on an assistant director and creating yet another lame, lousy creature feature with an insipid story, he tried to create something original, new, and interesting. He failed miserably, but at least he tried.

The plot revolves around a pre-Internet nerd named Troy, who, apparently, spends his time digging stuff out of the attic that relates to his father's death somehow, stares at it for a while, and then gives up on figuring out what happened and just puts it all away again. He lucks out when a ski-masked cult randomly decides to come looking for a map that leads to a lost city, even though they could have come any time in the seven years prior but for some reason decided to let him grow old enough to somehow thwart their entire incompetent organization with the help of a beer-guzzling, mullet-endowed drifter...but I get ahead of myself.

So anyway, Troy is forced to go outside the house for the first time in a decade and somehow winds up in the truck bed of the aforementioned drifter, who manages to deliver his name, Zap Rowsdower, with a straight face. Even the nerdy kid understands how embarrassing it is to call a grown man "Zap," so he (repeatedly) refers to him as "Rowsthdower," which isn't really much of an improvement. Anyhow, some other stuff happens, involving a gray-bearded, oh-my-god-I-can't-believe-people-like-this-actually-exist-type character named Mike Pipper, who explains some less-than-interesting exposition explaining what they're up against and what's at stake--the world, of course! After looking thoroughly unconcerned, our heroes, though they couldn't pool together enough mental resources to open a can of tuna (though Rowsdower has a lot of experience opening cans...of beer...), find a way to overthrow the muscleheaded cult, defeat the villainous Satoris (a man with a voice deeper than the lead singer of Type O Negative), knock over a pole, raise the lost cardboard miniature of Ziox, and save all of Canada, acting like it's some sort of major accomplishment all the while. The movie ends with an inspiring shot of Troy and Zap in the Zapmobile, going somewhere for some reason. My bet is that it involved beer and cheese.