Some times, we want to watch something silly, an excuse to eat some popcorn. That said, let's make a simple list of the attributes of this film:
* Special (d)effects: e.g., a motorcycle rides amongst giant scorpions, but their lighting, hues and even focus, at times, are so different that their images don't match, and, actually, too many times we can see the bike moving under the scorpions' film layer, in a weird angle, as they also didn't match the motion plane.
* Make-up: horrible (in a very bad way). I've seen amateur cosplaying way better than what they dared doing in this film (like the radiation-poisoned survivors gone-mad, which look like strawberry jam was smeared on their faces).
* Editing: bad, including a terrible shower scene (at about 1h13min) that seemed too short for somebody, so they decided to extend it, by playing it once more, backwards! The moment of inversion is ridiculous, like one of those stupid loop videos some mobile apps do (in a frame by frame watch, it's possible to see the water flowing backwards to the shower).
* Story: no surprises, with a sugar covered happy ending.
* Plot: cliché nuclear post-apocalyptic survivors vs. the wildly mutated world (it's so silly,99% of the military base's survivors die in a fire, started with a cigar and a porn magazine!)
* Acting: bad (the first 14 minutes are painful to watch, as the actors move like robots while nuking the world).
* Characters: maybe you'll feel sad when some of them die, but you won't even remember their names afterwards.
* Music: not the best of Jerry Goldsmith, with some dated tracks (you know the feeling, like jumping into a TARDIS, or a flying Delorean, and landing unprepared in the 1970's).
* Scenario: lots of sand, an eventual rock, and some water at the end, just to show off that their cars can "swim"...
... Wait, what, cars "swimming"?! "What cars," you ask? Well, I dare say the most amazing "sci-fi" land vehicle EVER designed and built for a film, the Landmaster! In the story, there were two Landmasters, but they were never shown together, because just one was actually assembled, in Detroit, just for this film and, wow, is it awesome!
I watched this film when I was a kid and I simply couldn't miss a single rerun of it, just to see them in action. I couldn't pay much attention to the story, then, because I simply hated every time they stopped... I mean, why did they have to stop so many times, having those amazing vehicles to ride?! Just to be chased by mutants and whatnot? Stay in the car!
This whole film plays like a concept car demonstration, trying to be a "road movie". It's so much so that the end spoils the fun, because you don't care about the survivors, you just want to see the cars riding, forever! That's the only reason to watch this film more than once, really.
10 stars for the Landmaster, -7 for all the rest.
* Special (d)effects: e.g., a motorcycle rides amongst giant scorpions, but their lighting, hues and even focus, at times, are so different that their images don't match, and, actually, too many times we can see the bike moving under the scorpions' film layer, in a weird angle, as they also didn't match the motion plane.
* Make-up: horrible (in a very bad way). I've seen amateur cosplaying way better than what they dared doing in this film (like the radiation-poisoned survivors gone-mad, which look like strawberry jam was smeared on their faces).
* Editing: bad, including a terrible shower scene (at about 1h13min) that seemed too short for somebody, so they decided to extend it, by playing it once more, backwards! The moment of inversion is ridiculous, like one of those stupid loop videos some mobile apps do (in a frame by frame watch, it's possible to see the water flowing backwards to the shower).
* Story: no surprises, with a sugar covered happy ending.
* Plot: cliché nuclear post-apocalyptic survivors vs. the wildly mutated world (it's so silly,99% of the military base's survivors die in a fire, started with a cigar and a porn magazine!)
* Acting: bad (the first 14 minutes are painful to watch, as the actors move like robots while nuking the world).
* Characters: maybe you'll feel sad when some of them die, but you won't even remember their names afterwards.
* Music: not the best of Jerry Goldsmith, with some dated tracks (you know the feeling, like jumping into a TARDIS, or a flying Delorean, and landing unprepared in the 1970's).
* Scenario: lots of sand, an eventual rock, and some water at the end, just to show off that their cars can "swim"...
... Wait, what, cars "swimming"?! "What cars," you ask? Well, I dare say the most amazing "sci-fi" land vehicle EVER designed and built for a film, the Landmaster! In the story, there were two Landmasters, but they were never shown together, because just one was actually assembled, in Detroit, just for this film and, wow, is it awesome!
I watched this film when I was a kid and I simply couldn't miss a single rerun of it, just to see them in action. I couldn't pay much attention to the story, then, because I simply hated every time they stopped... I mean, why did they have to stop so many times, having those amazing vehicles to ride?! Just to be chased by mutants and whatnot? Stay in the car!
This whole film plays like a concept car demonstration, trying to be a "road movie". It's so much so that the end spoils the fun, because you don't care about the survivors, you just want to see the cars riding, forever! That's the only reason to watch this film more than once, really.
10 stars for the Landmaster, -7 for all the rest.