Apocalypse POW!

After Mad Max and Escape from New York came out we got a ton of movies about the future. Mostly the Post Apocalypse future where everything is a deserted wasteland. A buddy of mine called them “Desert Movies” and that term sort of stuck with me. Recently (well last year) I purchased a 3 pack of movies dealing with this subject. 2 of the three star Fred Williamson (from Black Cobra and Vigilante – among other “soul cinema” classics). This pack had all of the movies anamorphic and 5.1 and the picture quality was pretty darn good. They also have commentaries by these Italian directors who made them! Good job!

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The New Barbarians (aka, Warriors of the Wasteland).

Story: The future, the world is ruled by the Templars, they want to kill all humanity cause we all suck. Leader’s name is ONE. Shadow and Mako are his allies. Scorpion is the hero along with Fred Williamson and some chick and a kid that shoots metal slingshots.

This movie was really enjoyable, I have always been fond of bowmen in movies and Fred uses the bow, and that was cool. He also has special arrowheads that explode etc. Rambo styles but in a Mad Max setting.

The costumes are cool and I just really liked the movie. I was a bit confused at the sodomy part? Ok….maybe I had missed something? But all in all really fun to watch. Fred Williamson is just too cool.

5/5 (for mad max vehicles with buzz saws!)

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1990: The Bronx Warriors

Story: The Future (blah blah). This is one is like the movie The Warriors. Different gangs rule. Bikers, Jive Talkers, Hockey Player guys, Break dancing guys and mutants. A girl is pissed with humanity and she comes to the Bronx where all these gangs fight and the biker guys take her in. Their leader is named TRASH. Fred Williamson plays a pimp like character who smokes cigars.

(note: these are Williamson actual brand. He has 6 white guys in cuba who make him special ones – this is real, not part of the movie – he owns his own plantation and doesn’t sell his cigars! – so only he smokes them!)

A lot of fighting in this one, and an interest villain comes in called The Hammer…he is kind of a bad guy, but he was sent in to rescue the girl…but he enjoys killing and is a real bastard! You end up cheering for Trash (even if, according to Williamson, he walks so light that he doesn’t leave footprints in the snow – a term meaning that he is gay in real life and Freddy had to teach him to walk like a man!).

Cool movie and fun to watch.

5/5 (for Fred Williamson teaching a gay guy to walk like a man)

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2019: After the Fall of New YorkStory: Future, New York is all messed up along with most of the world. Alaska seems to be ok though and the former president sends in his best man to rescue a girl who can have children. Women can no longer have kids…nice going you stupid bomb!

Anyway, as you can tell this is Escape From New York just modified a bit. The president even forces the guy to go into New York. But he has 2 allies with him and they go in. This was a really cool movie actually.

They meet a lot of interesting characters (Big Ape – played by George Eastman – who played the leader of the Templars (One) in New Barbarians. Interesting stuff and cool fights, make this one really fly by. You can barely tell the movie was 90 mins. Plus there is a guy who shoots spheres out of his wrist and a guy with a mechanical hand…oh and the bad girl of the film is the girl from New Barbarians…what did they just reuse the same cast? And a MIDGET!!!

You cannot go wrong with this film.

5/5 (for a guy using his pinchers to stab out the eyes of a bad guy)

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Fred Williamson.

Fred has an interview (see it in full on 1990 Bronx Warriors – partial interview in New Barbarians). This interview is worth the box set!

Fred “The Hammer” Williamson was a football player who retired and wanted to act. He walked into a Hollywood studio and said. I wanna act (he lied and said he acted in Canada), and I wanna be the star. I have 3 rules:

1 – I don’t get killed.
2 – I win every fight I’m in.
3 – I get the girl in the end, if I want to.

They said, see ya later buddy. Well, not really, he ended up on a show for 3 years…but after that he came up with the rules and was told to go home. So instead of going home, he went to Europe and did a bunch of low budget movies and became a star. He is in TONS of these movies and he is always the coolest character! That being said FW actually knows a lot about the process of making low budget stuff. His interview talks about the process, and how film making is different in Europe and United States. Like in Europe, if they love you, you are good for life. In the States, they only care about your last movie, (or touchdown, or basket) they are always looking for the guy to replace you. And he comments on how studios cannot make low budget movies. He uses chairs as an example.

If the scene requires 8 chairs and a table. And they only have 4 chairs and a table, they simply keep pumping more money in so that they can buy another 4. He would simply move them around and reshoot, change angles etc. to make it appear as though there were 8 chairs.

These are just some of the things he talks about. It’s a great pack to buy!

--J-KraKen--[>