New Barbarians takes place in 2019, after the nuclear holocaust, as civilization is picking up the pieces. A gang of ruthless gay men called the Templars (led by George Eastman and Ennio Giralami as Thomas Moore) is roaming the countryside, wiping out any last vestiges of humanity. When they try to kill Alma (Anna Kanakis), fortunately our hero Scorpion (Giancarlo Prete as Timothy Brent) is there to save the day. But now they want to kill him too, so they track him and his new ladyfriend down, only to have Nadir (Williamson), an archer with exploding arrows, save the day again. After finding a large group of extras from the "Life in a Northern Town" video living nearby, they know it'll only be a matter of time before the Templars come to wipe them out too. Will our heroes be enough to stop them?
This is a ton of fun in every way you'd want a movie like this to be a ton of fun. Fun Williamson. Fun cars. Fun outfits. Fun characters. The fact that the baddies are gay puts an interesting spin on it. When our hero gets his prerequisite torture scene, it includes the main baddie Eastman... well, violating him. I wasn't a fan of it happening to Rothrock in Lady Dragon, and I'm not a fan of it here, but they did it, and our hero gets his revenge by jamming a large drill that was built into his car through the back of Eastman's car and into is... well, you know. All of it adds to the overall manic nature of the film though, where shit just seems to be thrown together in this bouillabaisse that in the end all works for a fun time. Why is there an Italian version of Dennis the Menace who lives alone and works on cars for people like Scorpion? Who knows, but it's great, and when he joins Scorpion and Williamson in the final battle against the Templars, it's just as great. The other thing is the Italian touch to this. Enzo Castellari directing, Fausto Zuccoli as DP, and Claudio Simonetti's score give this a feel you don't get in your usual exploitation flick; plus all the great Italian names, like Giancarlo Prete aka Timothy Brent, Ennio Giralami aka Thomas Moore, Anna Kanakis, and Venantino Venantini as the leader of the "Life in a Northern Town" extras. This is the fun Italian post-apocalyptic flick you came for.
The Hammer is one movie away from the 30 Club, a club he should've been in a long time ago. We've said I don't know how many times that we're going to make an effort to get more of his films on the site, and here we are in December with his last post having been in May. Ugh, what happened? What usually ends up happening, I lose track of him and he goes months without a review. Anyway, we're here now, and this is some great Williamson. He's the cool, slick Williamson you want, even in that ridiculous post-apocalyptic Italian movie get-up. All of it is too fantastic for words. I'm trying to think what a good 30th post would be for him. VFW is one I can get with AMC+--and we're looking to get rid of that streaming service, so probably sooner rather than later for that. He has some great ones I'd like to do from the 80s and 90s, but the availability is limited. There's also Vegas Vampires, which is one he's directed that I'm having trouble finding, but has a great cast. Whatever I decide, I should make sure I just do it and not go another six months before I do a Williamson post again.
The 80s Italian low-budget post-apocalyptic film is a unique piece of cinematic history. The outfits, the props, the actors and the extras, combined with Italian cinematic tradition, gives us something that the people who invented moving pictures couldn't have fathomed, but that we as film watchers are lucky to have. In terms of where this film sits in that tradition, for the most part it not only works, but might be one of the finest of the craft. Where I find fault is with Anna Kanakis's heroine character. They went through all this trouble to give her a sexy, futuristic outfit, but they never really show her full body. Most of the time we only see her from the waist up, and more frequently only the neck up. I'm wondering if there was something wrong with the outfit, because it almost seemed on purpose. Maybe there was a wardrobe malfunction. They definitely didn't do that with Giancarlo Prete's see-through plastic top during the end fight with the baddies, we got that in all its glory.
You can see I got something of an action shot down below there. This is made possible by Prime's desktop browser streaming interface. As far as I can tell, only they and Netflix use one where you can get a clean screen after pausing. For example with Tubi, the time bar and film's title stay on the screen after you pause. Most are like Tubi's unfortunately, which means I need to hit "PrntScrn" while the video is playing, and hope I got it, something that can really limit my options for screenshots. I originally caught this on Plex, and when I went to grab images from that it was a mess. First off, their slider box doesn't give a small box preview of what the later part you're hovering over will be, so I need to remember the times I want for my screens and hope I'm accurate; but then with how their advertisements load, the desktop player constantly crashes. Fortunately I had Prime as an option for this, making my life easier.
Finally, let's go back to the above image. Is that a fanny pack Scorpion is wearing? I mean there's definitely a cod piece there, but does it also function as a fanny pack? A lot of these futuristic things have multiple functions, so you never know. I was thinking the fanny pack didn't exist back then, but I looked it up on Wikipedia, and it said as early as 1954 a leather version was marketed to skiers. Considering that looks like leather, could the filmmakers have found one for sale at an Italian ski resort in the Alps and just threw it in as part of the costume? Or maybe one of them was a skier and already had it? And again, I wouldn't call it a fanny pack, but rather a "cod piece pack," as it's part of the whole package... like what I did there? Also am I burying the lead on the futuristic golf carts in this shot? I can't say what I would do if I survived the nuclear holocaust, but getting around via golf cart doesn't seem like the worst idea. Something to keep in mind at least, God forbid I ever find myself in that situation.
And with that, let's wrap this up. Prime is probably the way to go. You'll see this listed both as Warriors of the Wasteland and New Barbarians--sometimes within the same streaming service! This is a fun time, and worth checking out, though the main character's prerequisite torture scene involving rape may make it tough for some audiences.
For more info: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084424
And my newest novel, Don's House in the Mountains, is available now on Amazon! Click the image to buy.
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