Blastfighter (1985)

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Lamberto Bava does it again with this Italian action movie that manages to be almost as entertaining as his cult classic, DEMONS! In many ways the film follows the same action-orientated template with hostile rednecks replacing supernatural monsters and the heroes gradually picked off one by one by the bad guys. However, the realism of the film adds to the suspenseful aspect. Beginning fairly low key, we watch as events gradually build out of hand (Bava takes time to develop the situation instead of rushing it and making it unbelievable) until the rip-roaring climax that will please action fans everywhere. Before then, the film is packed with incident and genuinely manages to stay exciting all the while. The plot is not very complex and takes influence from a number of other films. FIRST BLOOD is the obvious choice, but there are also some surprising references to THE EVIL DEAD and even a western homage! This is a film packed with burning vehicles, gunfire and lots of heroic staples. Michael Sopkiw (MASSACRE IN DINOSAUR VALLEY) is great as the lead and gets to cross waterfalls, abseil down sheer cliffs and take part in some great stunt action. Stuntman Massimo Vanni even shows his face in a cameo as a dying cop and supplies some great death scenes. Sopkiw, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Bruce Campbell, breathes life into the character of Jake Sharp, who could easily have been unlikable and stiff. The character is solemn, introspective and rather rude to those around him, but nonetheless you find yourself rooting for Sopkiw as the film progresses.Bava fills a few roles with familiar faces to the exploitation fan. Playing Sopkiw's main adversary is the always imposing George Eastman (ANTHROPOPHAGUS THE BEAST) as hulking, crippled redneck, Tom. Eastman actually has a developed character (the only villain that has) and does well with his performance. The action sequences are well staged and make good use of the wooded locations for the chases. They're also bolstered by a stirring synthesiser score. The movie is pretty grim and kills off loads of "good" characters, plus a lot of animals get shot etc. Yet Bava still manages to retain the entertainment despite this overwhelming nihilism and rewards the viewer with the climatic destruction of about three dozen bad guys, all gun-toting rednecks without an ounce of wit or intelligence about them. When Sopkiw's amusingly kick-ass gun comes into play, the film explodes with gruesome gore effects (sadly excised, as usual, in the UK cut) and more explosions that you can believe possible. My only complaint is with the very end of the film which makes absolutely no thematic sense to this viewer. Otherwise BLASTFIGHTER is a must for fans of cheesy Italian action.

A former cop named... no, not Joe Smith or Jim Jones, but... Tiger Sharp (Michael Sopkiw), retires to the country side. He meets some local rednecks led by Tom (George Eastman) and doesn't like the way they are hunting animals, just to sell some parts to China for medicine production. When they kill his pet, he beats them up, and that's just the beginning of their troubles. Tiger Sharp is joined by Connie (Valentina Forte), a daughter he hasn't seen or cared about for many years, but when the rednecks kill her, Tiger Sharp gets out a very big gun with a great selection of powerful ammo to blast all the bad guys to kingdom come, one man against a whole army...The sources of inspiration are obvious, "First Blood" meets "Deliverance" - "Blastfighter" was even shot at some of the same locations. But it's all created with good craftsmanship for the fans who like the genre. Sopkiw, who starred only in 4 pictures before he retired from the movies, is a cool action hero here. Flawless (violent) entertainment provided by director Lamberto Bava.

With a poll coming up on IMDbs Classic Film board for the best titles of 1984,I started to look at a mountain of DVDs,and spotted a fun looking movie directed by Lamberto Bava,which led to me getting ready to blast all the fighters away.The plot:Released from jail after serving 7 years for murdering the man who killed his wife,former police officer Jake 'Tiger' Sharp decides to head back to his quiet country town. Planning to spend the rest of his life living in solitude in the woodland area,Sharp is horrified to spot a group of residences from the town brutally killing a deer.Confronting the gang,Sharp is told that the town has changed,and that he should mind his own business,or else there will be some "trouble." Keeping a close watch on the gang,Sharp discovers that the gang are involved in a ring which kills animals for Oriental medicines. Sickened by what the town has become,Sharp decides that he must take on the gang.View on the film:Replacing original director Lucio Fulci,co-writer/(along with Luca De Rita/Massimo De Rita/Morando Morandini Jr & Dardano Sacchetti) director Lamberto Bava delivers a deliciously bonkers Action smash- up.Backed by a catchy 80s Pop soundtrack,Bava gives the outdoor fights a lush appearance as logic gets left by the side road.Destroying everything in sight,Bava hilariously shows cars suddenly exploding from out of thin air,and has Sharp shoot bullets from the medium size gun which are the size of fireworks!Planned at first as a remake of Mad Max,the frantic changes that the writers made to the screenplay lead to this being an explosive flick.Whilst the writers do not go into too much detail on Sharp's past, (with the exception of a short flashback,which allows Bava to rift on Dario Argento's Deep Red) they do very well at adding additional pressure on his current situation,with a sharp twist leading to the ending having a gritty revenge atmosphere.Teaming up twice with Bava in 1984, Michael Sopkiw gives a wonderful performance as Sharp,with Sopkiw giving Sharp a real curl of the lips,as he finds himself taking on a truck load of baddies.Final view on the film:A delightfully bonkers flick that is a real blast.

The always fun to watch Michael Sopkiw stars in this highly enjoyable action yarn. In it he plays an ex police officer who having just been released from an eight year prison sentence, now seeks the solitude of the great outdoors. However, with a film title such as Blastfighter, you can bet your bum that solitude is a luxury that our hero won't be attaining.Sure enough he finds himself in a heated dispute with some local rednecks who repeatedly antagonise him after he attempts to interfere with their cruel deer poaching activities. This initial antagonising eventually escalates to attempted murder and later on, the actual murder of one of our hero's friends plus our hero's estranged daughter's boyfriend (whoa, that was quite a mouthful!)Matters reach a dramatic peek when the daughter herself is also killed thus finally sending our hero over the edge..... It is at this point that in true Rambo style he takes drastic action and basically kills every one of the scumbags! To aid him with this joyous task our man utilises a rather nifty shotgun that fires multiple projectiles such as explosives, smoke grenades, darts etc. (COOL!!!)The climax of the picture has our hero up against the legendary George Eastman who plays the BIG brother of the head redneck.What can I say, this is a really satisfying movie with some stunning location shooting and in addition, plenty of shooting of the ammunition kind! Sopkiw gives probably his best performance and makes for a very sympathetic hero. It's such a shame that he retired as an actor after only four films. If there is one criticism I would level at the film however, then it is that although the special weapon our hero carries is supposedly the main draw of this film (as regards the advertising at least) it is only actually used proper in the final 15 or so minutes of the running time. In addition, despite a fair number of cool explosions, these final scenes are not handled as spectacularly as perhaps one might have hoped for (although the scene where our hero blows off a mans arm at point blank range is pretty awesome!)Still, as a whole, as I previously said, this is solidly entertaining stuff and I wholeheartedly recommend it to all serious action fans.....Now where can I get one of those guns from?