B.O.R.N. (1989)

So much average

A Masterpiece!

A Disappointing Continuation

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Well, my last hope of watching a semi-decent 80s horror movie completely flew out the window when, at least on the copy that I own, the film started with a video-introduction by Troma-founder and notorious bad taste jester Lloyd Kaufman. Apparently Troma served as the distributor for "B.O.R.N", and in case you know a little something about the horror industry, you also know that this company stands for low-budgeted, silly and overall inept horror trash. On the other hand, however, Kaufman's intro was perhaps the least boring part of the entire film. In his very own and almost retarded style Kaufman makes a couple of jokes about the cast and plot. For example, when he explains that the film deals will illegal organ transplants he add-libs the wordplay: "I kidney you not!" "B.O.R.N" is overall a disappointment and this in spite of several potential strongpoints. The black market organ business is a very macabre topic and the idea of ruthless gangsters cruising around the big city in an authentic ambulance and scouting for innocent victims to kidnap is quite tense and disturbing. Moreover, there a few interesting names in the cast, like William Smith as an emotionless surgeon, Russ Tamblyn as a sleazy kidnapper, P.J. Soles as the vicious brain behind the criminal organization and the odd-by-nature Clint Howard as a police deputy. Then why isn't "B.O.R.N" an undiscovered gem of the late 80s horror era? Well, basically because the whole thing turns into a dull and semi-sentimental soap-opera almost straight from the beginning! The very first victims that we see abducted in the ambulance are already critical to the rest of the plot. A movie such as this needs at least two or three random 'collateral damage' victims in order to set the tone and illustrate how relentless this organ-network in fact is! But here the cowboy- father (played by writer/director Ross Hagen) immediately witnesses how his three adopted daughters are dragged into the ambulance and calls in the help of a befriended former detective to track them down. The rest of the film is a derivative and boring cat-and-mouse thriller instead of a gruesome horror flick. There's hardly any action or suspense, let alone gore and bloodshed, and the coolest actors are given the least screen time. This is even Troma unworthy! In case you want to see better and/or more entertaining movies dealing with more or less the same subjects, look for the intelligent Michael Crichton thriller "Coma" (1978) and the overlooked Larry Cohen gem "The Ambulance" (1990).

Buck Cassidy (Hagen) is a big-hearted cowboy who, with his wife Della (Claire Hagen) have, over the years, adopted seventeen foster children. When three of his adopted daughters are kidnapped and thrown into an unlicensed ambulance, the nightmare begins. It turns out innocent people are being taken from off the street, put into dingy operating rooms, and their organs are removed and sold to the highest bidder on the black market. Dr. Farley (Smith) is the sinister surgeon, Jerry (Clint Howard) is the creepy male nurse, Liz (Soles) is the secretary, and the super-evil Hugh (Tamblyn) is the agent that acts as the liaison between the desperate families that need the organs and the unwilling participants. So Buck contacts his old buddy Charlie (Howell), a retired LAPD cop, and the two of them search all over the L.A. area for the missing girls. But will they be too late? The main reason we sought this movie out is because it contains most of the cast and a lot of the crew from one of our favorite movies, Action USA (1989). B.O.R.N. is almost like a dry run for their later masterwork. Ross Hagen, Claire Hagen, Gregory Scott Cummins, William Smith and Hoke Howell all reconvened the next year after B.O.R.N. to make the great Action USA, and the second unit director for B.O.R.N., John Stewart, became the director for Action USA, and later Cartel (1990). So when we heard that the Action USA team had tried their hand at a horror-themed film about a "Body Organ Replacement Network", obviously our interest was piqued.But you can tell they wanted to do an action movie all along, because there are shootouts, fisticuffs and car chases in B.O.R.N., making it less a straight-up horror movie and more a thriller with some action and horror elements.William Smith is delightfully unintelligible as the main surgeon. Sure, it's odd to see Smith as a surgeon, but that adds to the weirdness. PJ Soles is almost unrecognizable as the big-haired Liz. Russ Tamblyn stands out as one of the more evil baddies we've seen in a while. Clint Howard, playing, surprisingly, a creepy rapist, later reprised his role in Street Corner Justice (and probably a lot of his other roles as well). Rance Howard is also on board and he resembled Night Court's Harry Anderson more than his brothers Ron or Clint.At first it's hard to tell who's who in the movie, because everyone is inexplicably wearing cowboy hats in modern-day L.A., but eventually you can discern who the characters are. The editing is almost as choppy as Dr. Farley's scalpel-work, but then there are some oddly funny moments to distract you from that, such as when Buck and a large group of people are at a large dance called "Adopt A Grandparent Day" and they're all dancing in a circle singing "Beautiful Dreamer". And sure, there's a bit of what you might call "surgery gore", but the main problem is that the movie needed to be tightened up. Most of the running time consists of Hoke and Hagen searching around town for the missing daughters. It's almost like the B.O.R.N. concept couldn't fill 90 minutes on its own. There should have been more going on plotwise. But there are enough silly/Un-P.C./worthwhile moments to keep the movie afloat.In the music department, a band called Pigmy Love Circus plays at the aforementioned "Adopt A Grandparent Day" (good gig!) and Dawn Wildsmith is uncredited as the singer. Wildsmith was also in Cyclone (1987) with Russ Tamblyn and John Stewart, not to mention Armed Response (1986) with Ross Hagen. The end credits song (which also appears in one of the many scenes when Hagen is searching the city in his van) is "sung" by Ned Albright. It seems this was his first attempt at singing. Not just in front of a microphone at a recording session...I mean EVER. Is this the best they could have gotten? NED ALBRIGHT? In all, B.O.R.N. is an amusing curiosity, and its claim to fame, besides its cast, is that it paved the way for Action USA.For more action insanity, please visit: www.comeuppancereviews.com

This fun'n'funky little low-budget B-horror medical action item centers on an illegal underground black market human body organ ring which uses kidnapped young people as involuntary donors. P.J. Soles portrays the ruthless ice-cold bitch who runs the evil operation with tremendous lip-smacking venomous panache while the great William Smith lends his always welcome and commanding presence as the head surgeon. Rugged rancher Ross Hagen (who also directed) and his bitter, burnt-out former cop best buddy Hoke Howell hit the streets in search of Hagen's daughter after she gets abducted by crazed flunky Russ Tamblyn (who gives a gloriously gonzo and over-the-top eye-rolling hambone performance). Meanwhile, Clint Howard pops up as a pathetic rapist orderly and his father Rance appears as a corrupt police detective.Gary Graver's typically accomplished cinematography gives the film a nice, polished look. The dialogue boasts a few hard-boiled gems; my favorite is Howell's splendidly cynical and pessimistic philosophy: "The whole world is a stinking toilet that's just waiting to be flushed." However, Hagen's direction is strictly hit-or-miss: The opening third is painfully slow and meandering, but fortunately the pace kicks in and the movie gets progressively better as it goes along, culminating in a rousing climax with a thrilling car chase and equally exciting shoot-out that really deliver the slam-bang stirring goods. And the scene where Tamblyn erupts into a psychotic rage and gleefully blows away a little boy is an absolute hoot! Overall, this baby rates as a pretty solid, although flawed and uneven flick which makes for a perfectly acceptable and enjoyable time-killer.

BORN (Body Organ Replacement Network) takes perfectly healthy people right off the streets and then slices and dices them and then sells the unwilling donor's organs on the black market. Coma ripoff given the B movie treatment; low production values and once famous actors looking mighty embarassed to be in this film to cash in on a quick paycheck.