Stryker (1983)

Just what I expected

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

The beautiful Delha (luscious Andrea Savio) holds the secret to the location of a spring of water in a bleak and violent post-apocalyptic world plagued by drought. It's up to rugged loner Stryker (beefy Steve Sandor in sturdy stoic and two-fisted form) to protect Delha from a bunch of vicious thugs led by the ruthless Kardis (a nicely hateful portrayal by the chrome-domed Mike Lane).Sure, this flick hasn't much of a plot and the characters are wafer thin, but fortunately director Cirio H. Santiago keeps the enjoyably mindless story moving along at a zippy pace, makes neat use of the desolate desert locations, and stages the lively and exciting action set pieces with considerable go-for-it gusto. Moreover, lots of stuff blows up real good, Savio bares her fabulously full breasts once during a nasty attempted rape scene, and both a tribe of helpful chattering dwarfs and a band of formidable warrior women in leather hot pants are tossed in for good goofy measure. The decent acting from the game cast keeps this movie humming: William Ostrander as the valiant Bandit, Julie Gray as the perky Laurenz, Monique St. Pierre as the fierce Cerce, and Ken Metcalfe as friendly old-timer Trun. Ed Gatchalian's funky-thudding score hits the stirring syncopated spot. Entertaining schlock.

Santiago, in my opinion, though I've only seen three of his films (where I can pretty well imagine what his others are like) hasn't made anything that's matched up to the exciting, sexy, entertaining, and downright cheesy, Naked Fist aka: Firecracker. That's one of my favorite karate films, like The Protector, that I like to treat myself to on occasion. This was like a long dragging bore of a film, a pathetic reminder that these and other cheesy sci fi apocalyptic films existed in the eighties, with it's bad acting and script. It's one of those films, you lose interest in, then switch back, after a few minutes have lapsed, or something you just watch blankly. The story all so, mirrors the one on The Exterminators Of The Year 3000, a much livelier and exciting pic. Here, water has dried up. Situation: the good guys are helped by a girl who knows of the one last locations, where water is still to avail, only the bad guys are guarding it. There. Oh did I mention, the film has bad acting. This is a film, which if your girlfriend went down to the video store, and came back with it, you would strike (r) her. Forget it. Post apocalyptic crap.

In a post-apocalyptic world, water is scarce and is the most sought-after commodity in the new desert-like earth. When a woman appears who knows where to get a large supply of water, an evil, Sid Haig-like baddie kidnaps and tortures her for the information. However, only one man can rescue the girl and help spread the agua to the masses – Stryker (Sandor), of course. So because it's post-apocalypse, everyone puts on their wackiest getup and gets in their junkiest car, and the battle is on. During the "Quest For Water", which isn't a sequel to Quest for Fire (1981), Stryker and his babes have to contend with many obstacles, including some Jawa-like pygmies. Will they live to hydrate again? Out of all the many post-apocalyptic movies that hit video store shelves in the 1980's, our personal favorites tend to be the Italian ones, such as 1990: The Bronx Warriors (1982) and Escape From the Bronx (1983). Italian Post-Ap's (as we call them) (not really) seem to, generally speaking, have the most verve and pizazz. This doesn't leave a lot of room for snoozers like Stryker, which doesn't bring a lot to the table. We've probably seen more Cirio movies than anyone, and this ranks towards the bottom as far as what we've seen of his to date. He even repeated the formula again with Raiders of the Sun (1992), another Post-Ap slog, but that one at least has Richard Norton (Norton also played Straker – pronounced "striker"- in Crossfire, so they have that in common). Though on the bright side, here we have Steve Sandor.While Sandor was unforgettable as Ollie Hand in Trained To Kill, U.S.A. (1973), here the character of Stryker has no real definition. We really get no sense of Stryker as a man or as a hero. On a scale for character development that we just invented, for the entire cast, not just Stryker, on a scale of 0-10, the CD scale for Stryker, the movie, is -5. That's right, negative character development. There's such a deficit, you end up owing the movie by the time the end credits roll. So in this particular wasteland, Stryker is just a generic dude with a beard.Or perhaps more accurately, he's just another supposed action hero in the 80's named Stryker. Let us remember the aforementioned Richard Norton, as well as Lance Henriksen and Wings Hauser, among others. So you don't really rally behind Stryker, as much as you might do with, say, Steve Rally. So with the movie as a whole, we've really seen it all before, so it's not very engaging. And that's certainly true in this case, as Stryker the movie is especially Mad Max (1979)-y. The filmmakers really didn't even try to hide the fact that it's a blatant knockoff. But that's the problem: the lack of window dressing in that sense really hurts, and then boredom sets in. But in the positives column we have a cool score, and some neat violent bits, but those two things aren't enough to keep it all afloat, unfortunately. The movie is as dry as the climate it takes place in.So pray the "nuc-u-lar" (as the narrator in the intro part clearly pronounces it) bomb never hits, if for no other reason than it would mean we would be LIVING inside the world of Stryker. And that would be the real catastrophe.

I might enjoy this movie if I saw again today on TV. However, when my brother and I saw it in the theater (as part of a weeknight "crowd" of about 10-12 viewers) when it was new I thought it was the most terrible "Road Warrior" rip-off that could possibly be made. One of the things I remember about it was that it was LOUD, and that there was almost no letup from the noise. Then came the moment when the hero was about to go off alone, and one of the other characters asked "Where will you go? What will you do?", after which ensued the only moment of silence in the entire movie. Into this someone in the audience inserted what is probably the loudest instance of public flatulence I have ever heard. The majority of the (bored) audience cracked up except the one preppy-looking guy who was there with the only cute chick (who also laughed) in attendance. He took that as his opportunity to stand up and tell her "Let's go!" and stalk off leaving her to look at us with a shrug and "Whatever!" look before getting up and following him out. That was about the only memorable moment in the entire movie for us, but we still talk about it sometimes when we are reminiscing and want a good laugh.