Review of Warrior of the Lost World

According to this craptastic 80's apocalyptic Sci-Fi fest, the future of mankind is endangered, depressing and – most of all - utterly CHEESY! Personally I don't understand why this film receives such an embarrassingly low rating around here, because it's hugely entertaining, grotesque as hell, never boring and not even that bad; really. Most reviewers around here tend to label "Warrior of the Lost World" as a low-grade and shameless imitation of "Mad Max", but I feel it's more like a crossover between the Mel Gibson classic and more specifically the insanely popular TV-show "Knight Rider", because the heroic lead character has goofy interactions with the board computer on his fancy hi-tech motorcycle. That machine is nearly too insane for words, as it shout out phrases like "Beep Bop A Loola", "Bad Mothers! Bad Mothers!", "Whoopee!", etc… This is also one of them films that start with an exaggeratedly long introduction scrolling over the screen, explaining that the earth's population was nearly extinct after a nuclear war, one tyrant took over all leadership and created the Omega Police Force (similar to the Gestapo, in fact) and outside the perimeters of the Metropolitan city it's a wasteland of different gangs and battles for survival. But there's one man, the chosen one, who will rise and bring an end to Prossor's (Donald Pleasance in yet another demented villainous role) dictatorship. All this is information is provided in the intro, so you almost start to wonder why you should even bother to watch the rest of the film. Robert Ginty, who starred in another early 80's favorite of mine called "The Exterminator", plays The Rider and he's obviously very aware of the script's questionable quality, as he doesn't have the energy to speak one of his lines convincingly. But, the professional actor he is, Ginty reluctantly does what he has to do and that includes fighting a truckload of crazed people (S&M freaks, mutants, midget lumberjacks, geeks), playfully argue with his squeaky board computer, fall in love with the Wiseman's daughter and destroy the tyrant empire. The script is entirely derivative, notwithstanding there's a surprisingly ingenious (at least, according to me) twist near the end that I honestly didn't see coming. There's zero building up tension, but the action sequences are pleasingly OTT, with multiple types of vehicles (and people) exploding to pieces and virulent gang showdowns. It was also nice to see Donald Pleasance's still fits in his Ernest Blofeld outfit! His character is the mirror image of the notorious Bond villain, only without the scar around the eye. This was a very amusing film and it's really too bad most people only remember the MST3K version.