Survivor (1987)

Let's be realistic.

As Good As It Gets

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

A low budget, forgotten adventure film which focuses more on characters and philosophy than hard-hitting action, this dated but moderately impressive sci-fi film should be interesting viewing for fans of the genre. The makers of this film opt for a more thoughtful tone than most, as the "Survivor" wonders why the human race should still attempt to kill each other even as he blasts another survivor to death. The lack of budget means that any major action scenes are missing (the first sight of our hero is him tied to railings, as his survival and previous adventures are told in voice-over), although there are a fair amount of shoot-outs to keep action fans appeased.SURVIVOR benefits from good locations, especially the barren, bleak and windy desert which gusts around our hero's feet as he makes his way towards society. The desert also contains the rusty hulks of old, rotting ships which make for great visuals. In comparison, the dank underground base in which he finds himself at the end of the film is very atmospheric. The film is almost free of dialogue until the end, instead using voice-over narration as a means to communicate to the viewer the events which take place. I liked this style, as it reminded me of THE AFTERMATH, one of my favourite post-apocalyptic movies out there.Christopher Mayer is the hero with the '80s hair, and plays his role impassively yet with glimpses of humanity showing through. While he may not be the most appealing of heroes, I've seen a lot worse. Something that did annoy me was his weakness in the film - he's forever getting injured and fails to put up much of a fight, instead getting out of dangerous situations by the skin of his teeth at the last minute. I'm not saying I would have preferred some Van Damme ass-kicker but a bit more aggression/ability would have helped. The unknown Sue Kiel stars as the unconventional love interest and interestingly her character lends her own views to the proceedings. Richard Moll (who has carved a career in movie bad guys) is the philosophising villain who plans to produce a new society, and has a great character. Somewhat bizarrely, the British John Carson (who is best remembered as Squire Hamilton in PLAGUE OF THE ZOMBIES) turns up in a supporting role as an ally of the hero.The ending does venture into MAD MAX-style silliness what with its villains swinging around on chains and the like, but closes on a high with a great prolonged battle between Moll and Mayer in which the chief word is suspense. Otherwise this is a slow-moving movie which probably won't appeal to most fans looking for another action-packed MAD MAX rip-off. I can't say that I enjoyed watching it, but the South African visuals count for a lot and the change of pace certainly makes it one of the more original, and interesting, genre oddities.

Even among forgotten movies, this movie is probably forgotten. It's so obscure that there isn't even a Motion Picture Association of America logo or seal at the end of the final credits, and even Grade-Z Golan-Globus Cannon movies got those. I'm insanely curious about the background of how this movie got made, and my guess is that some low-rent producer came up with the idea based on whatever old sets and plane tickets he could muster together.That said, this movie has the kind of scruffy charm you could only get from a 1980s post-apocalyptic straight-to-video film. The banal offbeat locations give this movie its boost. Makes sense, though: if the world has been destroyed in a nuclear holocaust, who wouldn't want to live in an underground factory in the middle of a desert with a pool inside? And if you have an attractive actress, why not use her in the most awkwardly-long '80s-style softcore sex scene ever filmed? Why this scene was placed into a violent post-apocalyptic science fiction movie is beyond me, but then again I'd love to find out what was going on behind the scenes.Movies like this defy any conventional star rating. Who was the intended audience for a movie like this? How did Richard Moll("Bull") from TV's "Night Court" get cast as the villain? Why was this the director's first and only film? What is he doing now? Just like the unexplained weirdness of the entire movie, such questions only heighten the mystery. Perhaps if the world is ever destroyed by nuclear war, survivors will find old VHS copies of movies like this and wonder what the heck society was thinking.

Man returns from space to find war has devastated the earth . . .starts promisingly with a solar powered train, and the hero almost dying, but alas we are not spared the rest of the film. What few people he comes across all try to kill him, except for a scary foreign girl that he becomes. . .erm. .. friendly with.Well, she gets kidnapped by some bad guy (what is it about the future? There's an apocalypse and suddenly everyone changes their name to Kragg) and being the only woman he's seen, he has to go off to save her. Not too bad a film in the "so bad it's good" sense. A rare accurate post-apocalyptic world - no water OR petrol.

The memory I have of this film goes a long way back ever since I saw the theatrical trailer (it actually got released in the Philipines back in '87). Recently I picked up the DVD (region 0) and I just like this film for unknown reasons really. Chip Meyer plays an astronaut who comes back to earth only to discover he just missed out on world war III. It starts in flashback style and alot will find this film a total bore (specially the second half) but if you like end of the war films, you should see this film. It's the narration perhaps (the actors don't really talk, just narrate their thoughts to us), is it the cheesy score? Is it the cool cover art that appealed to me? Maybe it's because I love films about the end of the world. Check out Damnation Alley, City Limits for more post-apocalyptic low-budget mayem.