Blastfighter

(I revise my rating from 4 to 6--I looked at this movie again four years later on Blu-ray, and whether I was in a better mood or the upgraded print quality made a difference, it seemed much more fun than before in an admittedly derivative, trashy way.) Other commenters here have compared this to "Rambo," and it did come out early in the cycle of cheap Rambo imitations. But it's at least as much like "Walking Tall," in that the upstanding ornery cop (or ex-cop in this case) moves to a small hick town and immediately runs afoul of the good-old-boy louts running amuck there. His long-lost daughter shows up uninvited, and when the bullies kill one of her friends, they spend the rest of the movie's second more "Rambo"-like half stalking father and daughter through the surrounding wilderness in order to eliminate the remaining witnesses. This is fairly well-paced but not as much fun as you might hope. The dubbed dialogue is sort of funny-it's the usual bad Italian approximation of what Americans sound like, read by actors sporting very hokey "redneck" accents-but the film is an adequate, earnest "B" rather than luridly ridiculous and entertaining in the mode of many later "Rambo" knockoffs or 80s Italian exploitation films in general. Nor is the action or violence very memorable. My favorite exploitation actor George Eastman aka Luigi Montefiori turns up playing the main villain's sympathetic older brother, a much more low-key role than usual for him and not a very interesting one. Michael Sopkiw, the U. S. actor who was never able to parlay his stardom in these early-80s Italian movies into an American career, is handsome (here with a big Marlboro Man 'stache) and agreeable-enough as usual. Anyway, it's an OK time-killer but nothing special. Lamberto Bava does a decent job, but his 80s giallos and "Demon" movies are more memorable. Fans of the period will enjoy the disco-synthy score, though the fact that the film actually was shot in the U. S. (Georgia) makes it less obviously a European imitation of an American movie than most similar Italian enterprises around the same time. By the way, the irrelevant title was originally intended for a science-fiction movie that the funding fell through for. I guess some marketing materials had already been prepared, so to save costs they kept the title when the entire project was changed into this less-expensive rural action thriller.

Around a minute into Blastfighter, ex-cop and con Jake "Tiger" Sharp (Michael Sopkiw, 2019: After the Fall of New York) is given the weapon that this movie is named for, a SPAS-12 shotgun that can shoot everything from darts and rockets to tear gas and grenades. He's promised that every law enforcement officer will have this gun in a few years, but it's his now. Tiger was in jail because after his wife was murdered, he shot his wife's killer at point blank range right in front of his lawyer. Yeah, it turns out that the suspect was the lover of the corrupt and sleazy lawyer - because Italian movies - and when he tries to kill that lawyer after his release, he still can't bring himself to do it. Because deep down, he's a good guy - because Italian movies. So he decides to go to the mountains to live in peace, burying the Blastfighter. At this point, Tommie Baby's "Evening Star" plays. The song was written by Barry, Robin and Maurice Gibb of The Bee Gees and you will hear it in its entirety several times throughout the movie. Please read this paragraph as a dire warning. Tiger enjoys the wild game that runs past his cabin and adopts a baby fawn, but when local rednecks capture it alive and keep it in pain so a Chinese herbalist can benefit, he tracks down the deer and puts it out of its misery. At this point, the film goes from a revenge film to a remake of Rambo: First Blood. A girl named Connie randomly moves in with Tiger and ends up being his long-estranged daughter. Yep, our hero didn't even recognize his own kid. Luckily, they bond and become close, just before the town's redneck population rises up to get revenge. Also, to hammer home the redneck town, Billy Redden, the kid who "played" banjo in Deliverance, shows up. The poachers show up in force, despite the truce between their leader Tom (George Eastman, who starred in Antropophagus and Warriors of the Wasteland and wrote Stagefright) and Tiger. The guys were childhood pals, so Tiger agrees not to kill Wally, Tom's brother and get over it. But Wally is, well, Wally. You know how Wally is, always killing everyone around someone, even their grown teenage daughter. Yep. Don't get attached to anyone not named Tiger in this one. It's at this point that the Blastfighter is brought back and all revenge is taken. Glorious bloody, awesome revenge. Blastfighter is packed with Italian genre stars taking a step away from horror and visiting Georgia to make a movie. Like Ottaviano Dell'Acqua, the worm eyed and most memorable zombie in Zombi. And Michel Soavi, director of the aforementioned Stagefright and Cemetary Man, who plays Tiger's daughter's boyfriend. And there's even a score by Fabio Frizzi! This film was originally intended to be a science fiction film with Lucio Fulci directing, but budgetary issues led to it becoming a strange hybrid of Deliverance, Rambo, Mad Max and a Charles Bronson movie. Dardano Sacchetti (The Beyond, Demons, Manhattan Baby) wrote the changed script, which was originally part of a two-movie deal along with Fulci's Warriors of the Year 2072. Lamberto Bava (son of Mario, of course, and director of Demons) stepped in to direct this one. I don't know if this has come through in this piece yet, but Blastfighter is a weird movie. If you go by the poster, you're expecting that gun to be used over and over, but it's kept out of action until the end. With the talent on hand, you're expecting pure craziness, but that doesn't really happen until the end. That said, I wasn't bored at all during this and I've endured countless Stallone clones and this is way better than nearly all of them. That said, I can't even imagine seeing Fulci try his hand at a film like this. His version of Blastfighter would blow someone's eyeball clean out of their head!

How many movies were inspired by the horror classic "the most dangerous game" ?Even such recent works as Gibson's "Apocalypto" were . This one is not worse than the others ,and if the two leads had shown more emotion ,had they "played" ,it could have been even endearing.As an action movie ,it's moderately entertaining ,with a hackneyed screenplay -just one thing "happens" which would not generally happen in this kind of superman flick-And it's after "it " happens that the movie has nothing more in store for the viewer.Well filmed in nice landscapes which recall " Deliverance" another movie "blastfighter" borrows from.And the same horrible cliché that claims that country people are savage uneducated brutes.

I am not usually a big fan of action movies. That is, American action movies. Being a fan of Italian horror films, I was attracted to this film because of the director, Lamberto Bava. This was fun movie to watch, and kinda funny to- unintentionally. It was funny to see the Italian take on American rednecks from Georgia- did a pretty good job of it, but very much a caricature of rednecks. I don't want to spoil it, but there is a lot of over the top situations where the viewer will say, "they wouldn't do that!", or "that wouldn't ever happen!". But that is the joy of watching films, to see things that couldn't or wouldn't happen in real life. This is almost a cliché' for a action movie from the 80s. Explosions, big guns, and a sweaty dirty hero. I had to pick up a DVD-R from somebody, I don't believe that this is distributed by any company at the moment- in the US at least.

saw this movie way back in 1987 when I was in Greece. I thought it was a great revenge action movie. Sopkiw did a neat job as Tiger Sharp. Quite surprising why he hasn't featured in any movies after that !! Change of profession ?? Sopkiw as Tiger Sharp returns from Jail after 8 years after killing his wife's murderer. He tries to lead a quiet life when he stumbles upon a group of deer poachers who kill deers for a Kingpin from Hongkong who use the kill to prepare oriental drugs. This kingpin turns out to be Sharp's friend. This anger's him more. To make things worse, his daughter is killed by the poachers and Sharp goes berserk and pulls out the gun from under the porch given to him by his friend and quenches his revenge by killing them all !! A great revenge stories. I am sure the Indians will love this movie.

Lamberto Bava's best film so far plays like a variation of Deliverance and First Blood. For the first half of the movie, it remains in doubt rather Sopkiw is going to strike back at a huge passel of harassing rednecks. The scriptwriters here seemed to know what we wanted and made the movie flow accordingly. You can watch the film, hate a character, say whether he lives or dies, and you'll be pretty much correct. All in all this film packs a whallop, with a good Claudio Simonetti score (same as the score in MASSACRE IN DINOSAR VALLEY). The characters likable enough (except Sopkiw's LOAD daughter) and the climax was suitably exciting and violent. Basically the two hicks in DELIVERANCE here are replaced with 500 hicks, 90% of whom die in violent explosive ways. A good movie, lots of goods, not much to complain about. There were a lot of references to EVIL DEAD, such as the fact that Sopkiw drove the same model car, lived in a similar wooden shack in the woods, and even was made up to look like Bruce Campbell! Find this movie if you can.

Next to DEMONS this is probably director Lamberto Bava's best film. Having just been released from prison for a crime he didn't commit, leading man Michael Sopkiw just wants peace and quiet in the wilderness. But wouldn't you know it, as soon as he pulls into the town trouble arises in the forms of lowlifes with manners and tact all but absent. They give Michael static and while he tries not to fight back you just know that something is going to make him snap and get even with these small town hooligans and their sadistic ways.(Check out Michael's super tricked out futuristic(?) rifle. This is just a very entertaining film to watch, especially with friends. The soundtrack is amazing as well containing a driving instrumental and a warbles country & western tune.

Scenic locations and great action really make this italian entry into the Hicksploitation genre stand out. It's somewhat reminscent of Rambo: First Blood, but I actually like it better than that movie. Micheal Sopkiw really shows his talent as a versitile action star here. See it along with After the fall of New York and Massacre in Dinosaur Valley to really get a sense of Sopkiw's talents.

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.

Lamberto Bava; a director often passed off as merely the trash-making son of one of cinema's finest directors, and Michael Sopkiw; a memorable actor that makes a big impression every time he's on screen; even though he unfortunately wasn't on screen all that often. The pairing of these two might have been considered a match made in heaven if only they didn't make the awful Devil Fish together earlier in the same year. Instead of ripping off Jaws, this time they've decided to rip off action films; particularly, it would seem, Rambo, and the result is better; albeit it still not without problems. The plot focuses on a former cop named Jake 'Tiger' Sharp (I can only hope that isn't a tribute to the Bava/Sopkiw Jaws rip-off), a former cop who went down for murdering his wife's murderer. He gets back into town and quickly strikes up a war with a dumb bunch of deer hunters whose hunting more closely resembles slaughter. It's not long before the relationship between the ex-cop and the hunters take a turn for the worse when a man is killed. As is the case with the other three movies starring Michael Sopkiw; he is the best thing about the film. He stars alongside George Eastman and the two provide good examples of rugged action men. The problem with Sopkiw is, however, that it's really very hard to take him seriously; and that does impact on the movie more than just a little bit. As is often the case with cheap action movies; the dialogue here often verges on ridiculous, and while that suits the lead actor very well; it doesn't suit everyone in the film and sometimes it's downright cringe-worthy. The title is more than a little bit misleading too; from the title, I was expecting something more along the lines of futuristic shooting movie; so beware if that's what you're going in looking for! I can't say that the plot or any of the characters hold much weight and really I didn't care much about most of what goes on in the film; but the macho posturing and general fighting is at least entertaining and that's really all you can ask for in a movie like this. Overall, considering how rare this film is; I wouldn't say it's worth going out of your way for it, but it is at least worth a look.