"Show Me Your Dick!"

This week's VHS is one of my acquisitions from last month's Up All Night Fest at the Mayfair, Luis Llosa's 1988 flick Crime Zone.

Bone (Peter Nelson) & Helen (Sherilyn Fenn), two inhabitants of a dystopian society aim to escape with the help of a mysterious man named Jason (David Carradine).

From the coverbox I inferred that Crime Zone might be some sort of Road Warrior rip-off, but sadly that was not the case. Instead, this movie was more of a Bonnie & Clyde set against the backdrop of a bargain basement Blade Runner. You know what I mean, there were a ton of these in the late eighties/early nineties that all had a similar look, but couldn't spring for the flying cars or any other expensive visual effects. I do give them some points for world building though, as that wonky version of pool was amusing and they beat Lawnmower Man to the VR punch by four years.

Then again, those kids could just be high.

Seeing Fenn as a blonde was rather striking. Man, compared to The Wraith this must have felt like a blockbuster. This was during her “naughty” period so Crime Wave does feature an obligatory nude scene. I have to admit though, if they'd found a better lead, or at least someone Fenn had even a bit of chemistry with, it might have made all the difference. Because I gotta tell you, the last half hour of this movie felt like a thousand years long. Once the novelty of Carradine's couple-of-days-on-set performance lost its luster, I was wishing for the end credits.

I will say that the middle of Crime Zone did keep me entertained, either from the exchanges between Helen and Bone that were frankly hard to keep a straight face through, or other bits like the lady cop who uttered that aforementioned line above and that the government's preferred method of execution was to shoot a death ray at your genitals.

Come to think of it, there's a lot of weird crotch stuff in this movie. Probably best not to dwell on it. At the end of the day, I can forgive Llosa for this less than stellar effort because he is the gentle soul that would eventually give us Anaconda. Bless.