Saturday 9 February 2013

Cheapo DVD Review: Gladiator Cop (1995)

Starring:
Lorenzo Lamas 
James Hong
Frank Anderson
George Touliatos
Christopher Lee Clements
Claire Stansfield
and
Rather a lot of men with big muscles

  A legendary sword once owned by Alexander the Great is stolen from a museum by persons unknown.
 Meanwhile burly men are turning up dead with wounds apparently made by a really, big sharp knife.
 Andrew Garrett, a cop with certain...abilities and really nice hair, finds himself pursuing the sword into the shadowy world of underground death matches.
  And does the sword have anything to do with the really vivid dreams he's been having lately...

  This is yet another movie about underground fighting, although in this case the fighters are allowed to use axes and swords. You have to wonder how they recruit new fighters. More to the point, how do they stop them from showing up, taking one look at the enormous guy with a BFS* on the opposite side and saying "Bollocks to this."
  The first thing you notice about "Gladiator Cop" is that the whole thing plays like a pilot for a tv series that never got made. 
 Well actually the first thing you notice is that star Lorenzo Lamas got his hair done by Kevin Sorbo's old hairdresser.

 Not when he's doing cop stuff obviously. No, he wears it tied back in a ponytail and has one of those curiously stylish leather jackets, a look that screams "Undercover maverick cop"
 Mind you, I'm not sure if  Andrew Garrett is  undercover or it's just the police department is kinda embarrassed to have him around. He has psychometric powers, you see. what that means is, he touches a dead guy, gets a flash of how they died and then falls over a lot. 
 You mean the dead bloke that came in with two small stab wounds died from... being stabbed by something small and sharp? Wow. Never would have guessed.

 The second thing you notice...
Wait, hang on.
The third thing you notice is how disjointed "Gladiator Cop" feels. While Andrew Garrett is poking stiffs, jotting down his dreams and conducting a half-hearted romance with one of the Museum staff, the film puts more focus on wannabe Player Chris Kilos and male-model turned gladiator Jodar. 
 So while Andrew is trying to find the sword, Kilos and Jodar are trying to fight their way to a big money showdown as per every Underground Fight movie ever.
 ( Personally I'd have sold the damn thing.  Much less chance of getting chopped into bits that way.)
 Anyway, stuff happens, large men fight each other, love-interest Julie does little useful or relevant, James Hong shows up to spout cryptic bollocks  and  Gladiator Cop moves on from scene to scene without really establishing any kind of logical flow. It's like the editor accidentally trimmed out half the scenes where stuff gets explained.
  I found myself reaching for a book halfway through and tuning back in whenever the fights kicked in. There's a fair few of them, mostly involving guys who based their training regime on the 80s  WWF plan. So steroids, more steroids and dubious clothing, then.
 Andrew finally gets undercover as a Zorroesque mystery fighter, has a couple of fights, Kilos and Jodar get their comeuppance and I looked up from my book just long enough to hit the eject button.

 I did not consider this movie a valid or entertaining use of my time.  It wasn't even cheesy enough to be fun.

How much did I pay for this? 50p
Was it worth it? Well I got a blog entry out of it, I suppose. But once I'm done writing this piece, "Gladiator Cop" goes straight onto the Bottom Shelf of Shame, along with all the other stuff I will never, ever dig out again.

(In case you are wondering: BFS = Big F***ing Sword)
 Time for some screenshots:

Kilos - Museum boss gone rogue. 
Seriously, if you wanted to get rich, why didn't you just embezzle the money instead?

Jodar celebrates after killing a large black man with enormous muscles. 

 Julie asks Andrew "How come your hair is nicer than mine?"

While Andrew wants to know what Julie actually does in this film.

Kilos decides to take his new lady-friend out for an evening's entertainment.
By "Ladyfriend" I mean mid-range callgirl
And by "entertainment" he means, watching sweaty steroidmonsters fight to the death.
It doesn't occur to him that she might have wanted to go to a nice cocktail party instead.

I can't think of a caption to do this pic justice. 

Jodar fights a bald man in a carpark.
Considering that the audience all seem to be quite well off, you'd think
they'd maybe insist that these fights got held somewhere nicer.
Somewhere with toilets, maybe.

This woman shows up in a few scenes so you'd 
 expect her to be relevant in some way.
Nope.  

James Hong wonders why it's the 1990s and he's still 
having to do this stereotypical Fu Manchu/Triad shit.

Here's that blonde again, making the most of her last-ever scene in this film.

Jodar finally appears in the same scene as Andrew.
You know, the guy who's supposed to be the hero?  

 And this man is either really angry or has
the most horrendous case of constipation.

That's all folks.

2 comments:

  1. Hahahaha, sounds superb. Great review, cheers. Just bought myself a triple DVD boxset of horror films at Tesco for £3. - UNDERGROUND, SKEW, and HOUSE OF BONES. Could be entertainment value there I think. I'll let you know...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi there. This would probably not be a movie I’d see, but your review is great, very entertaining! Love the captions under the photos too, they gave me a good laugh. :)

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

Labels

#HeavyMetal (246) #TheMetalProject (228) Advice (2) Airboy (2) aircraft (27) album covers (115) Alestorm (2) Andrew j Offutt (1) angels (1) anime (22) AOR (10) art and stuff (28) Attractive women. (98) B-reaction (1) Barbarion (1) Beasty Girls (1) Big D is going to lose his temper in a minute. (4) Big D talks bollocks (36) Big D talks bollocks. (38) Big D talks bollocks. aircraft (2) Black Metal (3) blatant fanservice (154) blatant plug (5) BOLOS (1) Books (49) Boston Wrestling 1964 (1) British comics (21) bunny (1) Buses (3) Captain America (1) carrier bags (1) cars (2) cartoons (12) Catgirl Nuku Nuku (1) Catwoman (1) Change 123 (1) Charleston wrestling 1964 (1) Cheapo DVD Review (75) Children (1) Chingford (1) Christmas (4) Clouds (1) comics (31) Dale rambles about stuff. (1) David Gibbins (1) Dejah Thoris (1) dinosaurs (13) dogs (2) doing stuff badly. (1) Dragonforce (1) dreams (1) DUKW (1) DVD artists are lying bastards (23) Elvis impersonators (1) Eric Roberts will work for food (3) European wrestling 1964 (1) eurovision (20) eurovision Metal Contest (6) fantasy (9) Fathers Day (1) female cyborgs (1) Film (158) films (50) First Squad (1) gardening (1) German Comics (3) Getting started. (1) Ghosts (1) gig (3) Goolie abuse (4) gorgons (1) Grappling Gertie (4) Green Lantern (1) Guest post (2) Hard Gay (1) Harley Quinn (1) Hawkgirl (1) Heavy Metal Artwork Blog (121) Heavy Metal Blog (96) Heavy Metal Cover Girls (95) History (3) Horror (31) Islamic Metal (1) Judge Anderson (2) Kobra And The Lotus. (1) Lawnmower Deth (2) Lesbian Bed Death (2) List (16) Lords Of The Trident (3) Manga (11) marrow fighting (1) Martial Arts (14) Maryland wrestling 1964 (1) massive shoulderpads (1) Matthew Reilly (2) men's issues (6) Merlin (1) metal (329) Metal Christmas (1) Metal songs about metal (229) mimi hagiwara (1) MinamICon (1) Mind Wars (1) models (19) monkeys (2) Monsters Of Rock (2) MRAs (1) museums (8) music (31) music from the weird aprt of Youtube (3) music from the weird part of Youtube (2) music that gets under my skin. (2) Neil Peart RIP. (1) Nice cover (2) Nicholas Eames. (1) Night Fighters (1) Nightside (1) Noot noot (1) NWOBHM (3) Oatcakes (1) Olympics (1) photos (3) pinup (1) ponies (6) Portsmouth (13) Power Girl (2) power metal (1) puroresu (2) Rain (1) rant (19) Redheads (7) Roswell Conspiracies (2) rules (2) Sci-Fi (45) sexy witches (6) shame about the book. (2) Sharktopus (1) Sigismund (1) silliness (1) Southsea (15) Southsea Food Festival 2022 (1) spiders (1) Spitfires (4) Sport is bollocks (1) Starblazer (1) Stockings (1) Storm Eunice 2022 (1) Story (9) Strike Witches (1) Strip magazine (1) Stuff with armoured cars (1) Stuff with axemurdering lumberjacks (1) Stuff with B36 Bombers (1) Stuff with big flying lizards (12) Stuff with Black Metal Catgirls (1) Stuff with blokes in kilts. (2) stuff with cute banshees. (2) Stuff with enormous birds (1) Stuff With Flying Fruit (1) Stuff with Giant Crabs. (3) Stuff with giant Germans singing about sausage. Music from the weird part of Youtube. (1) Stuff with Girls In Eyepatches (3) Stuff with Gladiators (8) stuff with kickboxing teachers. (1) Stuff with killer cricketers (1) Stuff with Killer Rabbits (1) stuff with killer snails (1) Stuff With Killer Unicorns (1) stuff with Maoris (1) Stuff with mermaids (1) Stuff with Nazi Vampires (3) Stuff with Ninjas (3) Stuff with Psycho Coppers (1) Stuff with Robot Maids (1) Stuff with Roller Derby (1) stuff with rollerskating Muses (1) Stuff with soulsucking mummies. (2) Stuff with strippers (3) Stuff with talking statues (2) Stuff with Vikings (3) Stuff with violent clowns (1) Stuff With Walking Fish (2) Stuff with weird Kiwis (1) Stuff with werewolves (5) Stuff with Wolves (1) stuffed animals (1) Stupid films about sharks (10) Synthwave (4) tanks (5) Tarkan (1) Taya Valkyrie (1) Terrible Metal Album Covers (28) Terrible songs (1) Terry Pratchett. (1) The Band (1) The Hangover pt 2 (1) The Lost Fleet (1) The Metal Project (226) Thundercats (1) Ticket Tales. (1) Top Ten (6) Toy soldiers (9) Truffle (1) Turkish films (2) Ultimate Metal Playlist (9) Valentine (2) Valkyrie (2) Vampires (8) videos (1) voyager (1) War Films (4) Warships (1) weird crushes (5) weird shit (7) White Pigeon (1) women in blindfolds (2) Women with Scythes (1) women with spears (5) women with swords (52) women with wings (7) women's wrestling (50) womens wrestling comics (13) womens' wrestling movies. (1) Wrestling (33) Wrestling Books (5) Wrestling Magazines (15) wrestling October 1964 (1) WTF? Japan (10) WW2 (1) Yamato (2) you do this shit deliberately don't you? (1) Zombie Films (6)