MVD Rewind Collection: Terminus (1987) - Reviewed

Images courtesy of MVD Rewind Collection

Prolific French cinematographer turned occasional film director Pierre-William Glenn, best known for shooting François Truffaut’s Day for Night, first broke into the film scene with the 1974 Motorcycle World Championship documentary The Iron Horse well before working towards his 1987 bottom-feeding French-German-English Mad Max clone Terminus.  Picked up for rerelease on home-video by MVD’s Rewind Collection sublabel and presented in two cuts (extended French or truncated English) with different aspect ratios, the film with its striking poster art of a metal-fisted Johnny Hallyday alongside spunky Karen Allen and Jürgen Prochnow Dr. Strangelove-ing it with three different screen roles promises some X-brand-The Road Warrior fun in the vein of Dead End Drive-In or Cherry 2000.  Sadly despite the pedigree of the cast, multiple roles and mostly good-looking post-apocalyptic science-fiction dystopian futurism, Terminus in both versions is a depressingly stagnant bore that tosses one of its key acting talents out of the movie before we can pretend to care.

 
It is 2037 and the future rests in the talons of a genetically modified child prodigy named Mati (Gabriel Damon from Robocop 2) housing a mind preprogrammed and tailored by a mad scientist (Jürgen Prochnow in one of three roles).  In a plot point grafted from Death Race 2000 an international cross-country sport is practiced where a truck driver must traverse the country to a designated terminus while fending off unforeseen obstacles and/or assailants.  With the lead truck nicknamed ‘Monster’, designed by the boy genius and to be transported by a gruff female truck driver named Gus (Karen Allen) with the help of a talking dashboard computer replete with moving mouth parts, the dangerous game begins with an enticing multimillion dollar reward.  But when a glitch in the computer’s AI misdirects Gus into uncharted territory, she encounters a gang of leather-clad hoodlums who imprison her alongside a fellow prisoner named Stump (Johnny Hallyday) who joins in on her dangerous mission of bringing the truck to its intended destination.

 
A frankly tedious and dismal slog with occasional bouts of visual brilliance thanks to the director’s work in cinematography, Terminus in both versions is a largely incoherent action-free slog with occasional pyrotechnic explosions that are high on gasoline but low on the dynamic thrills that made George Miller’s series so iconic.  Based on a screenplay by Alain Gillot with dialogue revisions by the director and Patrice Duvic, Terminus despite resembling familiar dystopian sci-fi territory and housing many pyrotechnics doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.  Largely a starring vehicle for French rock-and-roll singer Johnny Hallyday, then known as the ‘French Elvis’, donning a bright white spiked haircut and a bionic arm, most of Terminus is spent with him in the truck driving along evading hoodlums where he can.  Karen Allen is in it about as long as Bryan Cranston was in the 2014 Godzilla film and her glorified cameo feels like a wasted opportunity.  Only Jürgen Prochnow playing a mad scientist, an androgynous evil ruler and a hired gun (all three characters nameless) seems to be having any fun here as Johnny Hallyday seems bored stiff. 

 
On the one hand, it briefly sports interesting neon-lit production design by Alain Challier and the cinematography by Serie Noire assistant cameraman Jean-Claude Vicquery is serviceable rendered in 1.66:1 or 1.78:1 depending on the version and the synthy score by recurring Peter Greenaway collaborator David Cunningham is okay.  Seeing the ‘Monster’ vehicle crashing through buildings and careening through the French countryside and/or villages was novel if not mildly amusing.  On the other hand, as it saunters from encounter to encounter, save for recurring images of an animatronic mouth speaking to the heroes trying to reach their terminus, the film becomes at only an hour and fifty-five minutes increasingly exhausting if not steadily crushingly joyless.

 
That isn’t to say MVD Rewind Collection haven’t put together a comprehensive ‘collector’s’ package here for those who really like their Z-grade Mad Max knockoffs in all their glory.  While missing a recently conducted Rifftrax roasting which might’ve made the experience of this less soporific, it does contain newly filmed interviews with Jürgen Prochnow, archival interviews with the director and a nearly one-hour retrospective making-of documentary.  Also included is a collectible mini-poster, collectible slipcover and reversible sleeve art, extra makeup and lipstick more or less on a pig.  For those curious what a French Mad Max clone might’ve looked like, here you go.  But for the rest of us just wanting some knockoff entertainment, you’re likely to come away disappointed if not dismayed.  An easy pass. 

--Andrew Kotwicki