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| All Images Courtesy: Arrow Video |
Three years ago Arrow Video gave us one of their most impressive and memorable box sets ever, with Enter the Video Store: Empire of Screams – an essential blu-ray collection for any fan of 1980s VHS genre schlock. The set was a celebration of Charles Band’s iconic 80s B-movie studio Empire Pictures, collecting five of their cult-classic films (The Dungeonmaster, Dolls, Cellar Dweller, Arena, and Robot Jox), and presenting a roster of special features charting the studio’s rise, glory years, and fall. Now, Arrow is finally giving us the follow-up to that set, Enter the Video Store 2: Video Vengeance. It is a very different set from its predecessor, and not what fans probably expected, but it is a very good box set in its own right, and another solid celebration of the unique films of the VHS era.
Let’s start right out by addressing the elephant in the room of what the set is not: it is not (as many fans had understandably assumed it would be, myself included) a second collection of Empire Pictures movies. Nor is it themed around another specific studio that was prolific during the video store era, like Charles Band’s Full Moon or Roger Corman’s New World/New Horizons/New Concorde. This is likely to disappoint some fans, since providing a box-set retrospective of a cult-favorite studio with a distinctive voice was a big part of what made the first Enter the Video Store so special. What this set is instead is a celebration of a specific genre niche: the straight-to-video action film. Video Vengeance gathers six action flicks made for video store shelves between 1987 and 1993 (five main titles and one bonus feature), giving us a genre study rather than a studio retrospective. And once again, the set is absolutely stacked with extras.
While this may not be exactly what fans had in mind, and while this approach probably means that Enter the Video Store 2 may have a more niche target audience than its predecessor (the first set had a variety of genres that offered something for many different tastes in B-movie junk, while this is a set exclusively for fans of a particular flavor of 80s/early-90s action movies), this is a very good collection that executes its chosen theme well. The movies are a mixed bag, but they add up to a very fun tour of the action section at a mom & pop video store, circa 1993. So let’s dive into this box set, and take a closer look at these six films…
THE FILMS:
Ministry of Vengeance (1989):
A Vietnam-vet priest (John Schneider, The Dukes of Hazzard, Smallville) has his life turned upside down when his family is killed in a terrorist attack at an airport. When the government agent investigating the case (Yaphet Kotto, Alien, Midnight Run) tells the priest that the perpetrators are out of the reach of extradition by the US and there is nothing they can do, the priest calls up his Vietnam buddy (James Tolkan, Back to the Future, Masters of the Universe), swaps his bible for a gun, and flies to Lebanon to get some vigilante justice by taking out the terrorists himself. It’s a pretty standard and by-the-books action movie premise, with elements of Death Wish and Rambo thrown in a blender. And the result is a reasonably fun, but fairly unremarkable action movie which would have been a good enough way to spend an evening after a trip to the video store, but which isn’t all that memorable.
The best thing about Ministry of Vengeance is definitely the cast. John Schneider is genuinely good as the priest turned vigilante, often coming off like a discount Michael Biehn. And the supporting cast, featuring great character actors like Yaphet Kotto, George Kennedy, and Ned Beatty, elevate the material a great deal. But the MVP of the movie has got to be James Tolkan, who is excellent here, devouring scenes whole with his brash drill-sergeant demeanor. Tolkan and Kotto share a couple scenes, and when put together they are able to spin this forgettable script into gold, making even some thoroughly predictable plot twists feel compelling and suspenseful.
The action is a mixed bag. Some of it is quite strong, with some impressive stuntwork, explosions, and squib gags. But there are also a lot of shot/reverse-shot scenarios where two actors are firing guns at each other in not the most compelling way. Likewise the camerawork and production techniques can be very good, with strong stylistic flourishes throughout, but definitely show the signs of its low-budget straight-to-video production, and often settle for “good enough.” When it is at the top of its game, Ministry of Vengeance does achieve some strong moments though.
In the end, this is a decent but unremarkable action movie, which is fun in the moment but quickly forgotten. It’s worth a look, but one of the less memorable films in this set, and not the most auspicious start to the collection. The same director (Peter Maris)’s later film Hangfire, which is also in this set, is a big improvement, and a major level-up over this one. Still, fans of 80s straight-to-video action cinema have seen worse, and should find some things to enjoy here.
The Final Alliance (1990):
David Hasselhoff plays a tough-as-nails soldier who – along with his pet mountain lion – returns to the Texas small town where he grew up… and where his whole family was murdered by a sadistic albino biker-gang boss (John Saxon, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Enter the Dragon) and the corrupt sheriff (Bo Hopkins, American Graffiti, Midnight Express) who works with him to run organized crime in the town. The Hoff and his big cat are here to get revenge, and clean up the small-town streets of their hitherto unchecked criminal element. On paper the “revenge for the murder of his family” plot sounds like a Death Wish-style exploitation revenge film, but the film is a lot more fun and less grim than that. It is much more like a sibling film to Road House. The Hoff is the Toughest Guy Ever, while also being mysterious and sensitive, and he’s rolled into town to stop the Toughest Gang Ever, and get the girl while he’s at it; it’s a delightfully overstated and over-the-top scenario, with Hasselhoff perfectly fitting the bill as the film’s discount Patrick Swayze.
As the film’s villains, John Saxon and Bo Hopkins both completely understand the over-the-top assignment, both chewing the scenery with all their might. Hopkins plays his corrupt cop/businessman as a manic, coked-up Texan fiend who seems like he could be a parody character in David Byrne’s True Stories. Saxon plays his gang leader as so despicably evil that he’s barely human – and the bizarre, uncanny makeup job used to turn the actor into an albino (heavy makeup, and oddly reptilian-looking contact lenses) just increases that feeling of inhumanity. They make for a very entertaining duo of bad guys, who leave almost no scenery un-consumed by the end.
The filmmaking is more good-enough, in a journeyman kind of way, than it is actually good, but it gets the job done. The movie is reasonably well-shot, making effective use of its mostly exterior locations – interestingly enough, filmed in South Africa, filling in for Texas, though it does a reasonably convincing job. The action, however, is quite strong. The film has some good stunts, and Hasselhoff does an impressively good job with the hand-to-hand combat scenes, making a strong case for himself as an action star.
The Final Alliance is not a great movie, but it strikes just the right over-the-top tone to be really fun, and for its okayer attributes to come across as part of the cheesy charm. It is a very enjoyable slice of pulpy VHS trash with just the right level of self-awareness. Just the kind of film that you would have had a good time with on a Friday night if Road House was checked out at the video store that night, and this was there to fill the void instead.
Interzone (1989):
(*Note – this film is a bonus movie on disc 2 of the set, presented in standard definition as a VHS-era 4x3 tape master. This is because, when Arrow sought to include it in the set, they found that all film elements for it are lost, and this dated master is all that currently exists.
Also, the features list on the back of the box erroneously lists this as being on disc 3, with R.O.T.O.R. – it is on The Last Alliance’s disc 2)
No, it has nothing to do with the writing of William S. Burroughs, unfortunately, though it would probably be a more interesting film if it did. Interzone belongs to that most prolific of 1980s sci-fi subgenres, the Mad Max knockoff. Bands of marauders, anachronistic post-apocalyptic cities operating on the barter system, vehicles with unusually-shaped exteriors welded to them to make them look cool, and lots of rock quarries and abandoned factories for generically-post-nuke locations… it’s playing all the greatest hits. The plot itself is oddly vague and muddled: somewhere in the wasteland there is a realm called Interzone which possesses some kind of undefined magical powers, and it is held together by a set of equally undefined cursed treasures which, if disturbed, will cause Interzone to collapse and trigger the end of the world for some reason. It’s all pretty unclear. But despite the catastrophic things that will happen if anyone disturbs the treasure, the sadistic band of marauders who rule the wasteland nonetheless want to steal the treasure for themselves, consequences be damned. Fortunately, the monks who protect Interzone have a prophecy that a hero will come along to stop the villains and save the day. Unfortunately, that prophesied hero turns out to be Swan (Bruce Abbott, Re-Animator), a quick-witted but cowardly and self-serving con-man who makes for a very begrudging hero indeed.
You know you’re in for an interesting time when a movie begins with the words “A Filmirage Production.” The notorious Italian B-movie studio was founded by trash-cinema auteur Joe D’Amato, and in addition to producing many of his own films like Anthropophagus and Absurd, it was the studio behind a bunch of dubiously-good minor cult favorites like Ghost House, Witchery, Ator, and most notoriously Troll II. So that’s where the bar is set in terms of quality with Interzone. The film was an American/Italian co-production, with US director Deran Sarafian (Terminal Velocity, Back in the USSR) behind the camera. But the movie feels very, very distinctly like an Italian B-movie of this era, and some of the other names in the credits make it clear why that is – specifically names like co-writer Claudio Fragasso (Troll II, Zombi 3 and 4, Beyond the Darkness), which cult-film fans will clock as either a red flag, or a sign of some fun trash, depending on your tastes.
Unfortunately, to hope for fun trash is to hope for too much from Interzone; this movie is terrible. The plot moves in a peculiarly disjointed way, and the pacing is sloppy, uneven, and frequently lifeless. The music is bizarre and out of place, the cinematography flat, and the action usually quite lazy and bad. The movie also tries to have a sense of humor, but usually those attempts fall flat (such as the baffling opening scene which turns into a Keystone Cops type of silent-movie comedy sequence), and none of it is particularly funny. The movie does have one good recurring bit, with an order of monks who are all named after electronics companies from their people’s distant past – Brother Sony, Brother Panasonic, their leader General Electric, etc – but that’s about the only thing worth complimenting.
The performances in Interzone are also terrible; it’s kind of hard to believe the director was an American, because the movie very much has that Troll II “actors being directed by someone who does not fluently speak English and has no idea if the line readings are any good or not” vibe. Bruce Abbott, who is excellent as tortured medical student Dan Cain in Re-Animator, is a cardboard cutout here, failing to bring life to a thankless role that swings back and forth between bumbling stooge and handsome hero. It seems like the writers and Sarafian were going for a Big Trouble in Little China, Jack Burton type of handsome idiot, who has enough swagger to fake it through every situation until he accidentally becomes a hero for real, but the script and characterization are way too weak and undefined to pull it off, and Abbott is left floundering, unable to make sense of the iffy writing with his performance. The villainous Mantis (Teagan Clive) seems like a fun big-bad in theory, but Clive was clearly cast because she’s a bodybuilder who looks the part, and not because she can act – she can’t, and her line deliveries are uniformly awful. The supporting cast (a mix of Americans and Italians speaking their lines phonetically) is no better.
I regret to inform that I found very little to enjoy in Interzone, and it is the set’s first true dud, which I cannot recommend at all. It is a shame that the film elements are lost, and it had to be relegated to the special features on another disc rather than getting its own; no movie deserves to become lost media. But it is the worst film in this set by a wide margin, and the least deserving of the special edition treatment, so if any of these films had to become an SD-only bonus title, better this one than the others.
R.O.T.O.R. (1987):
Following Interzone, which was the worst kind of bad, R.O.T.O.R. is a delightful kind of bad: campy absurdity which may be kind of terrible, but which is an absolute blast. It’s a deeply silly film, which wears its influences on its sleeve, in an unapologetic way that is a lot of fun to watch. While it was actually in production at the same time as RoboCop (and also shooting in Dallas, no less), one must assume that this was a Carnosaur or Leviathan situation, trying to be a well-timed B-tier version of a blockbuster they knew was coming. It’s about a Texan scientist (who is also a cowboy) working for the Dallas police department, who has been hired to create some kind of robotic cop to deal with the rising crime rate. But when the corrupt organization behind the project insists that they launch their robotic cop before it’s ready, it goes rogue and starts terminating any apparent criminal it comes across, judging even crimes as minor as speeding punishable by death. Yes, it’s a very unsubtle RoboCop meets The Terminator – and R.O.T.O.R. even sounds like a portmanteau of the two titles. But the film is smart enough to not take itself too seriously, and it has a lot of fun playing with these tropes. It even interjects a very silly comic-relief robot site-character to lean into the camp. The result is a regional B-movie which isn’t good, but which is thoroughly enjoyable.
It starts with some serious flare, showing that it also has more ambition than just copying the latest action movie trends. Rather than jumping straight into the robo-spoitation action formula, R.O.T.O.R. begins with a film noir setup. Our hero, cowboy scientist Dr. Coldyron, has been arrested for the apparent murder of a cop, and dragged into the interrogation room. It is there that he tells the detectives that things are not what they seem, launching into his tale in flashback structure, via hard-boiled narration. Because of course, the cop he killed was not really a cop at all, but a robot-cop turned terminating machine. It’s a very fun, strong start to the film. The movie quickly drops the film-noir act and settles into more conventional sci-fi tropes, but it sets the tone that anything goes in R.O.T.O.R., and it absolutely does. It’s the kind of movie where violent action can be juxtaposed with a goofball comedic robot who cracks jokes and looks like a Fisher-Price toy. The kind of movie where a scientist also creates inventions to vaporize the dead trees on his horse ranch, and has an absurd name like Dr. Coldyron. The kind of movie where a shocking number of random Texans are also martial arts experts, and can launch into elaborate fights when attacked on the streets by a terminating robot-cop. This movie is bonkers.
However, it could also be said that R.O.T.O.R. is less than the sum of its parts, and it probably won’t be for all tastes. It’s a fun film, but not a well-made one. Most of the acting in it is pretty terrible, with Richard Gesswein (who never acted in another film, and was also R.O.T.O.R.’s producer) coming off as incredibly wooden an uncharismatic as Dr. Coldyron, and Brad Overturf (a stuntman in such films as Mindwarp and Ticks) being equally wooden as the titular robot-cop, and not in an effective Terminator kind of way. Aside from the hilarity of the random martial arts, the action scenes are mostly not particularly well-done, and when the movie enters a sort of pseudo-slasher mode, with a final girl fleeing from R.O.T.O.R. and trying to kill him, results are mixed.
But even when it isn’t particularly good, the goofy, enjoyably cheesy vibes of R.O.T.O.R. go a long way. It’s the kind of movie that is ideal for a B-movie night with a rowdy group of cheesy-cinema-loving friends, ideally with a few beers. If it’s your flavor of cheese, you’ll find a lot to have fun with in R.O.T.O.R., and it definitely earns its reputation as a delightfully absurd cult-flick of the VHS era.
Hangfire (1991):
Hangfire is the second film in the set by Peter Maris, who also directed Ministry of Vengeance two years previously. As such, for the first time Enter the Video Store 2 recalls the experience of the original set, as we get to see the same crew of filmmakers grow from one film to the next. And grow they have: Ministry of Vengeance was pretty good, but Hangfire is the best movie in this box set. It sees Maris and company level up significantly from their previous work, going from a serviceable but modest and by-the-numbers straight-to-video actioner to a very impressive and ambitious larger-scale thriller that easily could have held its own in theaters. There are still traces of direct-to-video silliness here and there, but Hangfire is a very pleasant surprise, and a compellingly tense film.
When a chemical spill triggers the emergency evacuation of a Southwest high-security prison, sadistic murderer and prison-gang leader Kuttner (Lee de Broux, Pumpkinhead, RoboCop) seizes the opportunity and hijacks a transport bus full of prisoners, with plans to lead them all to freedom across the Mexican border. But when authorities (including George Kennedy and Yaphet Kotto, returning from Ministry of Vengeance) close in quicker than expected, Kuttner and his lieutenant (James Tolkan, also back from Ministry of Vengeance) change tactics and storm into a small border town, quickly taking the townspeople prisoner and turning the main street into a giant hostage situation. Only the town’s sheriff (Brad Davis, Midnight Express, Querelle, in one of his final roles before his untimely death) and his Vietnam-buddy right-hand-man (Ken Foree, Dawn of the Dead, From Beyond) manage to slip away, and must become a two-man army to take down Kuttner and free the townspeople.
The set-up is like Con-Air turning into Die Hard, and in both modes it is very fun, and full of well-crated tension and suspense. The beginning, as the pieces fall into place setting up the jailbreak, is extremely effective, and shows a storytelling confidence which none of the films in this set yet have shown (even if it is still occasionally goofy or rough around the edges). And once the siege premise takes hold in the small town, the movie sets up the army-of-two scenario very effectively. As in Die Hard, we see our lone heroes managing to narrowly escape notice, so they can sneak around and start hatching a battle plan, and while a small town seems like a much more expansive setting than a single building, the remoteness of the environment still creates a palpable sense of isolation and claustrophobia.
The action is quite a bit more impressive this time around, and certainly more expensive, with several big explosions and car stunts, and some solid stuntwork and combat. Brad Davis gives a very strong performance, bringing some welcome dramatic gravitas, and Ken Foree is solid in the supporting role. As the villain, Lee de Broux is very effectively slimy and menacing; very much a proto Cyrus the Virus, as the film recalls Con Air six years before Con Air. Supporting performances are more of a mixed bag though, and some of the big names in the cast like Yaphet Kotto get surprisingly little to do.
This is the first film in this set which feels like it could have held its own in a theatrical release, and played well on the big screen. It’s a pleasant surprise of a movie, and one that I would definitely recommend. It wound up being my favorite film in this set, although in some ways the next title wound up being even more impressive…
Joshua Tree (1993):
Prolific stunt director Vic Armstrong (Total Recall, The Last Action Hero, Starship Troopers) made his directorial debut with this 1993 Dolph Lundgren vehicle – which despite being released straight-to-video, was clearly shot for theaters. It is immediately obvious that this is by far the highest-budgeted, glossiest, and most professional film in this set, boasting very expensive-looking stunts and action, and shot in 2.35:1. Pan n scan would not have been kind to this film; it very clearly was shot to be seen in its ‘scope ratio on the big screen. Hangfire might be (in my estimation at least) the best film in the set, but Joshua Tree is definitely the slickest and best-looking, and a very cool action movie in its own right.
Dolph Lundgren plays a small-time criminal working for a smuggling operation, whose buddy (Ken Foree, appearing once again) is killed in a traffic stop gone wrong, which also leaves a cop dead. Lundgren is convicted for the cop’s murder, but he’s innocent: the cop’s death was a frame job, by well-connected people in the smuggling ring who want him to take a fall. He escapes from the police van taking him to prison, and goes on the run to clear his name, and take down the smuggling ring in the process. Along the way, he ends up with a hostage: a young woman who turns out to be a cop, who becomes an ally in his fight to free his name and take down the corruption around him. The frame-job, needing-to-clear-his-name premise is very neo-noir, and the production sometimes leans into that. But the action style feels very much akin to the likes of Commando and Hard Target. The plot is a tad formulaic, drawing from other 80s and early-90s macho action films like the aforementioned Commando, and the character development is minimal, but that’s okay, because the action is what we are here for, and it really delivers.
It is very clear that this is a movie directed by a stunt director. The action is outstanding: very cool, flashy, and cinematic, with well-choreographed combat, really good gunfights that feel strongly inspired by John Woo, great car chases, massive explosions, and wanton destruction. It has several very memorable and long action setpieces, including a centerpiece warehouse massacre that feels like an homage to Hard Boiled. And he isn’t just good with stunts; director Armstrong also has a great eye for stylish cinematography. This is a very well-shot film.
All of those positive qualities go a long way towards making up for how the plot is pretty by-the-numbers and the characters just okay. Narratively it’s a tad forgettable, but that doesn’t matter when the action is great, and the movie looks fantastic. It’s a really fun watch, even if it’s nothing revolutionary. Dolph Lundgren may not be a great actor, but he is an excellent physical presence, who is great in the movie’s fight scenes, and he easily carries the film. It may be a mixed bag of a movie, but the positives definitely outweigh the negatives, and it’s one that action fans should really enjoy – and be impressed by its ambition and level of polish, here in a straight-to-video-themed box set.
THE ARROW LIMITED EDITION:
The six films in Enter the Video Store Vol. 2 once again come packaged in a beautiful box set that looks like an 80s/90s video store (seriously, these sets have my favorite artwork of any box sets), with a booklet made to look like a vintage cult film magazine. Four of them (Ministry of Vengeance, The Last Alliance, Hangfire, and Joshua Tree) boast brand-new 2k restorations from the original negative. These new restorations all look outstanding, with strong detail, rich colors and contrast, and nicely filmic transfers with healthy grain structures. Arrow has done excellent work on the remasters. R.O.T.O.R. uses an existing 1080p master, but still looks excellent. Interzone is stuck in a 1980s tape master, and looks about as acceptable as you would expect, but that’s why the relegated it to the special features section and didn’t give it its own disc.
The set is absolutely stacked with extras, with every film (except Interzone) getting substantial special features. Each film has one or two new interviews with key cast and crew members, including Ken Foree on Hangfire, director Vic Armstrong on Joshua Tree, and star John Schneider on Ministry of Vengeance. The interviews are all excellent, going with impressive depth into the productions of the films. The discs for Ministry of Vengeance, The Last Alliance, and R.O.T.O.R. also have excellent genre-appreciation interviews with film scholars, which will certainly add to one’s appreciation of these movies and what they are trying to accomplish. Four of the films also have a commentary by a group of film scholars or critics, giving their perspectives on the movies, and Joshua Tree has an archival director’s commentary. Joshua Tree is the one film featuring archival extras: in addition to that commentary, there’s a vintage making-of featurette and an alternate ending, as well as two cuts of the film itself (each of which has some exclusive scenes, though the film is more or less equally good in either version. I probably slightly prefer the extended cut, though).
Fans of these films, and straight-to-video action in general, should love these extras: they are extensive, and extremely good. Arrow’s limited edition package is outstanding, with both the disc and physical extras rising to the occasion of a premium box set like this. While Enter the Video Store Vol. 2 isn’t necessarily what fans were expecting, with a looser genre-appreciation focus rather than a celebration of a specific straight-to-video studio, Arrow makes a strong argument for why it was a good idea. The films chosen make a pretty cohesive collection, and the extras do a very good job of contextualizing them within the straight-to-video era. While its appeal may be slightly more limited, as the range of films is not as eclectic as the original Enter the Video Store, action movie afficionados will have a blast with this set, and it is well worth picking up.
- Christopher S. Jordan
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