Less Human Than Human,
More Cyberpunk Than Keanu
So I flick on HBO one Thursday night, back when they were still featurin' their "Thursday Night Prime" action/trash/straight-to-video lineup, and...what's this? Some skinny dude in a long coat dashing across a blasted landscape while chicks in miniskirts try to shoot his heels off with machine guns? Must be another one of Andy Sidardis' "two-fisted centerfolds" features, right? Naw, Andy's epics, even at their most action-packed, simply didn't move quite this fast. Needless to say, I kept watching -- and promptly tumbled into the budget-cyberpunk world of NEMESIS (1993). (And taped the sucker from frame one the next time Home Box aired it!)
The next time I watched it all the way through, I spotted Albert Pyun's name as the director. Now, Pyun's got a catalog of B-to-Z-grade flix trailing in his wake, including ALIEN FROM LA (a longtime "Mystery Science Theater 3000" fave due to star Kathy Ireland's helium squeak and haven't-got-a-clue acting) and the Dice Clay/Teri Hatcher turkey BRAINSMASHER: A LOVE STORY. So I definitely wasn't prepared for how...um...entertaining NEMESIS turned out to be. Mind you, it ain't art by a long streak, but it's got enough action, stunts, and humor to satisfy.
What makes NEMESIS so satisfying to da Flatline is its unabashed copping of most of the tech from William Gibson's cyberpunk SF, particularly NEUROMANCER. Screenwriter Rebecca Charles loads the dialog with so many references to systems cowboys, RAM couriers, and corporate defections I'm surprised Gibson didn't sue for copyright infringement. In particular, there's a character named Marion Face (Thom Matthews), after Ralfi Face in the original "Johnny Mnemonic" short, and a cyborg cop who spends the second half of the movie as a ROM construct -- shades of the "real" Dixie Flatline!
The plot? In the immortal words of Joe Bob Briggs, way too much plot, but it doesn't get in the way of the action. In 2027, the LAPD consists mostly of partial or full cyborgs. (You can tell which are the 'borg cops: the men wear snappy suits and wraparound shades with mic/earphone attachments, the ladies wear business-suit minis and high heels.) They're chasing down an anti-technology terrorist organization called the Red Army Hammerheads (Pyun drives this home with repeated closeups of the hammerhead tattoos on members' hands). It's the RAH babes who are trying to ventilate our hero, undercover cop/semi-cyborg Alex Rain, in the opening scene. He's played by one Olivier Gruner, reportedly a French kickboxing champ (I'd like to see some documentation); while Gruner can shoot two-handed and run like the dickens, he gives some of the worst line readings since Stephen Lack in SCANNERS.
Anywho, after rubbing out said terrorists, quitting the force, and failing badly as a data hustler, Alex is forcibly brought back "online" by police commissioner Farnsworth (comic-turned-B-regular Tim Thomerson) and his cronies Germaine (Nicholas Guest) and Maritz (film heavy Brion James, here sporting an outrageously bogus German accent). Seems that Alex's ex-boss/lover Jared (Marjorie Monaghan) -- one of the aforementioned LAPD cyborgettes -- has swiped the security plans for a US/Japan summit and plans to turn them over to the RAH in Shang Loo, Java (Hawaii stands in for most of the exotic scenery). To give Alex a bit more motivation, Farnsworth had a bomb implanted near Alex's heart, and the clock is ticking...
What follows is a non-stop series of shoot-outs, bare breasts, explosions, and stunts. Actors don't just jump off buildings, they leap off, with enough midair twists to qualify for an Olympic swim meet. Kudos to whoever schooled the actresses in their gunwork; these ladies (especially Jennifer Gatti and the Stephanie Seymour-lookalike as the RAH shooters, and Deborah Shelton, supplier of the aforementioned garbonzas) handle some heavy artillery like they've been doing it all their lives. SFX supervisor Gene Warren Jr. eschews CGI and virtual-reality lightshows in favor of robot splatter and a dollop of TERMINATOR-style stop-motion animation. There's even some wacky humor, like the scene where Alex, hiding from his pursuers in a Shang Loo alley, spots a cyborg cop hassling a little old lady. When he turns to leave, she pulls a frigging Glock out of her handbag and drills him some new SCSI ports, then walks off muttering "it's not safe to walk the streets anymore." Chuckles Alex, "Shang Loo takes no sh*t. I love this town!"
According to the Internet Movie Database, Pyun's done at least two NEMESIS sequels to date, but they'd be hard-pressed to top the crash-zoom thrill of the original.
Okay, it ain't THAT original, but I was not bored.
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