Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Demolition Man

I got a free copy of Demolition Man from flixster awhile back, and I just not got around to watching it.

Now I know why it was free. It's awful. If you like the 90's Sylvester Stallone Judge Dredd movie, you may enjoy Demolition Man. The premise is thus, a crazy cop catches a crazy killer in psuedo 1996 and they are both sentenced to a cryo-freeze. The crazy killer is awoken in 2032 and only one man can stop him, the same cop who caught him years before. Sylvester Stallone plays John Spartan, our crazy cop, while Wesley Snipes plays killer Simon Pheonix. Its here in this film that you can see the beginnings of Stallone's Expendables character Barney Ross. Same gruff demeanor, same black wardrobe, same black beret.

Pheonix and Spartan (what comic book-y names right?) awake in idyllic future in 2032. Everything bad for you has been outlawed. Salt, spices, tobacco, alchohol, cursing, and even sex are longer allowed. Crime is virtually non-existent, so much so that the cops here don't carry guns but stun batons, and also don't know the 3-digit codes that cops use. So when crazed maniac Pheonix wakes up, they don't know how to handle him, because they don't do real police work past fining people for cursing. That leads them to wake up John Spartan for him to catch Simon Pheonix.

The action stuff is pretty 90's action fare. Nothing extraordinary, by today's standards pretty pedestrian. What is more interesting is this 1993 version of the future in 2032. Cars drive themselves, toilet paper no longer exists, every restaurant is Taco Bell (emerging victorious in the franchise wars), kimono inspired casual wear, as well as voice activated everything. Also, there is no more kissing or physical contact. Sex happens through two virtual reality headsets, not through physical means. It's a very detachd future and our big gruff Sylvester Stallone stands out against it. Beneath this idyllic society is a Mad-Max like underground who cook burgers with rat meat but also have salt and beer, things the word above does not. I thought the most interesting things about this world had to do with the future and would have liked so see a different film where instead of an action hero, he comes out and deals more with the politics and problems of this future world. Throw Wesley Snipes' over the top character out the window and move on.

Like I stated above, if you like Stallone's Judge Dredd, check this out. If you don't, don't bother with this film unless you want to visit this wacky future.

2 out of 5 Stars


1 comment:

  1. I give this review a 1 out of 5! The movie, on the other hand, was great. Remember all Stallone could do was knit, as that's what he learned during his deep sleep? And Sandra Bullock was so great.

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