Subject: REVIEW: BARB WIRE (1996)

From: [email-masked] (Michael J. Legeros)
Date: 8 May 1996 20:33:47 GMT

BARB WIRE
                       A film review by Michael John Legeros
                        Copyright 1996 Michael John Legeros

We'll Always Have BARB WIRE

(Gramercy)
Directed by     David Hogan
Written by      Chuck Pfarrer and Ilene Chaiken         
Cast            Pamela Anderson Lee, Temuera Morrison, Victoria Rowell ,
                Steve Railsback, Jack Noseworthy, Xander Berkeley, Udo
                Kier
MPAA Rating     "R" (presumably language, violence, and brief nudity)
Running Time    95 minutes
Reviewed at     Six Forks Station Cinemas, Raleigh, NC (6MAY96)

==

     It's not every day that we get to see a reworking of CASABLANCA,
much less one that (a.) is adapted from a comic book and (b.) stars
Pamela Anderson Lee.  Ms. Lee, a.k.a. "the Baywatch babe," a.k.a.
"you're looking rather buoyant this evening," plays the title character,
a bounty-hunting bar owner who lives in a (near) future where civil war
is being waged between the Nazi-looking Congressionals and the
underground Resistance.  They all come to Barb's place, though, because
she doesn't take sides.  That is, until a former lover-- and Resistance
alley-- steps out of the past and into her bar.  Sound familiar?

     There's more, of course, including a fat man who rides in a bucket
loader, a pair of contact lenses that fool retina scans, and, oh yeah, a
rocket-firing motorcycle.  (Trust me: it sounds more exciting than it
is.) BARB WIRE has a great "look," but director David Hogan doesn't
deliver a decent action sequence until the end.  And don't expect any
Bogarts or Bergmans, either; most of the cast appears to have been hired
for "assets" other than their acting abilities.  (Calm down guys, this
stuff doesn't even qualify as *soft*-core porn.  Just cleavage cleavage
cleavage and only the *occasional* peek behind curtains number one and
two.) No, there isn't much to this movie beyond the, uh, obvious, but if
you love CASABLANCA, and you can stomach Pamela Lee's hissed-through-
clinched-teeth line readings, then this may be the matinee for you.

     Grade: D+

--

Mike Legeros - Raleigh, NC 
[email-masked] (h) - [email-masked] (w)
Visit me in MOVIE HELL <URL http://www.n-vision.com/hell/>