The appeal of Manborg is that it’s multi-colored stupidity thrown against the screen with a frantically low budget, brain-damaged characters, and a bit of the old ultra-violence. It’s all so damned dumb, that it has to be given credit for achieving the kind of terrible that belongs at midnight on Adult Swim.
A soldier (Matthew Kennedy) cheeses his way through death on the battlefield but is brought back with a few robot parts installed. He then joins a group of futuristic gladiators battling against demons led by The Baron (Jeremy Gillespie).
Of course the movie doesn’t adhere too strictly to its own plot. It gets the job done, but it takes more than enough tangential paths to make it an almost-meaningless device. Never let it be said that Manborg lets a little thing like plot get in the way of making a joke about an evil ruler worrying about a hot female nemesis not sharing his romantic feelings.
This flick has clearly used a low amount of money to make it look like it was made for an even lower amount of money, but the result is a big, stupid ride through schlock that mostly works. Of course, it gets hobbled by the middle school level randomness for randomness’ sake, but it’s not overall A.D.D.-addled.
The visuals are kinetic and hyper-real. They are also put together with bits of duct tape and a 386 processor.
But, smartly, the movie doesn’t outstay its welcome. Writer/director Steve Kostanski seems to realize that his movie has the potential to be unbearable so it runs at a brisk 60 minutes. One more, and it might have caused projectile vomiting, but in the right mood, the cheap comedy works here as a sort of slapstick science fiction piece of intentional trash.
The Upside: Intentional, crappy work that’s occasionally funny with the right amount of ridiculous action
The Downside: It’s crappy. On purpose, yes, but it’s still crappy.
On the Side: This movie is from the fine folks at Astron-6 who delivered such fan favorites as GoreBlade, Lazer Ghosts 2, and Xtreme Ghost Killers.
Related Topics: Comedy
