Hands of Steel (1986)

Fists of Steel / Atomic Cyborg is one of the 1980s lost actions gems. Made to cash in on the success of The Terminator and numerous other successful 80s action and sci-fi movies, FoS actually turns out to be a rad little piece of exploration cinema. Good fun

Look, it's not high art, it's a silly B movie about a cyborg punching the bad guys. The effects are pretty bad, the acting is worse, and the so-called future is pretty much just the 80's with a couple of shiny tubes sticking out of things. But it has a goofy charm and any time a dude tears another dude's heart out with his bare hands you've got a good time. And don't forget John Saxon!

Sergio Martino's superficial cyborg saga "Hands of Steel" came out a year before "RoboCop" and six years before "Universal Soldier." Interestingly enough, this makes Martino's film somewhat seminal if you put it into a chronological cyborg time-line. These three epics featured cyborgs who suffer a crisis of conscience and rebel against their programming. Of course, all bionic adventures can be traced back to the television series "The Six-Million Dollar Man," but the Lee Majors hero never worried about following orders like the protagonists in "Hands of Steel," "RoboCop," and "Universal Soldier." Prior to these pictures, the biggest Hollywood cyborgs appeared in the "Star Wars" film franchise with Dark Vader as the ultimate cyborgs. Meanwhile, this slightly futuristic Italian melodrama takes place against an aura of political corruption and environmental intrigue. Pollution ranks as our foremost fear in America. An environmental advocate drapes the country with banners that proclaim: You Have No Future." Acid rain drenches parts of America. The villains deploy a primitive prototype of a laser weapon, and they possess a gadget that can penetrate walls and determine the number of individuals in a dwelling. Everything else remains strictly contemporary. "Torso" helmer Martino penned the predictable but action-packed screenplay with number of notable scribes, including Elisa Briganti of "Zombie," John Crowther of "The Evil Men Do," Ernesto Gastaldi of "The Grand Duel," Dardano Sacchetti of "1990: The Bronx Warriors," rookie writer Saul Sasha, with Lewis E. Ciannelli of "Arizona Colt" contributing supplemental dialogue. Most of these scenarists shared screenplay credit on several of Martino's films. Despite six writers, "Hands of Steel" qualifies as a fair to middling, a science fiction hybrid hampered by abysmal acting. Comparably, the film is like its protagonist. At one point, the hero states that he is seventy percent robotic and thirty percent human. "Hands of Steel" is thirty percent sci-fi, while seventy percent contemporary manhunt.The evil chairman of a major foundation, Francis Turner (John Saxon of "Enter The Dragon"), wants to permanently silence an ecology guru, the Reverend Arthur Mosely (Franco Fantasia of "Adios Sabata"), because he is interfering with his so they send a cyborg, Paco Queruak (Daniel Greene of "Kingpin"), to assassinate the popular leader. As it turns out, the same hotel where Mosely is operating out of with his minions is the same place that our hero is staying. Paco slips past FBI security, disposes of Mosely's second-in-command by knocking him out with a powerful blow, and then confronts Mosely. Paco experiences a crisis of conscience when he confronts Mosely. Instead of killing him as programmed, Paco violates his programming and ruptures Mosely's spleen. When Turner's gunsels embark on their search for Paco, they consult a scientist, Professor Olster (Donald O'Brien of "Grand Prix") who no longer works for Turner. Before his encounter with Mosely, Paco had been a classified as the best of the best, maximum in both efficiency and reliability. Olster attributes Paco's refusal to kill to memories from his youth clashing with his operating system. He thinks Paco is trying to recapture his past and rebuild his identity. Doesn't this sounds a lot like "RoboCop" with Peter Weller and "Universal Soldier" with Jean-Claude Van Damme, except "Hands of Steel" beat both pictures to the screen? Anyway, the henchmen kill Olster after he provides them with his theories and head to Arizona. Paco heads to his native state of Arizona and masquerades as a handyman for Linda (Janet Agren) who owns a bar and motel for hookers.While hiding out from Turner's hired guns, Paco finds himself caught up with redneck truck drivers in an arm wrestling championship that anticipated the 1987 sports opus "Over the Top" with Sylvester Stallone. A group of rednecks led by Raoul Morales (George Eastman) make life difficult for Paco. At one point, they drag him across the desert behind a tow-truck and then Raoul and his cronies beat him savagely so he cannot participate in the tournament. The sight of Paco dangling helplessly by his ankles while his assailants smash lead pipes against his physique is cartoonishly violent. Later, an arm wrestling championship appears reminiscent of an earlier Saxon movie "The Appaloosa" where scorpions were tied to the table where the match was held and the loser had his hand smashed down on the poisonous creature. Martino and his scribes have changed it up a little. Martino substitutes rattlesnakes for scorpions. This manhunt melodrama doesn't reveal Paco's true identity until almost an hour into the action. This low-budget, inferior thriller has a few good scenes and some bullet-blasting action but it is as moronic as they come. Fortunately, Martino doesn't let this nonsense drag on past 94 minutes. The acting is abysmal. Daniel Greene's performance is thoroughly impassive, but the bionic modification that his character submitted to could account for his wooden delivery. Naturally, John Saxon acquits himself well considering the low-budget and his inept co-stars. According to IMDb.COM, Saxon went to Rome to complete all his scenes since "Hands of Steel" was a non-union shoot. Had he flaunt the Screen Actors' Guild and done his scenes in Arizona, the actor believes that he would have died in the same helicopter crash that claimed co-star Claudio Cassinelli's life. Spaghetti western stalwart George Eastman is a thorough-going dastard! Look out for the scene when Paco tangles with a female cyborg. Claudio Simonetti's orchestral score enlivens the action.Some have accused Martino's Euro-Trash classic of ripping off James Cameron's "The Terminator," released two years before. Actually, Arnold Schwarzenegger played an android rather than a cyborgs in "The Terminator." The biggest surprise in "Hands of Steel" occurs at about 52 minutes when Dr. Peckinpah defines what constitutes a cyborg. "A cyborg is a human body with most of its internal organs, functions, ands structures replaced by mechanical and electrical substitutes. It's human in form and behavior, but it has incredible physical power and endurance." "Hands of Steel" is definitely no masterpiece, but it has a significant place in the chronological cyborg time-line.

A cyborg is sent to kill a scientist. If that sounds like "The Terminator", don't be surprised. This film was even marketed in some countries (notably Malaysia) as "Return of the Terminator", so the people behind this one knew full well what they were doing.Sergio Martino is the mastermind director here. Some have called this film better than "Fall of New York" while others have called it worse. I never saw "Fall of New York" but I truly hope it can't be worse than this one. Sure, e have John Saxon and George Eastman... but we don't really have the ability to see them.That's right; the picture quality (not to even mention the audio) is so bad, so fuzzy, that it's dang near impossible to tell what's going on much of the time. My cell phone takes video more clear than this. I've commented in the past about Italian budgets being low, but this one takes the taco.I see no reason to watch this film. I received it as part of a "tales of terror" movie collection (even though it has little or no horror elements), and would not have stumbled upon it otherwise. I suggest you also avoid it, though if they found some magical way to clean up the picture, my opinion might change.