Phoenix the Warrior (1988)

Look at that Boris Vallejo poster! Between that and Persis Khambatta (Megaforce), this seemed like one of those movies I had to see. Even better, it's alternate title, Phoenix the Warrior, is awesome!Starring Kathleen Kinmont as Phoenix (she's also Kelly Meeker in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers) and Khambatta as the evil Cobalt, this film is all about a pregnant woman who gives birth to one of the few men on earth. There's also a Reverend Mother who is in control of all the sperm and has a religious hold over all of the women.Oh yeah - there are also the Rezules, who worship television. How awesome would it be that if instead of zombies, they were dressed up like characters from famous TV shows? Archie Bunker ruling the Badlands of the end times? This movie could have made that happen.When I was a kid, I wrote a comic book called Cola War (get it, Cold War?) where there was no water so everyone only consumed soda and religiously followed the soda that they drank. It was a great idea until someone explained to me that to create soda, you needed water. None of that logical thinking was applied to this movie.That's one of the downsides to watching so many movies. You get yourself excited and then, the chase is, as Lemmy taught us all, often so much better than the catch.For a film packed with naked women and lesbian religious gangs, you kind of wish that it was a lot more entertaining. Well, you can't get everything, I guess.

In yet another post-apocalyptic future, men have been eradicated. The surviving women left alive on the planet battle for supremacy. The head baddie in this manless future is Reverend Mother (Howard), sort of a cross between The Emperor from the Star Wars movies and Plughead from the Circuitry Man movies. She has a way of impregnating people, but she doesn't want any male children born. She's kind of like the opposite of China. When Keela (Sands) becomes pregnant, she goes on the run. A baddie-ess named Cobalt (Khambatta) faithfully executes the orders of the Reverend Mother. Thankfully, Keela meets up with a warrior chick (also called a "Sandtrapper") named Phoenix (Kinmont) so they can both battle all the goons that are after them. Along the way, they find the last man alive, not surprisingly named Guy (Emery), and they face many trials and tribulations as they fight to stay alive. What will happen? It's not Warriors of the Wasteland, it's She-Wolves of the Wasteland, so, you know, let's keep that in mind. (Though, to be fair, this did come out on VHS as Phoenix The Warrior). For an American post-apocalyptic slog, this is modestly entertaining, and the pace isn't that bad. It's not terribly different from others of its kind, but the main twist in the formula, if you want to call it that, is the 98% female cast on display. If nothing else, you can always gawk at the eye candy. There's certainly no shame in that - heck, what else would you be gawking at if not for that? Many of the post-apocalyptic mainstays are here: riding around a desert setting in dune buggies, characters with torn/bizarre outfits, wacky makeup/hair, narration in the opening that sets up why there was an apocalypse, but never comes back to explain anything else, and of course, some shooting and blow-ups. By definition this time around, all the fights are cat-fights, though that description may be demeaning to Kinmont as the noble heroine. She doesn't need a man around, much less Lorenzo Lamas. Persis Khambatta as the baddie is tough too, however - she even has an Andrew Scott-style necklace of ears. Women love necklaces and earrings so this really saves time. Khambatta is also listed as an associate producer, and she does seem intensely into her role as Cobalt. We applaud her professionalism in the face of low-budget silliness.There are some organized prison fights to the death (THIS close to Punchfighting but not quite, mainly because swords and other weapons are used instead of fists, and we don't see anybody clutching the cash in their hands), and of course where would we be in life if there wasn't a Final Warehouse Fight? Interestingly enough, in the future, bizarrely deformed mutants will use TV Guides as religious articles and remembrances of TV shows are the new religion. Ideas like that help propel the movie along. And it is comforting to know that in the future, after the apocalypse, hair crimpers will still be widely available.God bless you, AIP, you've managed to wring some last droplets out of the post-apocalyptic genre. We knew we could count on you.

After a biological war has annihilated all the males on earth and most of the females, those few women who survive are left to fend for themselves in an effort to stay alive. Many of them soon gravitate to a particular evil sorceress known as "the Reverend Mother" (Sheila Howard) who mysteriously manages to impregnate some of the women but ensures that no males are born. Until, that is, one specific woman named "Keela" (Peggy Sands) becomes pregnant with a "male seed". Realizing that the Reverend Mother is determined to kill her unborn child, Keela attempts to escape from her domination. During the attempt she encounters a "sand trapper" named "Phoenix" (Kathleen Kinmont) who provides protection and support both before and after the child is born. Now, obviously with a title like "She Wolves of the Wasteland" a person probably shouldn't expect too much. And they would be fully justified in feeling wary as this film consists of bad acting, cheap sets and corny dialogue. It does, however, have an abundance of bimbos in skimpy attire which may be a good thing or a bad thing depending on your particular mindset. I personally didn't mind the acting of Kathleen Kinmont or Persis Khambatta (as "Cobalt") or the skimpy attire on any of the young ladies. However, skimpy attire or not I could only take so much of the bad acting and awful combat scenes. But that's just me. In short, this movie might be good with a friend or two and lots of beer. Otherwise, it might be best to let this one go by. Below average.

The movie is basically about a society of women in a post apocalyptic setting who hunt down the last remaining men and kill them in order to promote the goals of their leader who appears to be a very old borg/emperor palpatine love child. They do so in order to bring about her ultimate "goals" which are never really revealed. The only explanation the movie offers is that she is wanting to create her own race of humans, but how she plans on doing so without men is kind of left up in the air. To put it simply this was a total blue ball movie. A complete build up with absolutely no release. There are only two nude scenes back to back (one involving child birth which totally takes away from the awesomeness of the nude female figure) and before you know it everybody is fully clothed, acting badly, and running around hopelessly looking for the end. And that's just the people watching watching it. Oh bazing! Many times during this movie I found myself screaming for the female warriors of the waste to get naked and start doing each other, but unfortunately that never happens. If you want a good mad max sexploitation movie, then keep looking. This one is NOT it.