The Guide to the Gauntlet: The Bronx Executioner
Title: The Bronx Executioner
Cyborg Executioners (Philippines)
Genre: Science Fiction Action Drama
Tag Line: Born to be wild. (I swear to God, that’s what the tagline is)
Filming Location(s): New York City
Year Of Release: 1989
Cast: Alex Vitale, Woodie Strode, Gabriel Gori, Margie Newton
Director: Vanio Amici/Romolo Guerrieri (Trust me, this will all make sense soon)
Writer: Vanio Amici & Piero Regnoli / Roberto Leoni
Running Time: 92 mins.
Plot: Futuristic New York! A rookie sheriff begins his new duty as the keeper of a colony of rejected humanoids. Unfortunately for him, the humanoids are under constant attack from the savage and evil androids. Soon the officer finds himself teaming up with the humanoids to stop the terrible reign of Margie and her android gang and (apparently) bring peace to New York.
Breaking Point: It will become abundantly clear in the last act that the filmmakers shot about 4 kills and somehow looped it to make it 20 minutes long. Take special notice when Shark and Dakar kill the same guys 4 times each.
Pain Equivelancy : Getting hit with a hammer repeatedly in the same exact spot: your crotch.
Similar Films: Robocop, Escape From New York, Mad Max, Warriors Of The Wasteland.
In this reviewer’s eyes, The Bronx Executioner could be the greatest Gauntlet film of all time. There actually may not be words in the English language to describe its “greatness” so I must rely on the Italian vocabulary to describe this film: SANTO. FOTTERE. MERDA. That roughly translates to: “Holy. Fucking. Shit.”
Like monsters and sexually transmitted diseases, to fully understand this film we must know where it came from. Back in 1984, Romo Guerrieri made an Italian knockoff of Mad Max called The Last Executioner (L’ ultimo Guerrieri) starring former Olympic athlete Woodie Strode. Like any good low-budget science fiction action film in the 1980s, the footage was bought and chopped together with new footage to create an entirely new experience. Today, this experience exists as The Bronx Executioner.
The bracelet is for looks. The pitchfork is for killing.
The film opens with a rookie sheriff named James Crowley being chased through the woods of New York by a floating gun. Yes, a floating gun. First-person-shooter style. If you want to stop reading this review now, it’s okay, I’ll understand. There’s only so much awesome you can take. Anyways, James is rescued (I guess) by his new boss, Warren (credited racial-appropriately The Black Man). James has just finished what appears to be a training situation for his new job: protector of defective humanoids.
At some point in history, humanity not only created realistic robots, but also fucked up enough batches of them that it had no choice but to banish them to the outskirts of New York City. Humanity also dressed all of them like they were in C & C Music Factory. And don’t go trying to tell them apart because according to the logic of this masterpiece, they’re the only ones that can tell each other apart. We’re supposed to feel pity for the humanoids because they are constantly attacked by the evil androids and their leader Margie (“She’s got power!” – The Black Man (“And my aunt’s name” – Editor)).
“I only love death. Other people’s death, naturally.” – The Evil Margie
The viewer then meets said humanoids and androids. Margie sends her faithful lackey Shark (think Kyle MacLachlan from Twin Peaks but with the gayest leather jacket ever) to ambush the humanoids. Meanwhile Dakar and his men raid an android hideout looking for supplies. Dakar never explicitly says what they’re looking for because he’s too busy yelling “Get the stuff! The stuff we need!” and knocking shit over with a shotgun. They are attacked by a small group of androids and are distracted as basically 90% of their colony is wiped out by Margie and her crew. In a breathtaking 6 minute long massacre, we see some of the worst deaths ever acted out. One thing I learned from this film is that apparently when robots die, they must do acrobatic flips. Keep a look out for Shark’s awesome battle moves and his proficient single-shot machine gun. Dakar and his men race to save them but it’s too late. This sequence is a good gauge for the type of action you can come to expect from the rest of this film.
The next portion of The Bronx Executioner relies on the awkward chemistry between James and The Black Man. The Black Man brings James to a dump site where the government drops off food for the humanoids and androids. You read correctly: food. After you’ve finished wrapping your head around the fact that the androids eat, allow me to tell you what it is that they eat. Worms. They eat motherfucking worms! We see two small groups of humanoid and androids battling over the food. The humanoids prevail only until The Black Man approaches them and beats the shit out of them for no reason. Now to the training montage!
You didn’t think you’d get out of this film without a montage did you? Shame on you! The Black Man puts James through a rigorous test including the following. Crawling under barbed wire. Doing sit-ups while being held down by The Black Man’s crotch. Dodging sandbags. Being attacked by a flamethrower (for the sake of brevity, I’m gonna move on while you ponder that). After failing a target practice that consists of shooting projected pictures of guys on a brick wall, The Black Man deems James unworthy. He then immediately gives him the job in the next scene. And then vanishes for the rest of the film. Yes, The Black Man is gone. Maybe you’ll miss him.
Margie then murders her because she later goes on to explain that violence is the greatest aphrodisiac. Dakar is heartbroken as he reports back to Ned of his findings although he wasn’t heartbroken enough to actually bring her body with him instead choosing to leave it in the middle of nowhere. Dakar knows that the only way to end this madness is to team up with James. He finds James at the sheriff’s office which looks like a fake locker room set for a porno (make special note of the poster of New York City behind the desk. I hope to God, for the sake of cinema, that it’s really supposed to be a decoration and not a window). After some awkward joking, the two formulate a plan.
Buckle up too because we’re now treated to genius editing that includes the blatant re-using of the same sequences repeatedly. I’m not talking about re-using shots. I’m talking whole entire parts of the film. I shit you not. The same person dies three fucking times. We get James and Dakar as stealthy killers doing awesome sneak attacks on unsuspecting androids (and then blowing stealth to the wind and shooting the control panel with a shotgun). We get androids getting their necks broken. We get…some guy with a mustache and sunglasses looking at circuit boards that are screwed to the wall. For anyone who was uncomfortable with the bit of nudity shown in the rape scene, fear not, cause the android Margie’s getting naked. I know, the nonstop action is enough in its own right but robo-titties? Somewhere, Vanio Amici is polishing some type of award. Or he’s dead.
You sunk my battleship!
After Margie has an awkward titty-grabbing session with one of her lackeys (which seems to span 8 minutes plot-wise), she is alerted about the humanoid intruders. What does she do? Unleash the radio-controlled dogs on them, that’s what she does. You need to pay close attention to this scene for a few reasons. For starters, both the hairstyles on Margie and Dakar have changed. Margie’s change is minimal but Dakar’s pretty much looks like they hollowed out a coconut husk and glued it to Alex Vitale’s head. Also look at the faces of the attack dogs. You’ll thank me.
After Dakar kills the dogs with his bare hands (or put’s them in sleeper holds… who the fuck cares at this point?), a huge battle ensues. This battle has everything. Exploding doors. Dakar taking androids out with a shotgun. An athletic Shark doing gymnastics while he kills humanoids. Some guy who looks like Kevin McDonald from Kids In The Hall calmly explaining that “there’s a battle outside. Lots of people are dying.” There’s even an android on a dirt bike that completely explodes into a fireball after being shot once.
In the future, humanoids and androids fight over worms to eat. Maybe they should sell the bikes.
The Bronx Executioner is one of those exceptional films that, while making no sense, will leave you laughing until you cry. Or you maybe just crying. I urge you to find out your own copy to add to your own Gauntlet collections. You won’t be sorry, friends. This is Dave Losso signing off and looking forward to a future where humanoids and androids who look like extras in a Right Said Fred video battle each other over worms and robo-titties.
FOR THOSE KEEPING SCORE AT HOME:
– TITTIES: Yes (extra points for Robo-Titties!)
– TERRIBLE OVERDUBBING: Yes
– TERRIBLE OVERDUBBING OVER ALREADY-RECORDED ENGLISH: Yes
– AWKWARD RAPE SCENE: Yes
– JUNGLE?: No
– SET IN THE FUTURE: Yes
– UNNECESSARILY LONG CLOSE-UPS: Yes
