Battle Truck - review

Civilization has begun its march to extinction.  It’s a steady pace, the cadence of violence and fear rings loud and clear for all. Panic is everywhere.  Cities crumble as survivors spread out to the wasteland in search of food and shelter; society decays.  On the streets it is a white line nightmare of Darwinian survival.  The highways are painted red with the blood of the innocent.  The high and tights, the ex-militia, the crazy and lonely and sadistic men that used violence to protect us and let us sleep at night have emerged from the maelstrom to take control.  The gas wars lead to the oil wars which lead to the water wars which end in a nuclear nightmare.  Resources are spread to the breaking point.  Tribalism rules the land.  Roaming bandits feast upon the weak.  It’s a new world, with new rules, learn them….

And amidst the rubble and decay of this post-apocalyptic nightmare, never stopping, never ceasing; BATTLE TRUCK!  A roaming death machine, twisted metal crushing bodies in its wake, unstoppable, unbreakable, and helmed by the sadistic ex-colonel Straker.  Straker sees the new world as it is; an opportunity for the strong to suppress the weak, to survive and flourish as warlords.  Politics of the old world are too soft and for the meek, “too much lipstick, not enough napalm”.  He roams the world doing what “the Generals” were too cowardly to do; instill order through fear and violence.  He has gathered a band of brutal mercenaries to impose his will on whomever he crosses, gobbling them up in his war machine to use as another resource in his unending search for conquest. 

Straker is polite, courteous, and willing to murder anyone with a cold reptilian detachment; anything for more oil.  His daughter however is a peace loving daisy hugging dreamer (bleargh!) who can’t reconcile her petty moral code with the harsh reality of the nuclear wasteland.  She runs away from Straker’s camp and is rescued by a loner with a cool motorcycle and night vision goggles; Hunter.  Hunter brings her to his thriving chicken shit farm.  After telling her he really hates people but helps them anyways he leads her to another community of hippies who are attacked by Battle Truck while picking apples.  They put up a pathetic fight, and a distressed Straker’s daughter runs back to Hunter as the raiders gather up the town women.  Let me tell you, when she is recounting the tale of the fallen town to Hunter it really seems like the actress is suffering from severe PTSD or something.  Snot is flying from her nose, she’s crying so hard she can barely speak her line; holy shitballs give this lady a Grammy or whatever; best supporting actress in a B-rated post-apocalyptic movie about a giant truck.  Later Hunter bangs her, and she gets all prophetic about humanity like she’s stoned or something; damn hippy.  The mailman from Cheers is in this too although his mustache is gone (must have been melted by nuclear fallout). 

There’s a shootout at night.  They must have used the same lighting guy from Humongous because I can’t see shit.  Straker ends up kidnapping his daughter back and Hunter works with the dude from Cheers to build a new battle wagon, which sucks ass.  It really kind of looks like a junky piece of shit but Hunter makes it work.  I’m assuming the film crew tried building something formable at first like the V-8 Interceptor from Mad Max but ran out of money or patience or both and just said “fuck it, let’s mount a machine gun to a beat up Volkswagen bug and call it a day”.   In the end the Battle Truck careens off into a gully and explodes although I’m not convinced Straker really died.  Seemed like they hysterically set up room for a sequel: Battle Truck 2: The Revenge of Straker.  Fuck I’d be there opening day.  Something about post-apocalyptic nonsense makes me feel free and long for the end of civilization.