Some sort of environmental disaster has occured, the end of man is imminent, and small patches of survivors are required to live in plastic bubbles, replete with bean bag chairs! Add copious amounts of simulated sex(?!).
Only from Something Weird's vaults comes a movie like Cries of Ecstasy, Blows of Death, a rather gloomy dystopian, post-apocalyptic flick, punctuated by long bouts of naked bodies.
I've got a 71-minute Blu-ray version with no ending, though I've read the final reel was damaged beyond repair. As it stands, I feel like this movie is ultimately an exercise in futility. I'll admit a couple things (out of countless things they tried) worked for me. There is a palpable sense of doom in this... uh, hampered by the fact that, past maybe the 15-minute mark, no one but the roving nomads on cheap dirt bikes wear their "required" masks outside. So much for the environmental threat. Now's a good time to point out that there's a certain percentage of inaudible dialogue. I'm guessing they gave up on the masks when they realized you couldn't hear dialogue through them.
I also dug the character of Keisha (Dianne Bishop), the sketchy, desperate deaf/mute traveler, who can't be touched... unless you want to be at the receiving end of some hilarious kung-fu moves! Sporting a number of braided pigtails and some sort of ridiculous swimsuit, it was a joy to watch her kick ass. Naturally a pack of roving marauders gun her down. Well, this movie had my interest for a couple minutes.
The dialogue sucks, there's not much of a sense of character or community, and well, there's no story. S#!t happens. The guard's uniforms are these hideous yellow and orange (apropos of 1973, anyhow) drapes/mumus, that looked knit to me! (I could be mistaken, the film's print is pretty rough). Also, they sample and loop a segment of Ringo's drum solo from "The End." TWICE!
There IS a sense of doom and desperation, which I'd consider this movie's strong suit, but it's offset by a real excess of softcore skin. Good enough for four stars, I guess.
