The Gladiator

A deranged (and easily identifiable) 70's muscle car goes on a killing spree, so the brother of a victim (Ken Wahl) decides to build his own Death Truck (with sheets of steel, grill protector, and a spear-gun) to bring vigilante justice to the streets at night. Will he catch the killer?

The poster and the plot summary sound like "can't lose" kind of idea. Anyone familiar with the end of THE EXTERMINATOR 2 or the real-life rampage by Marvin Heemeyer will see some comfortable familiarity in the scenario of a guy souping up his truck to exact righteous vengeance upon the wicked. Unfortunately this film squanders the premise largely out of adherence to the TV standards of the time.

For one, it's extremely cheap and lacking in any of the cold, calculating style of Ferrara's other 80's films. Additionally the script presents plenty of problems that make the premise seem much more ridiculous than it had to be. The movie takes great pains to make Ken Wahl's descent into vigilantism gradual and emotionally realistic, yet stretches credulity many times as he would not be able to get away with it so long and not be able to hide it from his friends and lover (Nancy Allen) who know him, know about his dead brother, and know about his fancy truck. Yes "The Gladiator" as he calls himself becomes something of a celebrity with the cops not-so-hot on his trail, but he puts effort into to trying to get people to pull over and adhere to a citizen's arrest rather than hurting or killing anyone. This leaves dozens of witnesses who could easily see his license plate, but it doesn't come to anything.

Personally I think the film would have been a lot better had they decided to make it more realistic, give us some tension with the authorities closing their net around him, or else to just gone all-out with the violence and mayhem. We could have seen Wahl start as a noble do-gooder turn into a monster just as bad as the one who created him. The film hints at this but never delivers. As it is, THE GLADIATOR unfortunately stands as an extremely unsatisfying yet fascinating window into the forgotten realm of 80's TV movies aimed at adults but safe enough for kids.

I was in sixth grade when i first saw this movie, it had everything i was looking for in an "automobile chase" movie, at that time that was what i was into, roadwarrior etc.....

It had the drunk on revenge main character....who soups up his truck to take down drunk drivers after his brother gets hurt by one. And not to mention the standoff automobile fight scene in the end that would make vaughn from crash, pass out in ecstasy.

did i mention that i loved able ferra movies before i even knew who he was?!

If you ever get a chance to see this vehicle vigilance movie. then do so. Other wise you will miss his really cool harpoon gun.

A nutter in a black car is causing hit and runs throughout town, but he picked on the wrong guy when he caused the death of that guy out of the Wanderers. This guy, a mechanic who only wanted his kid brother to grow up and get out of town with a good job, is understandably mental with revenge, soups up his flat bed truck with all kind of gadgets, and goes out on the streets to get justice!

He calls himself The Gladiator and has a gizmo ridden car that disable drink drivers. The public think he's great, but most of the cops don't, and they begin to think that he may be behind all the killings out on the highways. Will our hero catch his prey, or will the hit and run guy go on wasting good old American folks? Well, this is a TV movie, so don't expect gore and violence. Then again, it's directed by Abel Ferrarra, so it's no walk in the park either.

Although lacking in violence, Abel makes up for it with many car chases and an excellent showdown in the a junkyard between the gadget truck and the gadget death car. It's good enough for a TV movie, I'll say that, and has a bit of heart about it too. A nice time waster.

I love Abel Ferrara, but I'm guessing he was slightly high when he accepted this gig and had some bills to pay?? No that's cruel. Although the film stock and general production values of this are shoddy and televisual, Ferrara's gritty aesthetic just about peers through the sanitised veneer of this one. His mechanic best buddy is a nice character, and there are a few unintentional laughs to be had. Overall though, if this was your first insight into abel ferrara, then it would be a bad one to pick...Choose Ms.45, King of New York, Bad Lieutenant or Fear City instead....

I believe Tarantino's segment of the forthcoming film GRINDHOUSE is about a killer, hit-and-run car.....I'm sure he's seen this one then! I also had the (mis)fortune of watching BLACK MOON RISING on the same day!? Also about cars/car chases/the fetishisation of driving souped up cars in the US. Is this the direction that Tarantino is travelling???.....

Ah, the 1980s, when Mullets ruled and hair bands screeched like howler monkeys, and Hollywood produced schlock like this as fast as movie cameras could roll.

To say this was made on the cheap is an understatement.

It's sort of a PSA for Mothers Against Drunk Driving (MADD).

We're missing half the story.

Who says that the baddie's car is called "The Skull Car?" It's not in the movie. That Skull Car attacks randomly? No, he just goes in for disproportionate revenge over petty actions (kinda like our "Hero" does). Is he insane? Well, maybe if the movie had bothered to give him even a single line of dialog, we might know that.

Instead we're just told that the black car driver is insane. Insane villains don't have motivations or back-stories.

1980s action heroes don't know the law about how citizen's arrests work.

Also, when are streets in LA ever that empty? Maybe in the 1920s?

The one thing that movies from the 1980s have that modern movies don't is that the cameras actually focus on the action (such as it is) so that you can see it clearly.

The end result is better than, say, any of the Halloween or Friday the 13th movies, but not by much.