301. Twister's Revenge

301. Twister’s Revenge! (1988)
Director: Bill Rebane
Writers: William Arthur, Larry Dreyfus, and Bill Rebane
From: Drive-In (only 2 remain!)

A trio of idiots plot to kidnap and ransom the programmer of a monster truck with advanced computer technology, but the truck starts to outthink them.

I started tearing up with giddy joy after reading the IMDB summary of this movie: “Three bumbling criminals have been trying to get their hands on the computerized control system of Mr. Twister, a talking monster truck with a mind of its own.” Oh God, yes please. It will not live up to my anticipated joy, but I do not care. Bless you Bill Rebane for making stupid, stupid movies. Oh so stupid.

For those unfamiliar, Rebane also directed Monster A-Go-Go and The Giant Spider Invasion (featured on MST3k) as well as The Demons of Ludlow, The Cold, and The Alpha Incident featured earlier on this blog. This movie is not as good as those.

We have a trio of criminals who learn about Mr. Twister, a monster truck with approximately $200,000 worth of computer technology in it. The trio is initially planning to steal the computer equipment, but end up, somehow, deciding to kidnap the woman who designed the tech. This takes about half-an-hour, by the way.

The designer is married to Twister’s driver and, as the husband is planning on getting a shotgun and hunting the kidnappers down, Twister starts talking to him. Twister offers an alternate plan that fails. Then they team up and start hunting down the trio one-by-one. Only, when they track one of the guys down, the pair doesn’t try to kill or capture them. Instead we get monster truck antics of cars and houses being run over/through and then the kidnapper runs away. What’s the plan exactly?

This all climaxes in a fight in a junkyard. The husband manages to defeat, in some way, each of the kidnappers until one of them gets a tank and starts chasing the truck. The truck and tank get stuck in a parade (with a weird Donald Duck float in the middle) and then, inevitably, end up at the cave where the victim is tied up. The husband saves her and the couple hides behind the tires of Twister and watch the kidnappers run into the cave just before it explodes. The kidnappers turn on their leader while the couple and Twister laugh. THE END

It’s a comedy that’s not funny. The gags never land because the timing and tone is just off. The movie is a cartoon with all the explosions and people getting run over by a monster truck but no one ever getting hurt, but it never feels like a cartoon. This feels like a movie that’s supposed to be set in the real world, just populated by idiots.

The movie is at its best when it tends to drop any pretense. The producers rented a monster truck and monster truck gonna monster truck. Cars get smashed, buildings get run over, even a swimming pool gets laid flat. And then they up the ante by adding a tank in the final twenty minutes. Those moments are fun and there should have been more of that in the movie. They’re using stunt vehicles so why isn’t the movie wall-to-wall stunts?

The answer is that would have cost money and they had to make sure the truck was returned unharmed.

I don’t have any other place in the post to mention this, but there’s a scene in a bar with a man in a bat mask. Look at that picture. That’s a fully-articulated mask. The mouth even moves. I have no idea what it’s doing in this movie. It’s not referenced before, it’s never brought up again, but the camera lingers on it for a few seconds so you get a good look.

Movie. Are you trying to send us a message? Are you trapped somewhere? Should we call for help?

As I said at the top, this was never going to live up to my expectations. The movie’s dull with a sense of humor that just doesn’t work. The humor didn’t offend me or fail to age well like a lot of these movies, the jokes just never landed. I had fun watching things get run over, knocked down, and blown up and I would have appreciated more of that kind of silliness. The movie’s not a recommend, but if you can find the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode for The Giant Spider Invasion, I highly recommend that. Go Packers!