Watch Warriors of the Year 2072 For Free

I wanted to but couldn't!

Fresh and Exciting

Absolutely Fantastic

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

In the year 2027, there's fierce competition between TV networks in Rome ... so fierce that one network creates a show where convicted murderers fight to the death on motorcycles. Looking to create a popular champion, the network frames a popular contestant from another show for murder and stick them on their show. Sounds a lot like "The Running Man", no? Well, Fulci beat that film to the punch by three years. Unfortunately, his film is terrible. The "Blade Runner" inspired futuristic city scapes are tiny looking little models, and essentially, nothing of any interest happens for over an hour, and then it wraps up with a quick action scene and we're outta here. Fred Williamson and Italian genre mainstays Al Cliver and Donald O'Brien co-star.

Fulci gathers an ensemble cast and almost but not quite gives us yet another Italian post-apocalypse style movie. Is this one post-apocalypse? If so, they missed all those Roman landmarks.This time round, we've got some guy from Dallas, Al Cliver (The Devil Hunter, House of Clocks), Fred Williamson (Black Cobra 1, Black Cobra 2, Black Cobra 3), Claudio Cassenelli (Flavia the Heritic, Hands of Steel, sporting a very strange haircut), Donald OBrien (Mannaja, Emmanual and the Last Cannibals) and Al Yamanouchi (House of Lost Souls, Endgame). George Eastman? He's not here man! Still, with a cast like that you'd think you'd be in for something totally awesome, right? Well, it starts off pretty well, with our Hero (Dallas guy) being a big TV star in some show called Killbike. The thing is, Claudio is an exec for some rival show and wants to up the stakes by having gladiators go toe to toe, to the death, but needs Dallas guy as he draws the big ratings. Three guys turn up and murder our Hero's wife, leading him to kill them in revenge (or does he?). Voila – instant convicted killer TV show type thing. Roll on the carnage! This is where the film stumbles a bit. Instead of Big Fred driving about on a bike chopping heads off people, we get our Hero trying to escape the prison, fighting other prisoners, going up against the guards, and both him and one of the TV exec girls tyring to find out who killed those guys who killed his wife. Plus, an awful lot of strobe effects. And I mean loads.You do get to the action eventually though, and although you'd be expecting blood and gore from Fulci, he's kind of restrained here. There are severed heads flying about the place but The Beyond this is not.Fulci also continues his headache inducing camera techniques he used in the far better Conquest, as, along with all the strobe effects, he has demented visual effects, lights fading on and off, lens flashes and the like. I did like the bikers driving through futuristic Rome and thought perhaps he was making some reference to that scene in Fellini's Roma? Anytthing's possible in Italian cinema.So, New Gladiators is, as they say, not one of Fulci's best. It's not bad, but compared to the sci-fi Joe D'Amato and Enzo Castellari were throwing at us at the same time, it's second tier stuff.Forgot to mention: Al Cliver is dubbed by Nick Alexander, for a change.

Totally unconvincing as an actual view at the future, New Gladiators (aka: "Rome 2072: The New Gladiators" or "Fighting Centurions") is none the less an extremely entertaining Sci-Fi action programmer from Lucio Fulci. At times gory, action packed (full of exploding-for-no-reason vehicles), cheese-tastic dialogue ("Go to Hell!", "I would - if I thought it would increase my ratings!") and delicious scenery reused from other Italian sci-fi films, giving the film the feel of an episode of Doctor Who circa 1983 as directed by slow-minded aliens.Jared Martin, of the 1980s War of the Worlds series and Fulci's own AENIGMA, is our hero - the star Killbike champion. It's hard to tell if he is the star of the TV show Killbike BEFORE he's framed for murdering the Clockwork Orange-esque gang who murdered his wife, or if that is a flashback (as indicated by the commentary from Fulci-fan Troma staff) and that's how he became a Killbike star. I think it's the former, though. He finds himself in a prison cell (a one room riff on Stuart Gordon's FORTRESS which had yet to be made) with Fred "The Hammer" Williamson (From Dusk Till Dawn, Black Caesar, New Barbarians etc), Hal Yamagouchi (from "Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou") and Al Cliver (dubbed again by the guy who did Zombie for him), among others. They are trained in hilarious strobe-lit scene with mentally-projected holograms to become more effective killers (this has very little to do with the game show they ultimately compete in), there's a love story, in-fighting, a sadistic guard...You get the picture.No, words cannot describe the joys of the picture - small model sets, actually entertaining sci-fi ideas (almost universally executed beneath their value) and Riz Ortolani (orchestral composer and film composer for "Cannibal Holocaust" and Fulci's "Don't Torture a Duckling" and "Perversion Story/One On Top of the Other") contributes a scruzzy New Wave rock score which is a total, rip-roaring triumphant cheesefest. Sure, there's only three pieces of music and they loop constantly, but by the end you'll be so happy it won't matter!The DVD is a fairly typical early 21st century Troma disc - fullscreen video master, stereo, minimal extras. A commentary from the "FBI" (Fulci Benevolant Institution) is just Trent "Killjoy, Dead Girl and Terror Firmer" Haaga and Troma's then-DVD producer Ronni Raygun riffing on the movie. It's unclear whether only some of the affection for the film is sarcastic, or all of it, but it's entertaining enough. There's a short interview with the beautiful Antonella Fulci (not as good as on the "Zombie" blu-ray or Arrow "Gates of Hell" Daughter of Darkness interviews) apparently filmed by herself or a friend (note the Divine "Love Reaction" vinyl prominantly displayed...did she think John Waters owned Troma?), a Dario Argento interview (not a lot involved here, but mention is made of Fulci and how he didn't play a part influencing Dario, at all), a short Robert Englund interview about...Dario Argento, and the usual introduction and trailer. There's also some Troma extras with nothing to do with the film.Considering it's a full screen video master, and the film is clearly missing some information (yes I would prefer a 1.85:1 transfer but fortunately New Gladiators was not a cinemascope production, so we're not missing too much), the transfer is pretty good. Once you get used to the idea that in this dystopian future, a particular shade of dark green has replaced the colour black, you'll notice it upscales just fine.Overall, it's the best version of the movie out there I'm aware of (apparently the US Media release cuts out some of the violence) and it's pretty cheap, so pick it up.

THE NEW GLADIATORS is the 20th movie by Lucio Fulci I have seen, and it marks a little piece of movie-going history for me. I was a teenage horror fanatic, so to speak, and in the beginning of my horror odyssey I wouldn't have thought I would get to see even five. But that was before imported DVD. That was before the Internet. Now I have a fairly good view of Fulci and I know very well why my admiration for him is so high. The New Gladiators, Fighting Centurions, or whatever you want to call it, is just an example. I love the very idea that Fulci even tried to make this movie.Fulci was not high class, to say the very least, but he definitely had an artistic vision. He went out to follow his themes no matter what. It's like he didn't notice, or cared, that the actors were horrible, the effects crappy and the dialog so ridiculously high-blown that basically every movie he ever made, in some way or another became hard to take seriously. This one is definitely no exception.In the mid 80's, Fulci tried to jump off the horror wagon for a while. I guess he felt he knocked himself out for good with THE NEW YORK RIPPER and who can blame him. Just one year after that movie he did the sword&sorcery/fantasy-fest CONQUEST and if you put those two beside each other, well, one conclusion is that he definitely could do different things. Conquest is a howler, if I hadn't known about Fulci I would have pretty much assumed it was a comedy. Much of the same goes with The New Gladiators, but unlike Conquest, or any other Fulci movie for that matter, it has a more obvious problem: It's a sci-fi-fantasy movie with a budget taken from the tin can of a bum! The models are barely convincing even as models, and the many sequences of biker action comes off as peculiarly pointless, since there are basically no stunts and we don't know which character is which (since they are all stunt men). Many of the drivers also seem to drive into spears and walls all by themselves, for no apparent reason.The plot is also just barely there. There's a bunch of "gladiators". They are supposed to fight. In the end we get the would-be-showdown, but between the first scene and the last there's just a bunch of separate sequences of torture or escape action and one or two loose plot threads. One mad scientist here, one Gestapo-dressed Howard Ross there, who is a threat one second, and totally outsmarted the next, and I don't blame Fred Williamson for later claiming "I have no idea what that movie was about".But who cares, right? Just like in Conquest, another plot less feast for the senses, there's a lot of hilarious sequences. Swallow this gadget and you will be able to melt stuff with your brain. Pick up the gun. No. Pick it up. No. PIIICK IIIT UUUUUPPPP. I mean, the list goes on. For Fulci apostles though, we get some familiar themes of humanity with some seriously bad odds against it - in this case by computerization and TV, something you have to give Fulci some before-his-time-credit for - but with a surprisingly happy ending. The eyeball theme (or "who sees what" as I like to call it) becomes totally physical towards the end when a supposedly half-blind man turns out to have a camera behind the blind lens (OK, that's a little brilliant) and there's even.... let's see... one cool Fulciesque moment, involving a bizarre and surrealistic murder with three whistling men dressed in fancy 80's suits.It's no surprise that this move is re-distributed by Troma, because it's surely a joy for all. It's a great movie to watch if you want to get together and laugh at a bad movie, and it's definitely worthwhile for Fulci enthusiasts (I mean.... why not??). As long as you don't expect Blade Runner, you're in for a treat. In addition, I recommend to watch it back to back with Conquest, which should be saved for last because it's even funnier.KIIIILLLL!!!