TRANCERS [1984]

 I don’t think there’s any question in anyone’s mind that this is Charles Band’s finest film as a director! 

Screenwriters Danny Bilson & Paul De Meo provide a top notch script and Band manages to translate it to the screen extremely well.  This, of course, owes a lot to the Top notch performances of the cast as well as the “do-a-lot-with-almost-nothing” special effects of John Carl Buechler.

  I especially love the ‘sunken Los Angeles’ shot that Band lovingly lingers on towards the start of the film.  I got strong vibes of THUNDARR THE BARBARIAN as well as those SPX in the BBC TV series THE HITCHHIKER’S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY where the buildings wash up on the shore like ocean waves.  But, of course, there’s the pterodactyl in the room – the common misconception that TRANCERS was a rip-off of THE TERMINATOR and that’s actually not true.  For the first time in Charles Band’s career, he DIDN’T rip-off a popular movie of the time.  The script was completely written and filming was beginning while THE TERMINATOR was still filming and hadn’t been released yet.  Release date of THE TERMINATOR was October 26th, 1984 while the release date of TRANCERS was November 7th, 1984 (in the U.K.).  Even a ‘quick & cheerful’ outfit like Charles Band’s Empire Pictures couldn’t get a rip-off out THAT quickly!  Besides, as all genre fans SHOULD know, THE TERMINATOR itself was pretty much a ‘rip-off’ of Harlan Ellison’s episode of THE OUTER LIMITS entitled “Soldier” which aired back in 1964 based on the author’s 1957 short story.  THE TERMINATOR is identical to “SOLDIER” in every important way; as Ellison was pissed off about for years and years.  Granted, Harlan Ellison was usually pissed off about SOMETHING all the time but in this case he was correct in his pissy-ness.  So, if you wanna call something a rip-off, call THE TERMINATOR and TRANCERS both “inspired by” Harlan Ellison’s “SOLDIER”.

As for the film itself, the film Kim Newman calls ‘the greatest B-movie of the 1980s’, I stunningly never saw TRANCERS until just now.  And I (along with my doddy Cheeks) was a heavy consumer of Full Moon videotapes in the late 80’s/early 90’s when, I’m pretty sure, Full Moon released a VHS of TRANCERS under the Full Moon banner (because Charles Band wisely kept copyright to the film for himself).  I’ve seen others mention that they missed it at the time because it looks like straight science fiction and I was a horror guy.  This is probably the case for myself as well.  For some reason, I never felt compelled to give TRANCERS a rent.  Boy, what a stupid ass!  The film itself is jam-packed with great ideas (whether or not Ellison’s “SOLDIER” was an inspiration for the screenplay) as Kim Newman quite rightly suggests.  TRANCERS is just a hell of a good watch and towards the top of every nee EMPIRE now FULL MOON movie EVER in my humble humble.  Tim Thomerson is, as always, superb as Jack Deth;

playing it perfectly straight but with a naughty twinkle in his eye like the best private eye actors from the 40’s & 50’s the filmmakers here are so lovingly evoking.  Helen Hunt, just turned 21 and leaving her ‘kid actor’ career behind, is also fantastically warm and funny as Jack’s 20th century sidekick Leena.  I hope she is proud of her work in TRANCERS because it’s top notch and there is a great chemistry between her and Thomerson.  Art LaFleur as crusty cop McNulty is also lovable and at the top of his game.  Telma Hopkins as Jack Deth’s version of ‘M’ Ruth Raines is a welcome addition to the cast and does a great job too.  Veteran Hollywood actress Anne Seymour is a treat as Chairman Ashe playing it straight as an arrow and we even get a ‘blink-and-you’ll-miss-it’ cameo by Clu Gulager as a Mall security guard!  I love the ‘long second’ wristwatch and the zappy zap guns and the heavy use of neon lighting all through the picture.  I love the ‘thrown bottle’ much more than the ‘thrown rock’ in TO THE DEVIL—A DAUGHTER, that’s fer damn sure which evokes a strong BLADE RUNNER feel (which in this case was DEFINITELY a deliberate rip-off but lovable nonetheless).  This is just a terrific film I’ll be rewatching and rewatching in the years to come!  And I couldn’t end this without reminding you that dry hair is for squids!