Barb Wire - BOMB
Okay, see if this plot sounds familiar. Set in a backdrop of war in a free city in occupied country, a hard-drinking, world-weary former resistance fighter now runs the most popular club in a desperate town. This is the last town where anyone can get a plane to freedom as long as you have the money. This nightclub owner gas an unusual assortment of employees and has comfortable relationships with the corrupt police chief as well as the grossly overweight underworld chief. One day, an old flame from the past steps back into the club with their spouse and asks the club owner to help get them out of the city to freedom. See, the spouse is an important figure in the resistance, and the totalitarian government is stopping at nothing to find this leader. The club owner, scarred and heartbroken by a perceived betrayal from the old flame at first refuses to help. But when the authorities close up and smash the club, it causes a shift in the owner's thoughts. See, the owner is holding an item that will help anyone pass through customs without question. Some of the owner's friends help convince the owner to help the leader by appealing to once-shunned idealism, and the old flame tries to briefly rekindle their relationship. The owner decides to help, goes to the underworld chief to provide the means to leave, and then evades the authorities until they get near the airport. The owner then shoots the leader of the authorities, and with the help of the corrupt police chief, get the old flame and leader on the plane. At this point, the chief expresses his admiration go the owner. Do you remember it?
If you answered Barb Wire, the magnum opus from Pamela Anderson Lee, you would be correct. What, you were expecting something else? Of course, most of you probably would be thinking of Casablanca, one of the greatest and iconic movies ever made. Yes, dear readers, the mind-numbing crapfest Barb Wire is, whether anyone realizes it or not, a remake of Casablanca, with the exact same plot, characters and sequence of events. It is interesting to note that Casablanca was a throwaway movie for Warner Bros., just another from the slate of movies they were making. Shot in just under two weeks or so, it was a movie that was just like any other being filmed on the lot. Yet, it became one of the best of the best ever. Barb Wire, by contrast, was shot like most small to medium sized budget films with a respectable crew. And it is basically the exact same movie as one of the greatest of all time. So where does Barb Wire go so horribly wrong?
1. Never let teenagers write your script. Well, they may not have been teenagers, but they were definitely writing for them. I've said it before, time and again, what matters is the script. The funny thing is, the template they used is a great one. It was an adult romance written for adults, with a lot of subtext to what is happening in the film. We all know that Rick and Ilsa have sex in the scene in Casablanca, but the film leaves it to your imagination with subtle hints and clues in the dialog. Barb Wire has all the subtlety of a sledgehammer to the side of the head. Barb is a club owning, resistance fighting, bounty hunting hooker with the heart of gold. She can be vulnerable, but is also tougher than all the guys around her. And like all late 80's and early 90's action flicks, she even has a tag line, "Don't call me babe." A prototypical feminist icon for a new century, right? Well...not exactly. Which brings us to...
2. The entire film is a straight-up exploitation flick masking as an action-filled Casablanca. Exploitation films had their heyday in the 70's and early 80's. These cheapie films tended to be gut-churningly violent and hyper-sexualized. Women were often protagonists and victims in these films. They often had scenes of brutal rapes and queasy torture, often with women as the victims. But what was important, more than anything else was shock/schlock. They often played in midnight Grindhouse theaters and run-down drive-ins. Plot, when present at all, was secondary to style. Barb Wire has the grimy feeling of these old exploitation films. It opens with Pam Anderson doing an extended strip dance with her showing a lot of boobs. In fact, the movie really should called boobs, considering the oversized (pun intended) role they play throughout the film. Yes, they play the role better than Pam (more on that later). The movie's producers insisted on more nudity and violence, and thus the extended dance sequence. But there are also some surprisingly brutal torture sequences as well, mostly directed against women. Women are either victims or hookers in this movie with few exceptions. It's interesting that one of the main screenwriters was a woman, Ilene Chaikin. Now, I'm not sure what parts she did or didn't write, but I am surprised she let them use her name in the credits considering the overall tone of the pic.
3. Actors should be able to, you know, ACT. Now, we can't put all the blame on the actors. There's only so much you can do with lines like, "Don't call me babe." But this movie is so dumb, that the actors call attention to the mind-numbing dumbness by delivering their lines as if they were asleep. IMDB notes in the trivia section that the first director was fired for how bad the dailies were. If this is the acceptable finished product, I have to seriously ask about the competence of the entire cast and crew. Everyone delivers their lines in what appears to be first takes of scripts handed to them five minutes before the camera rolled. As stated earlier, Pam's boobs have a wider range of (e)motion than Pam herself, and as such, should awarded an Oscar all their own. Pam Anderson can never be accused of being a master thespian in any of our roles. Watching her in anything is akin to watching a train wreck in slow motion. It's fascinating to behold and terrible in its consequences in the lives of all who experience it. There are several B-List actors who do a passable job at characters they have created in the past, most notably Udo Keir and Clint Howard. But the rest of the actors are an insult to acting in particular, and living, feeling people in general.
4. Great stunts and atmosphere do not make up for lack of craft. Many actors complain that crew and directors think of them as talking scenery, not serious artists who want to do their part to make the film good. This is the exact opposite problem of Barb Wire. The atmosphere and scenery are actually pretty good for what must have been a modest budget. Like the earlier Flash Gordon, everything is right except for the story and actors. All the technical stuff is pretty good. Great lighting, some exciting stunt work, evocative ambience, great costuming given the subject matter. See below for some examples compared to similar scenes in Casablanca:
But all the good direction in the world can't save a bad script and worse actors.
In the end, it comes down to this, Barb Wire is just Casablanca dumbed down for children who have a Ritalin-impaired attention span. And this was a harbinger to most of today's action films' hallmarks: loud, overbearing, thought-free disposable entertainment. Don't believe me? Think I'm just an doddering old fart? Witness today's masterpieces: Battleship, White House Down, Taken 2' Transformers, Thor, the Star Wars prequels, just to name a few. There is not a thought to be had in any of them. That is not to say there have not been good and original action movies recently, but the style beast is eating substance whole, and I, for one, find that sad.
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