Blind Fury (1989)/Omega Doom (1996)

A Rutger Hauer double feature? Oh, Netflix, you spoil me!

Since each film is barely over an hour long, I watched them back to back without too much hardship. I really only wanted to watch Blind Fury, although the reasons for that have escaped me at the moment, but since they both came on the same disc I figured what the hell. It's not that they're precisely terrible films but I can see why they're not exactly mentioned in the same breath as Blade Runner.

So Blind Fury is the story of a Vietnam War soldier who loses his sight in battle and is taken in by the most understanding and forgiving village of people ever in the history of the world. I know that they're really just a plot device in order to provide the main character with epic swordfighting skills (because everyone knows that if you spend time in close quarters with Asians you become a samourai/ninja/wu xia master automatically). That's kind of rammed home when the village spends an ungodly amount of time (evidenced by Rutger's lengthening hair) teaching this blind invader mastery of the stick-blade and then are never seen again. Jump to Florida, 20 years later. Nick Parker, he of the furious blindness, is a drifter looking for his old Army buddy who happens to be Locke from LOST.

Side note: Terry O'Quinn was never young. This movie was filmed in 1989 and the man looks identical to the "flashback" scenes of LOST.

Too bad Locke is a degenerate gambler in Reno who is being leaned on (ugh, that's some tortured grammar) by a casino owner. Blind Guy shows up at Locke's old house and has some tea with the ex-wife and her bratty kid just in time for the henchmen to show up, make threats, and attempt to kidnap said brat. Time to bust out the mad blading skills!

The main henchmen actually says "Not bad... for a blind guy!" I respectfully disagree. Navigating an unfamiliar house: not bad for a blind guy. Kicking the shit out of three armed opponents: fucking epic for a blind guy.

Anyway, Mom takes a shotgun blast to the stomach and Blind Guy gets roped into dragging the kid across the country to Reno. Except for some more ass-kicking in a cornfield, this whole section seemed like part of a different movie. More Dutch or Uncle Buck. I don't need to see character development between hero and annoying child at the expense of action. Imagine that Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom completely ignored that badass opening with the shootout and the poisoning and the raft out of the plane in favor of Dr. Jones coaxing Short Round out of a temper tantrum.

The rest of the movie is kind of stupid, mostly due to the most retarded "comic relief" henchmen ever. The only other part of note is a cool battle-of-the-masters-style fight between Blind Guy and a Sword-for-hire.

Omega Doom could be mentioned in the same breath as A Fistful of Dollars. Also, in that breath would be "plagiarism", "blatant", and "stupid". Not that AFOD is all that original since it was based on a Kurosawa film and it's been remade several times since (looking at you, Bruce Willis).

Omega Doom answers the question "What if everyone in A Fistful of Dollars was replaced by Terminators?" presumably asked by someone who was really high.

So the world is in the middle of nuclear winter because John Conner never came to save us and the terminators won. Humans are a rumor droids tell around the campfire at night. Rutger Hauer arrives and absolutely nothing surprising happens.

I am now going to take this moment to nerd out.

The reason AFOD works is because it creates tension by a stranger pitting two rival groups against each other and playing off their paranoia for fun and profit. This premise is completely thrown out the window when the rival groups aren't human. You can shout AI until you're blue in the face but I refuse to believe that robots would accept such illogical reasoning. Especially over something as stupid as a cache of guns. You're robots with laser throwing knives! A Beretta seems a little low-tech.

Most of the cast was female, though, of which I do approve. And no romantic sub-plot, also a plus. I have to give this movie a FAIL though for one specific line: "Don't try to confuse me with logic." /facepalm