City Limits Movie Review

Director Aaron Lipstadt's first film, Android, is a precious sleeper. This, his second film, has developed a less welcome cult reputation after being given the Mystery Science Theater 3000 treatment. In the not-so-distant future, a plague will have wiped out most of the adults, leaving the adolescents to form motorcycle-riding gangs to roam the landscape looking for food, gasoline, and comic books. Loner John Stockwell teams up with L.A. Clippers Rae Dawn Chong, John Diehl, and Darrell Larson (with an assist by James Earl Jones) to take on the sinister Sunya Corporation from violently wresting control of the city from the gangs. Robby Benson, here only for the paycheck, is Sunya's sinister boss. When he is ultimately cornered, he calmly cautions that it would be useless to kill him because he will be replaced by someone even worse. That's doubtful. He spends most of the film glowering behind a desk and glancing at the red light blinking on his telephone. He is finally crushed when a betrayed gang leader rams his motorcycle into his desk (which usually elicits cheers from anyone who has suffered through Harry and Son). Written by Don Opper, who also wrote and starred in Android.

1985 (PG-13) 85m/C John Stockwell, Kim Cattrall, Darrell Larson, Rae Dawn Chong, Robby Benson, James Earl Jones, Jennifer Balgobin, John Diehl; D: Aaron Lipstadt; W: Don Opper. VHS, Beta, LV VES, LIV, HHE