In fact Nemesis was originally designed to be a prequel to
Cyborg but along the way this got dropped and the film developed into its own
franchise. It was also intended to have a female cop in the lead but this idea also fell by the wayside.
Nemesis introduces us to Alex (played with an Arnie-esque command of vocal cadence by French kickboxer Olivier Gruner), an already part cyborg cop, who at the beginning of the movie comes off worse after a run in with some human ‘information terrorists’ – they have information, they’re pretty terrible. Rescued by the LAPD he’s re-assembled with considerably less human in him than before and a bomb next to his heart due to detonate in three days. Suitably armed he's set off on his next and possibly final mission in Java, to do something with information and terrorists and stolen security plans and an ex-girlfriend Jared who is also a cyborg, while Farnsworth, the guy who sent him there, has been replaced by a cyborg and now wants to kill Alex – sorry I couldn’t quite work out the finer details, but I don’t think it really matters.
Nemesis introduces us to Alex (played with an Arnie-esque command of vocal cadence by French kickboxer Olivier Gruner), an already part cyborg cop, who at the beginning of the movie comes off worse after a run in with some human ‘information terrorists’ – they have information, they’re pretty terrible. Rescued by the LAPD he’s re-assembled with considerably less human in him than before and a bomb next to his heart due to detonate in three days. Suitably armed he's set off on his next and possibly final mission in Java, to do something with information and terrorists and stolen security plans and an ex-girlfriend Jared who is also a cyborg, while Farnsworth, the guy who sent him there, has been replaced by a cyborg and now wants to kill Alex – sorry I couldn’t quite work out the finer details, but I don’t think it really matters.
From the opening shoot out, Nemesis is rather bonkers. I was
transported back to the days of watching dodgy martial arts and Chuck Norris
movies on VHS, such is the amount of gunfire, spent ammo, explosions and close
ups of chiselled faces on display – and that’s just the women. You want to see
three cyborgs blast away with heavy duty guns while facing each other over a
distance of about fifteen feet – for a long time? Step this way. You want
endless chop socky and over the top stunt work while rolling down mountains?
Get in line. You want sparkling dialogue? Sorry, different movie.
Effects wise, breathe a sigh of relief – no CGI here. We get
cyborgs with breakaway faces that reveal guns, a fantastic eyeball popping
scene, and the cheesiest endoskeleton reveal that must have cost around 1/19th
of the budget of a similar scene in The Terminator.
Olivier Gruner went on to a career starring in movies with
one word titles. As Alex, Gruner wasn’t required to act much, but as a kick
boxer he was probably annoyed that the director wanted him to use the gun more
than his feet – maybe the insurance didn’t cover it. Other cast members worth
noting are Tim Thomerson as mastermind Farnsworth - a veteran of TV whose
career had started to slide with roles in films with one word titles and
numbers after them – and spunky little Merle Kennedy as Max Impact (yes, I
know) who crops up about half way through as a pint size renegade and assists
Alex to evade cyborg death by doing lots of running, jumping and swimming.
You'll have to look elsewhere for coverage of Nemesis II - IV. Once is clearly enough for this keyboard slinger.
You'll have to look elsewhere for coverage of Nemesis II - IV. Once is clearly enough for this keyboard slinger.
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