Barb Wire

Hogan's credits include second unit direction of the diabolical Batman Forever, plus numerous pop videos. No coincidence, then, that this awful action-adventure should employ similar production principles: waste land sets, rusty warehouses, plenty of fireworks, and orange filters to depict the dying skyline of a futuristic America ravaged by its second civil war. The year's 2017, the place Steel Harbor, home to a raggle-taggle society of misfits and the legendary Hammerhead Bar and Grille, owned by the eponymous heroine, a stilettoed, heavy-leather blonde with a penchant for roughing it. Before long, former freedom-fighter Barb (Anderson Lee) is roped into helping some old resistance colleagues find a pair of contact lenses which will enable a government employee, who alone knows about her bosses' plans for biological warfare, to flee the country. Mean, nasty and looking not unlike Nazi extras from Kelly's Heroes, the Congressional Directorate always seem to be one step ahead...until Barb gets serious and tools up for a showdown. To be fair, Anderson Lee cuts a fair dash as a cartoon-style heroine (acting aside). But the film's haphazardly edited, lacks narrative clout, and rambles on to a ludicrously extended conclusion.