ENDGAME is a highly entertaining slice of Italian cheese, served at least ten weeks past its sell by date. Just one of a rash of post-apocalyptic films which emerged from Italy (usually amid nuclear blasts) in the early '80s, it's a fun-filled action adventure film all the way. The Italians certainly had a sense of style - and fun - that their American counterparts lacked. Take the film's American version, for instance, Schwarzenegger's much better-known THE RUNNING MAN. Does it have innocent blind men being gunned down? The heck it does. America is too restricted to make really good films any more, but you can't say that about the Italians. They sure know how to make a film, and who cares who they offend? It comes as no surprise that the film was directed by Joe D'Amato. Joe, God rest his soul, was never really renowned for making brilliant films. But whether his films were enjoyable… well, it depends on the viewer. I for one am impressed. What makes ENDGAME such a masterpiece - however odd that may seem - is the absurdity of it. It could have just been a typical gladiator film, but no. There are 'regressive mutants' who are supposed to have become half-fish (hmm, sounds like something Lovecraft might have thought of). To show this, they have those little shiny discs stuck all over their faces. And when they die they bleed water. Or blue paint in this case. The other 'regressive mutants' look very much like rejects from PLANET OF THE APES.To add to the fun, mix in a cast of European 'stars' such as Laura Gemser (famed for her role in the BLACK EMANUELLE films of the 1970s) as the love interest who inevitably loses her top halfway through, George Eastman (ANTHROPOPHAGUS THE BEAST) as a psycho, shotgun-armed warrior (very good role here folks) and even Bobby Rhodes, the star of DEMONS and its sequel, wearing a robe and carrying a big spiked club thing! Rhodes is really the icing on the cake. Italian peplum fans will be delighted to spot former muscleman Gordon Mitchell in a small role as a baddie.What else is there? An almost constant stream of action, from the single punch-ups in the first half to the full-scale wars in the second. People kick either other when they're down, punch, and there's even a warrior called Ninja (who breaks the neck of a poor guy asked to attack him in class) who jumps around and kicks people in the face (I thought that was just something Jean Claude Van Damme did). The action is very second rate but this makes it all the more entertaining. There's lots of gore around as well as plenty of nudity for enthusiasts of that variety. Cliver is excellent in his Mad Max type role. ENDGAME is not a well made film by any means but it's a heck of a lot of fun and highly entertaining. So much so that I'm giving it a high rating for effort. A highly underrated cheesy classic.

Joe D'Amato's "Endgame - Bronx lotta finale" (simply called "Endgame" in English) is an exercise in unabashed exploitation, and a fun one at that. Post-apocalyptic settings are a common theme in cinema, but this is one of those movies that looks really prescient in retrospect. Set in an irradiated New York in 2025, people are forced to fight to the death to entertain the elites (a bit like "The Hunger Games"). And this movie came out over a decade before there was reality TV! I view these sorts of movies as a latter-day manifestation of Franz Kafka's parable of the leopards: what used to be shocking becomes routine (whether the types of movies or what they portray happening in real life)."Endgame" is a pretty slipshod movie, but it makes no pretense about what kind of a movie it is: a B movie and proud of it. And Laura Gemser sure is hot.

In a bleak, post-apocalyptic future, society is controlled by a military force determined to exterminate undesirable under-classes, including a race of peaceful telepaths whose powers pose a potential threat to their totalitarian regime; as the 'security service' (who fittingly wear Nazi-style Stormtrooper helmets emblazoned with an SS logo) carry out their acts of mass slaughter, the general public is kept distracted by Endgame, a violent television show that pits several hunters against a single human prey, of which all-round tough guy Shannon (Al Cliver) is the current undefeated champion.During the latest edition of Endgame, Shannon is approached by telepath Lilith (Laura Gemser), who offers the warrior a fortune in gold to lead a small group of mutants beyond the confines of the city, where they intend to rendezvous with others of their kind. Shannon accepts the job, recruits a team of double-hard bastards to assist him, and escorts the mutants into the dangerous atomic wastelands, hotly pursued by his chief Endgame rival Karzak (George Eastman) and several gas-mask wearing SS troops.Endgame's basic premise—The Running Man meets The X-Men, by way of The Ultimate Warrior, Escape From New York and Mad Max—sure sounds like a lot of fun, but as is often the case with these early '80s, Italian, post-apocalyptic rip-offs, the actual film leaves a lot to be desired. Low production values, heavy handed direction from Joe D'amato, poorly choreographed fight scenes, surprisingly listless performances from its seasoned exploitation cast, and a lack of outrageous splatter means that the film is far from the enjoyably cheesy, excessively violent, OTT futuristic romp that the gloriously fetishistic cover—an image of a musclebound gladiator wielding all manner of gore spattered weaponry—leads us to believe it will be.The movie begins with approximately half an hour of extremely dull Endgame action in which the expressionless Al Cliver, sporting embarrassing Ziggy Stardust-style silver face paint, engages in several lacklustre scenes of combat against the game's hunters; this is followed by an hour or so of repetitive and only-slightly-less-dull larger scale conflict as Shannon and pals battle unconvincingly against the denizens of the wasteland, who include involuted mutants (fish men, monkey men etc.) and hordes of blind scavengers. In order to eke out his limited budget, D'amato uses derelict warehouses and patches of urban wasteland to stand in for his world ravaged by nuclear war, limits his vehicular stunts to a few unspectacular falls from motorcycles and a car crash or two, opts for bargain basement make-up for his mutants, and shells out as few Lira as possible on gore (I want squibs, Goddamit—lots of squibs!).Admittedly fun moments include the rape of Lilith by a fat, blue, scaly, drooling fish man (yet another opportunity for far-from-shy-and-retiring Gemser to bare her breasts), a telepath receiving an axe in the head (a scene apparently cut from the UK release by those nice people at the BBFC), and the chief Nazi blowing his own brains out (forced to do so by a telekinetic kid, one of the supposedly benign mutant clan incapable of hurting others). These 'high points', however, are nowhere near enough to prevent the film as a whole from being an instantly forgettable and relatively worthless experience.

It has been a while since I saw this movie but I still remember it quite well. I know that some people discard it as a cheesy and pathetic attempt at a movie but I cannot help but hold it dear to my heart. Of course, I am a sucker for low budget Italian apocalypse movies...Anyhoo, I enjoyed it because of the anti-commercialism theme, colorful characters, and overall obnoxious attempt to be serious. I mean, who couldn't love George Eastman as Karnak? He has to be one of the coolest arch nemesis' that I have seen in a while! Half of the time I was rooting for him! And what about the mutants? I know that it was made in 1983 but I thought that they did a pretty damn good job with what they had to work with. I was somewhat torn by the ending because while I did like the clashing freeze-frame, it left you hanging with quite a cliffhanger.As a final word, it was corny as hell but strangely entertaining. I only hope that I can still find it on VHS or god forbid, DVD...