Paul McMillan (Vogel) is a Vietnam veteran living in Colorado. After having some very strange nightmares, he begins to notice that the members of Delta Company - his outfit in 'Nam - all begin committing suicide. First they go on some sort of crime spree, and then they off themselves. Because this is happening so systematically, McMillan deduces that something nefarious is going on behind the scenes and he begins his investigation into the bizarre happenings. Teaming up with the wife of one of his former compatriots, Claire Hamilton (Cline), and Detective Bach (Hathaway-Clark), McMillan demands answers. But it's not going to be easy to unravel the mystery. What is "King's Pawn"? And what is the secret behind the phrase "Lock and Load"?Lock 'n' Load is one of the more somber and subdued AIP movies out there. If you liked AIP's Night Wars (1988), surely you will like this one as well, as it deals with similar subject matter. The whole outing has a certain rough-hewn charm and the emphasis here seems to be on drama and intrigue, rather than shooting, blow-ups, and silliness. Sure, some of that is here, and there is a classic drug deal gone wrong, but it's all pretty serious-minded. Thankfully, it's done well and makes for a nice change of pace. Speaking of pace, it is a little slow, but there's nothing wrong with that per se. Vogel/McMillan really, genuinely seems to care about what's going on. McMillan is a good hero - he's cool, but he's not an outrageous caricature. Vogel had been in other AIP movies such as Hell On The Battleground (1988) and Order of the Eagle (1989), and even served in a behind the scenes capacity on Maximum Breakout (1991). But this is truly his "Breakout" role. As for his co-star Renee Cline, she was no stranger to AIP and David Prior productions - she was in Future Zone, Invasion Force, The Final Sanction, and Lock 'n' Load all in the same year - 1990. Talk about a banner year! Fitting with the overall tone of the movie, her performance is a total 180 from Invasion Force and she goes for a more melancholy and sedate style. Unfortunately, Lock 'n' Load is the only screen credit for one William Hathaway-Clark, who played the mustachioed Detective Bach. We liked him and we thought he added to the movie. Also, if you look carefully at McMillan's legal pad where he has his list of Delta Company veterans who are behaving strangely, you see the name David Prior. If you blink, you'll miss it, but it was a nice in-joke. Lock 'n' Load doesn't seem to be one of the more well-known AIP movies, but if you like that classic AIP style, give it a chance. It's a little bit different from the rest (well, with the possible exception of the aforementioned Night Wars) and the muted style may appeal to you.

*This review contains SPOILERS*Pinch me, I must be dreaming. Did I actually just see a good movie written and directed by David A Prior? Indeed, I did! After watching so many stink bombs and misfires I simply couldn't believe my eyes as `Lock n Load' played on my TV screen. I was having so much fun that I completely forgot about my previous poor experiences. Yes, if you are thinking about watching a David A. Prior movie (surely SOMEONE is doing so!) than this is the one you simply must grab.Certainly one of the most noticeable differences here is that `Lock n Load' does not feature David's brother, Ted, but instead stars Jack Vogel. I don't know anything about Vogel, but he is a clear improvement! Vogel is a war veteran that has been having reoccurring nightmares about other members of his former squadron. Vogel finds himself in a smoky corridor with a light at the end. There is a man there beckoning him to come forward, but Vogel is reluctant. After a few refusals, Vogel sees some of his former squad members with him, though they are walking dead. He wakes up before he can be forced down the aisle. With a little research, he finds that whomever he sees dead in his dream had actually committed suicide mysterious the day before. Vogel decides to look up a few of his surviving teammates before it happens again. But what is actually going on? Well, someone is telephoning the veterans and slipping them a password (the film's title), which puts the vets in a trance in which they commit a violent robbery, hide the loot, drive somewhere isolated and off themselves. When it happens to Vogel's best friend, he and his friend's widow start looking deeply into the matter and find that someone had performed mind experiments on them when they served in the military.Prior may not normally be very good at pulling off his projects, but his initial ideas are usually really neat. This one is no exception. In addition to the idea, the actors are surprisingly good. Vogel and Renee Cline, playing the widow, are very good together. The circumstances bringing them together are much more real than the usual action movie coupling. I also was a big fan of the police detectives (William Hathaway-Clark and Craig Paull). They weren't cliches like I expected and they weren't' fools. Most surprising of all was that I really liked the dialogue. It was serious when it needed to be so and funny when it meant to be. I cracked up very hard when the detectives had a discussion about where one of them got their information:Clark: `He just handed over classified info?'Paull: `I saved his life in the war. And I introduced him to his wife.'Clark: `Talk about give and take. You save his life and you sentence him to death. . . . What?'Paull: `He married my sister.'Great stuff, indeed. But it wasn't all great, which saddens me. There are three things that work against Prior here and stop me from giving it a perfect 10. One of them is his fault, as the mystery of what is going on is very easy to figure out. He needed a few more characters is all, but they weren't there. The other two faults fall on the production company, AIP. The budgets they deal out are always low, and it seems like they only had a few hundred dollars left to give Prior for this one. The picture is very grainy throughout. I didn't especially mind though since Prior's direction is refreshingly consistent and enjoyable, but I did keep noticing it. The third problem is the music. Normally, AIP would give the music projects to the highly talented Steve McClintock, whom I always feel bad fir, since his good work usually fell on bad movies. But for some reason McClintock didn't do this music. What music there is sounds like it came from a child's toy electric keyboard. It is highly distracting. But all in all, I had so much fun watching this. If only every one of Prior's movies were this good! Zantara's score: 7 out of 10.