Coventry
I think it's hilarious that this movie is actually called "Terminator II"! This just shows how unscrupulous and shameless Italian exploitation directors were during the late 80's when unleashing their films upon unsuspecting cinema lovers! The real "Terminator II", with Arnie Schwarzenegger, was probably already in a much advanced stage of production around the time of this movie's release, but these guys didn't care and went ahead naming it "Terminator II" all around the world, except in the USA. I think it's even more hilarious that this "Terminator II" is basically more of blatant imitation of "Aliens", with just a bit of "Terminator" thrown in near the finale. The cast and crew probably thought something like: "Hey, if we're going to upset James Cameron, we better do it right and imitate two of his films at once". Maybe it's just my twisted mind, but all this epitomizes the methods of the Italian exploitation cinema during the late 80's. They went extremely far in ripping off Hollywood box office hits only just to drain the formula entirely and make the maximum of easy money out it. I love it. To the avid fans of this kind of trash cinema, it really shouldn't come as much of a surprise that "Terminator II" was directed by Bruno Mattei; here under his favorite pseudonym Vincent Dawn. Mattei's life mission was to rip-off as much successful SF-horror classics as humanly possible and he literally continued to do so until his death a couple of years ago. Mattei often imitated one and the same movie several times, like John McTiernan's "Predator". Although I sadly haven't seen Mattei's entire repertoire just yet, I think it's safe to say that "Terminator II" ranks amongst his utmost bonkers achievements. The plot is a hodgepodge of borrowed ideas including slimy mutant monsters, corrupt global corporations, cyborgs, toxic cities, time-traveling and secret experiments. By the year 2000, the once beautiful city of Venice has become an uninhabitable wasteland. The water is heavily polluted and the entire city is covered by a thick toxic cloud. For some reason that must have escaped my attention, a specially trained troop of solider and scientists go back in assignment for the dubious Tubular Corporation. Samuel Fuller, representing the corporation, is clearly up to no good and one of the female scientists recovers an orphaned girl in an abandoned lab, exactly like Ellen Ripley found Newt in "Aliens", although unfortunately this girl isn't a mute. There's not the slightest bit of coherence or logic in the screenplay, but that doesn't matter too much, as clearly Bruno Mattei's sole intention was to copy the successful James Cameron flicks as much as possible. The stereotypical rough and tough soldiers are like exact clones of the characters in "Aliens" (like the loud-mouthed Bill Paxton, butch lady Jenette Goldstein and good Samaritan solider Michael Biehn) and multiple situations are even identical copies to the ones in "Aliens", like when the women are trapped in a sound proof laboratory with a monster and the villainous Fuller discretely turns off the safety cameras or when the remaining soldiers are counting down on their radar how fast the monsters are approaching. "Termintor II" is great trashy and cheesy fun and comes warmly recommend, but of course only if you have a high tolerance for gratuitous Italian exploitation rubbish. And if you can find it, too, as the film is really quite obscure.
Unicorn-9
This is... very strange. Basically a ripoff of Aliens and a bit of Terminator with guys wearing uniforms that look like they were last used in an Ed Wood sci-fi movie running around a power station. While it doesn't sink to Uwe Boll levels, it would certainly be inept if they didn't have James Cameron movies to rip off.Now, I must admit, I've only seen the movie in Italian... and I don't speak Italian; so maybe it's less dumb if you do. But I don't really need to, because they lift so much so directly from Aliens that I could tell you almost exactly what they're saying most of the time. And I mean direct; not just individual shots, but _entire scenes_ are lifted wholesale from Aliens.For those who like their movies mind-boggling it's probably a must-see, but for those who like good movies it's one to avoid. The most puzzling question is how did they get away with it?
Benjamin Simko
Most of the reviews (especially the favorable ones) are for the Schwarzenegger film. This is actually an Aliens knockoff, despite the title (which is more commonly "Alienators" or "Shocking Dark"). This is good fun if you like cheap Italian versions of expensive American genre movies, which I do.The plot concerns a group of actors in plastic armor running down many hallways and into several rubber aliens. I don't want to spoil it for you. There's not a lot to be found here in terms of traditional artistic merits, but there ARE a lot of funny costumes and a lot of bold, unselfconscious thievery from better films.
