Tank Girl...

Recently, I came across Tank Girl...

If you're into in-your-face visuals, outrageous action sequences and non-stop explosive laughs, this is your "rip-roaring power surge of a movie" (L.A. Weekly). The year's 2033 and since a humongous meteor hit earth, the world just hasn't been the same. No Movies, No Cable TV, NO WATER!!! A mega-villain, Kesslee (Malcolm McDowell), the leader of Water & Power, holds the world in his grasp since he controls all the H2O down to the last drop...or so he thinks. Two colossal enemies stand in his way: (1) The Rippers - an army of half-men/half-kangaroo people whose sole purpose is to bring down the W & P, and (2) a chick with a tank and tons of attitude - a.k.a. Tank Girl (Lori Petty). Kesslee had better get a grip on reality and his water jugs because not even a run in her stocking is going to stop her from saving the planet.

Way back in the misty dawn of time, during the infamous Ultimate Otaku Fall Cleanup, I once had a VHS version of the movie and, sadly, I let it get away. Although, I'm pretty sure the neighbor across the street ended up with that tape, I didn't really feel like asking for it back. Then, one fine day, I just happened to come across it on one of the movie channels, so, I tracked down the DVD version in my local video store and welcomed Tank Girl back into the archive.

Tank Girl didn't fair so well in its initial run. According to Wikipedia..

Tank Girl is a 1995 science fiction action film loosely based on the Tank Girl comic book created by Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett. It was directed by Rachel Talalay and stars Lori Petty as Rebecca Buck, aka the eponymous Tank Girl, who had originally appeared in the UK comic magazine Deadline.

The film received mixed to negative reviews from critics and had disappointing sales at the box office. It only grossed $4 million on a $25 million budget. The film holds a 42% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 33 reviews (14 positive, 19 negative).

Roger Ebert gave the film 2 out of 4 stars. While praising the film's ambition, he stated the film's manic energy wore him down: "Whatever the faults of "Tank Girl," lack of ambition is not one of them. Here is a movie that dives into the bag of film making tricks and chooses all of them. Trying to re-create the multimedia effect of the comic books it's based on, the film employs live action, animation, montages of still graphics, animatronic makeup, prosthetics, song-and-dance routines, scale models, fake backdrops, holography, title cards, matte drawings, and computerized special effects. All I really missed were 3-D and Smell-O-Vision."

In the wake of poor box office gross, Deadline collapsed, having apparently taken huge gambles on Tank Girl. Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett have since spoken poorly of their experiences in creating the film, calling it "a bit of a sore point" for them. Hewlett said, "The script was lousy; me and Alan kept rewriting it and putting Grange Hill jokes and Benny Hill jokes in, and they obviously weren't getting it. They forgot to film about ten major scenes so we had to animate them ... it was a horrible experience."

Despite, Tank Girl's poor performance at the box office, I still find it to be very entertaining and happily welcomed it back into the archive.