LADY TERMINATOR

Falling somewhere between exploitation and allegory, LADY TERMINATOR (aka NASTY HUNTER) might be a raggedly unappealing TERMINATOR rip-off but nonetheless contains several intriguing insights as to the values and feelings of the collective Indonesian psyche. Amid the thrown together production - including preposterous perms, squirm-inducing '80s colours, dry ice and liquid smear soft focus - is a film that holds a genuine awareness of both its pervading badness and its place in popular culture.

Living in grape-sucking luxury at her castle by the water, the South Sea Queen regularly entertains male lovers. After a steamy soft-core session, she mutilates a poor bloke's bits with a snake that hatches out of her privates, before asking the camera "Is there a man out there who can satisfy me?" Cue a white skinned, suave-looking beefcake whose bedroom savvy proves the equaliser. Bringing her to orgasm first and pulling out quick, he anticipates the offending snake before stretching it out in the form of a powerful dagger and warning her to "Stop the killing."

Furious and affronted, she flinches away from the mystical snake-turned-weapon and plots the man's downfall. Threatening to kill his great-granddaughter, she consults dark forces deep under the ocean to put her plans into effect…One hundred years later, American anthropology student Tanya pursues her interest in the legend of the South Seas Queen and persuades a superstitious fisherman to take her to where it all happened. A few minutes of skinny-dipping lands her in a world of shit, as she ends up on the SSQ's sunken bed, her vagina penetrated by the ancient snake, which possesses her.

Emerging from the water at night, she shreds the manhood of a pair of punks, and steals their clothes - not forgetting a leather jacket - Arnie style. Holing up at a Jakarta hotel, now-evil Tanya is jarred from her meditation by a pop music video, noticing that the singer in question is the wanted descendent. Finding her performing at a garishly lit nightclub, Tanya pulls out an Uzi and turns the place into a shower of broken neon. Before singer Erika can be turned into Swiss cheese, incredibly bland Yankee Max McNeil and his cop buddies trade firepower with her.

Bullets proving ineffectual, McNeil still manages to escape with Erika and takes her to the police station, which falls victim to another TERMINATOR-derived attack causing them to regroup yet again. While Max organises some serious military hardware, Erika is grounded by an elder relative in some important mystical practise, in a furious finale that combines machine guns, rocket launchers, tanks, a helicopter and a bit of much-needed mutual magic.

No film can be divorced from the context it emerged from, and LADY TERMINATOR actively addresses General Suharto's post '65 policy to encourage mass consumerism in Indonesia. As Stephen Gladwin suggests in FAB Press' Fear Without Frontiers, icons of Western society/progress like the police's up-to-date weaponry (and white leader) are no match for Tanya, standing for ancient superstition - and thus indigenous tradition. Consequently, Tanya wages numerous battles in shopping malls, where the vacuous shoppers are as disposable as the goods they fawn after. Instead of having them caught in the crossfire, director Jalil takes a major detour from the proper TERMINATOR as she deliberately blasts as many as possible.

This tendency for filmmakers to veil concern beneath exploitation has precedents, especially in the silat (martial arts) films starring Barry Prima, in which villains were made of the Dutch, who had occupied the country until 1949. Despite this confrontational tradition of film culture, LADY TERMINATOR's ideas never come close to making it a richer experience. It's awfully drab, and the allegory doesn't help. Tanya's immunity to guns allows for overextended scenes in which armed-to-the-teeth police try and fill her full of holes - all to no avail. Lacking zeal, it quickly becomes tedious. The repetitive tune could have used some kind of variety, especially when the undistinguished shooters come in droves during multiple set-pieces.

The various TERMINATOR rehashes are just awful. If the scenes in which Tanya steals some leathers oddly prefigures TERMINATOR 3, the disco attack, assault on the police station, and the eye damage are not only blatant rip-offs, but also lack TERMINATOR's pace, economy or gritty noir-tinged style and simply serve as brief intervals between ketchup cock sex. Lit in high key and soft focus, the film is mediated through a bleary and disorganized haze - like opening dry eyes in the morning. As McNeil, Christopher J. Hart has the appeal of a shop dummy, although this appears to be a deliberate 'alienation effect' considering the preposterous dialogue he comes out with, but the husky, muscular-faced Constable makes Tanya look appropriately hungry and lascivious: If you can get over the perm.

The film, however patchy, is given a slick transfer by the ever committed Mondo Macabro, and the extras are pretty useful. The essay by exotic horror expert Pete Tombs puts everything in context - as does the documentary on Indian cinema, which shows us tantalising images of films like MYSTICS IN BALI, as well as actor Barry Prima's work. Prima, hilariously, admits "I never made a good film", and director Jalil is also present. The alternative scenes add clothing to various nude scenes - used to present the film to the censor, but then changed afterward for original theatrical exhibition.

Review by Matthew Sanderson

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