Enter the Video Store: Video Vengeance

Nostalgia is the enemy of objectivity. Most of the movies that crowded video-store aisles in the late ’80s and early ’90s were not lost masterpieces, no matter how much we want them to be. They were spur of the moment rentals sold on a lurid box cover and forgotten as soon as the tape was rewound. But junk has its own archaeology. And Arrow's Enter the Video Store: Video Vengeance box set gathers five artifacts from the twilight of the VHS era, when a recognizable face, two explosions and a vaguely tough-sounding title could still get a movie onto the shelf. Not all of them hold up. A couple barely held together in the first place. But each has enough sunburned location work, oddball casting and misplaced ambition to earn its spot in the weird little time capsule.

Ministry of Vengeance (1989) stars John Schneider (yep…Bo Duke of The Dukes of Hazzard) as a former Marine turned peaceful minister whose family is murdered by terrorists, sending him on a holy-war revenge spree. Peter Maris directs it like a made-for-cable Death Wish with some Bible verses tossed in for good measure, while Ned Beatty, George Kennedy, Yaphet Kotto, James Tolkan and Apollonia drift through wondering how their careers have come to this. It’s the one title in the collection that runs out of gas before it even starts. In fact, Schneider is so lifeless he makes the “Hoff” seem like a master thespian.

Speaking of which, in The Final Alliance (1990) David Hasselhoff plays a mysterious drifter who rolls into a small town with a pet puma and some unresolved family trauma. That’s right, the movie asks its audience to accept Hasselhoff as a haunted, taciturn loner up against a gang of rowdy bikers led by an albino John Saxon. And damn, if it doesn’t mostly work! With some old school stunts and a dusty small town backdrop (South Africa stands in for Texas), director Mario DiLeo’s ballsy little action picture keeps circling back to the same glorious question: who thought “Hasselhoff + bikers + puma” needed to be made...and why weren’t there three more?

No amount of affection can turn R.O.T.O.R. (1987) into a good movie, but it has long since graduated into something more valuable: a genuinely baffling POS that corrupts the cerebellum of everyone who sees it. This is a bargain-bin Robocop with all the ominous weight Paul Blart: Mall Cop. Full of flat Texas locations, dead-serious dialogue and a bad guy that looks like an extra from Cheers, nobody involved in the production appears to be kidding (except for the fact that all their voices are disguised by bad dubbing). And that’s why it works as a one of the most blatant examples of cinematic self-masochism.

Hangfire (1991) is the sort of grimy, overstuffed action movie that could only have come from the early ’90s: an escaped-convict siege picture with Brad Davis (Midnight Express) as the sheriff, Kim Delaney as his kidnapped wife and Ken Foree as his Vietnam buddy. George Kennedy, Yaphet Kotto and James Tolkan (again!) are joined by Lou Ferrigno, Lyle Alzado and Jan-Michael Vincent who wander around the set apparently drawn by the smell of gunfire and a bitchin’ craft services table. It’s not exactly tense, but it’s also never dull. How could it be with a cast list reads a TV guide crossword puzzle.

The real prize here is Joshua Tree (1993), a lean, sun-bleached fugitive-on-the-run thriller that gives Dolph Lundgren one of his best vehicles….literally. Framed for murder, he breaks loose, takes a cop hostage and tears through the California desert in a stolen Ferrari while corrupt cops close in. Director Vic Armstrong, a veteran stunt coordinator making his feature debut, understands the assignment: keep the cars moving and point the camera at Dolph like he’s a Scandinavian sculpture carved from granite. It borrows shamelessly from The Getaway and assorted Hong Kong gunplay, but it does so with enough speed, smoke and shiny red sports cars to make the theft feel like a compliment.

Arrow puts real effort into the package, which is their second volume in the Enter the Video Store franchise. This one comes with newly commissioned slipcase art, reversible sleeves with original video-era artwork, and a perfect-bound book of new essays and archival material. Four films receive fresh 2K restorations from 35mm materials, while R.O.T.O.R. gets Arrow’s own HD cleanup.

The extras focus on the people who were actually there. New interviews with John Schneider, Ken Foree, Bill Blair and director Vic Armstrong are joined by commentaries on every film, a direct-to-video history piece and a look at the Vietnam-vet action cycle. Joshua Tree includes both the R-rated and unrated cuts, plus an alternate ending and Armstrong’s archival commentary.

But best of all, R.O.T.O.R. throws in the bonus feature Interzone (1987), a Road Warrior-inspired Italian lensed sci-fi kerfuffle that star Re-Animator’s Bruce Abbott as an unlikely tough guy tasked with saving the world. It’s probably the second-best film in the set, but is only presented in standard-def due to the original negative going MIA.