Gli Sterminatori dell'Anno 3000 (A.K.A. Exterminators of the Year 3000) (1983)

After a long break from watching anything, it was time for me to go for another post-apocalyptict one. From where else than Italy of course! 

The year 3000, after a nuclear war turned the earth into a desert. A group of survivors in a cave runs out of water and desperately need new supply. The last guy they sent out didn't return. His 10 years old son Timmy wants to join the next team. They know where they'll find a well, but the problem it the way there, which is controlled by a savage gang of motorcyclists under the bloodthirsty Crazy Bull. A lonesome stranger who Timmy meets on the way may help.

Exterminators of the Year 3000 starts off very promising. There is nothing more charming in cinema world than two dusty, rusty, armored oldtimers racing against each other in the middle of a desert. I believe scenes like that can't be made today with the same charm as these post-apocalyptic movies had. Even Tarantino couldn't.

After the chasescene the movie calms down for a bit to explain the simple, but for these kind of movies acceptable, story. It appears a community that's living in the desert has just run out of their last water. They send out a team to search for more water to keep everyone in the community alive.

These ''raiders for hidden water'' get slaughtered quickly by a gang of bandits that's led by our main villain ''Crazy Bull''. Like in many other of these post-apocalyptic movies the main villain is dressed up crazily over the top, featuring eye makeup, creepy ponytail a lot of feather-clothing. A bit too much for me. We also get introduced to the group who's gonna take over and continue with the task to find the water. The leader of this group is Alien, the typical bad-ass with sun-browned skin, unshaven face and a hundred and one tactics to kill an enemy. Robert Iannucci does a decent job portraying this hard bastard and it's quite strange that he only featured in 3 movies throughout his career. Especially because most actors who featured in a movie like this once, would stick around and never leave this (sub)genre. An unfortunate thing about the character Alien is that he does seem WAY too egocentric to really be a likeable person. The rest of the group consists of the old Papillon (decent role by Luciano Pigozzi), 10-year old Tommy (not a fan of kids in movies, the same for this one) and bad-ass wasteland chick Trash, portrayed by Alicia Moro, who is not only beautiful but also does a good job as the more likeable part of the fighting duo ''Alien-Trash''.

Exterminators of the Year 3000 certainly isn't oscar worthy but is IS down right entertaining as hell. The chase and stuntscenes (although there are many of 'em) never get boring and the 80's vibe is so obvious you can almost touch it. Add to that a great theme and some bad-ass cars and you've got yourself a night of pure Italian post-apocalyptic fun. The ending is a bit too simple, even for the standards of a movie like this, but that doesn't take away that's it's great entertainment.