The New Barbarians/I nuovi barbari/Warriors of the Wasteland (1983)

‘Books, that’s what started this whole apocalypse.’

The year is 2019, and in the aftermath of nuclear war, a group of savage raiders known as the Templars carry out a holy war to exterminate what is left of humanity. A lone drifter is reluctant to become involved but circmstances conspire to force him to join in the fight against them…

Post Apocalyptic action from Italian filmmaker Enzo G Castellari. Following in Mad Max’s tyre tracks is Giancarlo Prete (billed as Timothy Brent), who gets an assist from Fred ‘The Hammer’ Williamson in his fight against the barbarian hordes led by George Eastman.

The world has ended in nuclear war, and the barren wasteland that remains is a harsh mistress. A band of peaceful nomads led by Father Moses (Venantino Venantini) is searching for other pockets of humanity, hoping they can start over somehow. However, they are soon targeted by the white-suited Templars, led by One (Eastman), who plans to purge the Earth by wiping out all survivors. Fortunately, his arch-enemy Scorpion (Prete) has other ideas and the technology to back his play in the form of a pimped-out, hi-tech Pontiac Firebird.

Prete becomes directly involved by saving the beautiful Alma (Anna Kanakis) when Eastman’s goons run her truck off the road. Then the Templars attack Venantini’s peaceful group, slaughtering many of its members, and Prete realises that he can no longer remain on the sidelines. He forms a reluctant partnership with old adversary, warrior Nadir (Williamson) and gets a vehicle and weaponry upgrade, courtesy of boy genius Giovanni Frezza. The unlikely trio suit up for a final showdown with the Templars.

‘Mad Max 2/The Road Warrior’ (1981) finally reached Italian shores in August 1982, and by then, it was already well on its way to becoming a global box office phenomenon. Castellari was filming ‘1990: The Bronx Warriors/1990: I guerrieri del Bronx’ (1982) when producer Fabrizio De Angelis approached him with an idea for a post-nuke adventure based on the same template. He had already sold the distribution rights. Castellari jumped on board, and by November, they were filming, with the results reaching Italian theatres the following Spring.

Given the short period between conception and delivery, it’s perhaps not entirely surprising that the finished results are a little undercooked in some departments. Miller’s original film may not have had a dense plot, but it’s a labyrinth of story development compared to Castellari’s film. This is not much more than a series of action scenes loosely strung together with the bare minimum of justification. Eastman and his disciples are bad dudes who like to kill, and Prete and Williamson don’t like them very much. That’s about it. The three of them all have a history with each other, apparently, which prompts Prete’s distrust of Williamson and their mutual antagonism to Eastman. However, the script doesn’t concern itself with anything as troublesome as the details.

There are other characters, of course, but most are purely incidental. Kanakis and Williamson’s girl, Vinya (Iris Peynado), bring the beauty but serve little other purpose. Boy genius Frezza is potentially the most interesting character, but, again, we discover nothing about him, and he’s under-used despite his participation in the climax. Things are a little livelier in the Templar’s camp, with the hot-headed, purple Mohican-topped Mako (Massimo Vanni) keen to relieve Eastman of his leadership responsibilities. Eastman’s lieutenant, Shadow (the charismatic Ennio Girolami), also sports one of the finest wigs in the history of science-fiction cinema. It looks a little ridiculous, of course, but seems right at home in a group whose fashion tastes run to white jumpsuits tailored with bondage accessories and American Football shoulder pads. It’s also worth celebrating Williamson’s outfit, and the sartorial elegance spreads to Prete’s sheepskin jacket and his body amour at the climax, which was an obvious nod to Sergio Leone’s ‘A Fistful of Dollars/Per un pugno di dollari’ (1964).

All this is kind of irrelevant, though, because a film like this lives and dies by its action scenes. Unfortunately, it’s obvious that Castellari was restricted by a lack of financial resources. As some more unkind commentators have pointed out, the Templars seemed to be riding around in golf carts with a top speed barely exceeding that of a perambulating snail. These not-so-hot rods are also tricked out with some nifty optional extras, including flamethrowers, missile launchers, spinning decapitation blades and a rotating pointy thing that’s probably better not discussed. The guns were bought in a toy store, and the sound FX accompanying their use doesn’t help sell their deadly effect. Still, it’s nice to know that some local hardware store made a killing when the property master came shopping for silver paint.

There is some motorbike action, but Castellari decided to present most of the stunts as slow-motion cutaways. This artistic choice was possibly inspired by Sam Peckinpah’s signature editing technique on ‘The Wild Bunch’ (1969), but, more likely, it was an effort to cover up their lack of spectacle. Castellari employs some clever sleight of hand at times, but it’s a losing battle, and the lack of production value shows through, reducing the drama to a small-scale skirmish rather than the high stakes that it needs to possess. ‘Mad Max 2/The Road Warrior’ (1981) delivered its action at a high, pulse-pounding speed, and it felt like the future of humanity was up for grabs. By contrast, Castellari’s film looks agonisingly slow, although its quirky and slightly outlandish design touches compensate somewhat for its shortcomings. In fact, if you can embrace the low-fi nature of the enterprise, there’s quite a lot of fun on offer. The film does have a cult following, and it’s not hard to see why.

One red flag for some members of a modern audience will be its identification of the Templars as a group of gay men. It’s never explicitly acknowledged early on, although one escaping man is speared from behind by that rotating attachment on Eastman’s vehicle. It’s after Prete is captured and forced to bend over by an arrangement of chains and a neck brace that it becomes obvious. Nothing is shown, of course, but Eastman’s intentions are plain, and he refers to it as if it were a ritual initiation to the group. The sequence seems a little out of place in these more enlightened times and doesn’t add anything valuable to the film.

As was often the case at this point in Castellari’s career, several close family members get some screen time, most prominently Girolami, his elder brother by three years, and cousin Vanni, who is wonderfully deranged as the power-hungry Mako. There’s also teenage son Andrea Girolami, who has a couple of lines as one of Father Moses’ group, and daughter Stefania, who plays their radio operator. She’d already appeared as the heroine in ‘1990: The Bronx Warriors/1990: I guerrieri del Bronx’ (1982).

Castellari was born in Rome in 1938, the son of filmmaker Marino Girolami. Starting with small jobs on his father’s film sets, he graduated to directing on the Spaghetti Western ‘A Few Dollars for Django/Pochi dollari per Django’ (1966) when his father, who was producing the picture, fell out with director León Klimovsky. Castellari stayed out West for most of his projects in the remainder of the decade but began exploring other genres in the 1970s. Disappointing Giallo ‘Cold Eyes of Fear/Gli occhi freddi della paura’ (1971) gave way to the far more accomplished crime drama ‘High Crime/La polizia incrimina la legge assolve’ (1973), which began his working relationship with Franco Nero. Further collaborations with the star followed, although his most celebrated film of the decade was the war drama ‘The Inglorious Bastards/Quel maledetto treno blindato’ (1978). The arrival of the home video rental market in the early 1980s gave the Italian film industry a much-needed shot in the arm, and Castellari responded with a slate of films across most popular genres, although he chose to pass on horror films. He began working more sporadically in the 1990s before taking his last bow with the little seen ‘Caribbean Basterds’ (2013).

There’s no universe in which this could be described as a good movie, but it’s certainly enjoyable if you approach it in the right spirit.