Digital Man: The greatest B-movie of all time?

The blog has now redirected its focus onto movies that are not generally appreciated in the public eye. Whilst we still might consider some geeky blockbusters, we're now looking mainly at B-movies and genre stuff that most people would consider somewhat... "crap"....

To begin this, what better film could we choose than what could be the greatest B-movie of all time: Digital Man.


So just what is so awesome about this movie? Well, it wants to be Terminator... and Aliens... and Robocop... and Universal Soldier... and Predator... and Tremors... All at the same time...

A top-secret, prototype super cyborg - and that's cyborg in the Terminator sense, a robot with organic parts - codenamed Digital Man (coz his face has two expressions: mouth open and mouth shut, arf...), goes AWOL after a terrorist-whacking mission. The marines from Aliens are sent after him. We have Hicks and Vasquez, just with emo quiffs; a red-head Ripley; a black Hudson; and... a Samoan horror-film fan for some reason... The team track their target to a redneck town with a population of 20, only to suddenly remember that the Digital Man is a top-secret, prototype super cyborg and all die quite rapidly.

Meanwhile, back at base, Adam Baldwin from Serenity uncovers the world's least-secret conspiracy and the reason Digital Man (who looks a little like a giant, Swedish Pete Postlethwaite, by the way) went haywire. You may think that this has something to do with Digi becoming self aware and spouting a sob story, but no, not that kind of movie. Instead it's some irrelevant guff about nuclear launch codes. This leaves him free to go on a wonderful slaughter spree with a really big gun.

There is some surprising depth though. As each of the Aliens cast is picked off, one-by-one, they are revealed to be cyborgs themselves, bringing into doubt whether the rest are what they claim to be, or if they'd even know if they weren't.

Equally, there is some not-completely-rubbish acting. Emo-fringe Hicks once played Picard's fake son in Star Trek, and he's not bad. Nor is Red-head Ripley. You'll also find a few faces you recognise but just can't place. Yes, that is Patrick Swayze's younger brother, and his topless girlfriend is Leeta from Deep Space Nine. Meanwhile, Digi himself filled out a few villain costumes in Power Rangers.

There's also some half-decent dialogue - such gems as: "he can't even afford to pay attention" and "Malfunctioning?! I'd hate to see something you thought was really screwed up!"

Still, have no fear, this is our kind of movie. Many things explode, the effects look like the cut scenes from an Atari 64 game and there is not one original idea. The giant guns are Bazookoids from Red Dwarf, the dying cyborgs act like Rutger Hauer in Bladerunner and Digi himself looks like a UniSol in Robocop armour that he takes off when his gun malfunctions for a mano e mano showdown at the end like Predator.

Ultimately, this is never going to win any awards, but you come out of the film with a certain respect for it and a smile on your face. You'll learn that you should spare five minutes of your time to mourn your dead cyborg friends before heading off to get jiggy with your girlfriend, that you should never trust rednecks and, most of all, that fancy kicking sh*t doesn't work.

Digital Man is still quite rare, but is now available through LoveFILM, so if you look around you should be able to find it elsewhere too.