Bullet Points: The Last Riders
A few years back I watched and reviewed Repo Jake, a movie that I likened to the bottom of the PM Entertainment barrel.. well I was wrong, because I know realize there was another layer underneath Repo Jake and it contained 1992’s The Last Riders…
- Birds of a Feather: For all its faults, The Last Riders may have one of the best opening credit sequences in PM Entertainment history, especially if you are fan of the Magnificent Mimi Lesseos. Mimi, who plays Feather, is making her way down the Venice Beach Boardwalk in an itsy bitsy, teeny weeny, canary yellow, thong bikini. Her mission, to deliver some drugs from her dirty cop boyfriend to a couple of bikers from The Slavers… but one look at Feather and the bikers have more on their minds than a simple cash for cocaine transaction. This leads to the bikini clad Feather delivering a flying dropkick and opening up two cans of whoop ass on her male foes. When the smoke clears, Feather leaves with the coke and the cash and hits the best line in the entire movie, “You guys wanted to get fucked… well you just did!”
- A Slaver to his Job: Jake (Addison Randall, Chance) was one of the two guys that got his ass beat by Feather, he was also the one in charge of making the exchange happen, so rightfully so he’s the one who is paying the price for the major screw up at the hands of Slaver top dog, Rico (Angelo Tiffe, Sword of Honor). Things aren’t looking good for Jake, when the other senior member of the Salvers, Johnny (Erik Estrada, Light Blast), steps in and says he’ll make things right. So Johnny and Jake track down Feather at her boyfriend’s home and the end result is Jake, Feather and her boyfriend all end up DEAD… and it is only after Johnny shot Feather’s boyfriend that he looked around and realized the dude was with the LAPD! Johnny needs to get the hell out of town…
- Hammer Time: Johnny’s initial plan is to drive up to Canada to start a new life in a new country. But Johnny decides to stop in a little town on the way to visit his old friend Hammer (William Smith, L.A. Vice). Hammer convinces Johnny to start his new life in his sleepy little town, working for him at his garage and renting a trailer that’s #1 feature is that the roof doesn’t leak. Maybe it was Hammer’s gruff and commanding voice or maybe Johnny didn’t really want to go to Canada in the first place, but Johnny agrees and the next day he begins his new life as a mechanic and that’s when he meets her…
- Love Not At First Sight: Anna (Kathrin Lautner, Hologram Man) is a recently divorced woman traveling with her daughter Samantha to start a new life in Phoenix, when her car breaks down. A frustrated Anna wants Johnny to fix her car ASAP and thinks he is the stereotypical mechanic looking to take advantage of a naïve customer… Johnny shoots straight with her, but she doesn’t want to hear it. Johnny fills her oil and sends her on her way… even though he knows full well that car is not making it to Arizona. As Johnny makes his way home to his non-leaky roof trailer, he sees Anna and Sam broken down on the side of the road… which leads to Johnny offering up his extra bedroom to Anna and Sam, which leads to an eventual double date with Hammer and his lady Sheila… which leads to Johnny and Anna going to Vegas and splurging on the deluxe wedding package.
- Doing Him Dirty: The dirty cop that Johnny killed in self defense that caused him to go on the run had an equally dirty partner named Davis, who is looking to avenge the death of his dirty cop friend. So Davis leaks information to Johnny’s old Slaver buddy Rico that Johnny got busted and ratted on The Slavers to save his own ass. Rico is PISSED so he sends some of The Slavers to kill the rat. Some Slavers show up in the dark of knight and shoot up Johnny’s trailer killing Anna and Samantha in the process… in lieu of funeral arrangements Johnny covers the trailer in gasoline and lights in on fire, watching it burn with Hammer until it explodes. Rest in Pieces Anna and Sam…
- One Last Ride: Now Johnny is pissed and it is time to get revenge on The Slavers and he does so montage style with the musical stylings of The Sheilas and their song “Walking to the Beat of a Drum” playing. Johnny takes out Slavers in a variety of ways, but my favorite would probably be where he threw one of them off a roof. But Johnny doesn’t come out of his revenge tour unscathed as he is stabbed during one of his encounters. Fortunately Johnny gets some help from Mitsy, a waitress at a bar that The Slavers often frequented. Mitsy stashes Johnny at her place while he recovers, because there is still one Slaver left for Johnny to confront… Rico. But we never really get that confrontation, instead Mitsy goes to Rico and tells him Johnny didn’t rat and just like that, we see Rico blow up dirty cop Davis, have a bit of a stare down with Johnny with both men on their bikes before riding off in different directions and the movie was over.
I had so many questions after watching The Last Ride… why didn’t Rico try to get Johnny’s side of the story before sending men to kill him? Didn’t he at least owe him that after all they had been through? And even if he was convinced that Johnny did betray him, why not handle that vendetta himself? Plus… how are you going to have a PM Entertainment movie about a motorcycle gang and not have at least one crazy ass scene involving motorcycle mayhem? Where was Spiro Razatos? That would be like having a Chris The Brain review on this site without some Bonus Bullet Points…
- Should Have Been a Deleted Scene: There is a lengthy scene early on of Mimi in her more natural habitat, a wrestling ring, taking on a man while her boyfriend coached and refereed from ringside. The scene really served no purpose to the story and maybe things wouldn’t have had to wrap up so abruptly if things like this were taken out.
- If You Ever: …wanted to see Erik Estrada go grocery shopping, then The Last Riders is the movie for you.
- This Quote Didn’t Age Well: “I wouldn’t lay a loudmouth woman like you if you were the last person on the face of the Earth!” – Johnny to his future wife Anna
- The Bar Rule: Remember that double date I mentioned earlier, well Hammer made sure the bar fight rule was observed when some guys foolishly step up to him and he kicks their asses, while Johnny, Anna and Hammer’s old lady Sheila look on with delight.
