Bullet Points: The Stabilizer (1986)
When someone needs terminated, you call The Terminator.
When something needs equalized, you call The Equalizer.
When someone needs exterminated, you call The Exterminator.
And when something needs stabilized, you call The Stabilizer.
- Hot Open: Professor Provost is in his laboratory when he gets some unexpected guests by way of a dude driving his motorcycle through the lab’s window! The Professor’s former assistant, Victor , then makes his presence felt, as he orders his goons to trash the Professor’s lab. Victor is looking for a secret formula AND a narcotics detector that the Professor developed. The Professor is not cooperative at all and he even attempts to fight them off… that doesn’t turn out to well for him Victor threatens to blow up the Professor’s lab if he doesn’t give him what he wants. Moments later when the Professor’s daughter, Christina Provost, and Captain Johnny, a detective wanting to speak to the Professor, show up at the front gate, the lab blows up! Things just got unstable!
- Welcome to Jakarta: As I mentioned in the introduction, when things need stabilized, it’s best to call The Stabilizer and that’s exactly what Johnny does! The Stabilizer makes his way to Jakarta and Captain Johnny is at the airport to pick him up. The Stabilizer is Peter Goldson (Peter O’Brian, The Intruder) a cop from the United States, who earned the nickname of The Stabilizer thanks to his ability to restore the balance of good and evil. Accompanying Peter on this mission is his partner, Sylvia. The car full of cops almost immediately find themselves in danger as they are being tailed… which leads to a car chase featuring more than one vehicle ending up in the drink!
- Make it Rain: Victor works for a man by the name of Greg Rainmaker, the head of the Golden Triangle cartel. We learn that Rainmaker has a past with Peter Goldson. Rainmaker and his spiked shoes killed Peter’s bride-to-be seven years earlier, so to say there’s a grudge between the two would be an understatement. It’s no wonder that Rainmaker has his minions trying to eliminate Peter before Peter can find him. The car chase was the first attempt. The second attempt takes place at a nightclub, where Johnny has taken Peter and Sylvia to enjoy some drinks and applause worthy live entertainment… that is until one of the entertainers goes after Peter! Peter survives the nightclub, but it isn’t long before Peter and Johnny fall into another Rainmaker trap and find themselves captured and taken to Victor. But before Victor can shoot them, the two cops get some unexpected help from Christina Provost and her archery skills! We learn that the reason Victor is the former assistant of Christina’s father, was because Victor tried to rape Christina! With enemies in common, it only makes sense to have Christina join forces with Peter, Johnny and Sylvia. This also opens the door for some Peter/Christina and Johnny/Sylvia romance.
- Rescue Mission: It turns out that Victor kidnapped Professor Provost before his lab blew up at the start of the movie. Our heroes believe that Victor is holding the Professor at one of the Golden Triangle’s drug labs, so they decided to crash it… literally. Peter drives a motorcycle right through the wall of the drug lab, which kicks off one of the most entertaining fight scenes in recent memory. Before it is all said and done, Sylvia, Christina and Johnny get in the mix… Johnny even gets a flamethrower! Peter rescues a worse for wear Professor Provost from the basement of the drug lab, and while he doesn’t end up making it, the Professor does get a chance to tell Christina he loves her before he passes on to the afterlife. It isn’t long before our heroes have to go on another rescue mission, because Benny, one of Rainmaker’s other minions, orchestrates the abduction of Christina!
- Performance Review: Rainmaker doesn’t let the fact that Benny did one thing right cancel out all the times that Benny has failed him…. so Rainmaker has his other minions beat the crap out of Benny and send him on his way… A beaten up Benny then finds Captain Johnny, Peter and Sylvia and he’s ready to flip on his former employer. Benny spills the beans on the location Rainmaker’s island headquarters, but does warn our heroes that Rainmaker is expecting them. Do you think The Stabilizer gives two shits if Rainmaker is expecting him!?!? The trio of Johnny, Peter, Sylvia get their scuba gear, hop in a boat and make their way to Rainmaker Island… and just like Benny said, Rainmaker and his minions are waiting, shooting torpedoes and bullets at the trio… eventually forcing them to bail out and do some scuba diving before they make it ashore. It’s not long before they find a woman tied up with a bomb around her neck The woman is Nora, Rainmaker’s former main squeeze. Nora is more than happy to help our heroes take down Rainmaker, Victor and the rest of the Golden Triangle. Lead the way Nora…
- Here We Go Again: Peter ends up driving through a wall once again, this time in a truck, which surprises the enemy forces and things are looking up for the forces of good. That is until, Rainmaker and Victor show up and capture Peter, Nora and Johnny (where’s Sylvia?!?!). In classic bad guy fashion, instead of just shooting the good guys, Rainmaker has them tied up and then has his minions pour gasoline all around them… he’s going to burn them alive. And not wanting to die in the fire themselves, the baddies leave and figure nature will take its course… which opens the door for Johnny to cut the ropes, freeing himself, Nora and Peter. Then Sylvia drives a forklift through the wall to save her friends… This leads to a big shootout, Nora hunting down Victor with Christina getting involved, dirt bikes aplenty, Peter putting on one of Rainmaker’s spiked shoes and looking to pay Rainmaker back for what he did seven years ago… and finally Rainmaker attempting to escape via helicopter, only for Peter to go into full Stabilizer mode, dirt bike jump up the helicopter’s skids and proceed to blow the chopper out of the sky!
Moments after The Stabilizer concluded, I found myself wanting to e-mail Vinegar Syndrome, so I could beg them to release a Peter O’Brian box set featuring 1986’s The Stabilizer, 1986’s The Intruder and even though I have yet to see it, 1989’s Double Crosser too!
Much like The Intruder did many years ago when I first experienced it, The Stabilizer brought me so much joy. I felt euphoric while watching the madness unfold on my television screen. The action, the characters, the dialogue… every bit of this movie entertained me. I can’t praise this movie enough.
Let’s balance this review out with some Bonus Bullet Points…
- Words of Wisdom: “Dying isn’t much of a living.” – Peter Goldson
- Bastard Count: There were a total of 12 “bastards” in The Stabilizer.
- If You Ever: …wanted to see a movie make the most out of 55 gallon drums, then The Stabilizer is the movie for you. Peter and Johnny stash numerous bad guys into the drums, they use a drum in the back of a truck to interrogate another bad guy, and they even hop in the drums themselves in order to make it out of a ring of fire!
- Extreme Quote: “Your father will cry in hell, seeing me fucking you in front of everyone!” – Victor
