What Not To Watch: Maximum Breakout
The premise of 1991’s Maximum Breakout was bursting with promise… a guy and his ex-con best friend form a posse that includes a computer nerd who likes to blow things up, a gun nut and a Hollywood stuntman to track down and rescue the guy’s girlfriend who was kidnapped and is being held at a ranch where women are impregnated by force and their babies sold to couples with fertility issues.
The cover of Maximum Breakout was equally intriguing. With a damsel in distress covered by the image of a brick wall with the opacity turned way down and then a hero that looked like he could have graduated magna cum laude from the Deron McBee School of Acting, the cheese level of this cover made me glad I don’t suffer from lactose intolerance. But it was that cheese factor that made me think I was in for another “classic” à la Young Rebels or The Intruder.
After reading the synopsis and soaking in the cover my anticipation for the movie was really building… and then I go and spoil it all by doing something stupid like hitting play…
- We’re on the Highway to Hell: As the movie begins the movie’s main character Travis (Bobby Johnston) and his girlfriend Bobbi (Sydney Coale) are driving along a back road on their way to a romantic getaway but the two can’t decide on what radio station to listen to. Who doesn’t want to be present when a couple is fighting? And in this case what is there to even fight about!? Everyone knows the driver ALWAYS controls the radio. The bickering comes to a halt as Travis and Bobbi drive up on the scene of a motorcycle accident… Travis gets out to help the fallen rider and tells Bobbi to get the first aid kit out of the back of the SUV, but that is when a goon in hiding grabs Bobbi but before Travis can save her, the fallen motorcyclist gets up and starts kicking Travis’ ass to the point he is knocked out. Bobbi is then drugged and taken away… when the bloody and beaten Travis comes to he finds himself alone on the road (they even took his SUV) crying and screaming repeatedly for Bobbi.
- Six Months Later: The police have all but given up on their investigation on Bobbi’s abduction. Bobbi’s parents are starting to come to terms with the fact that their daughter is more than likely dead. Travis however refuses to give up on the love of his life. But what can one man do that the police and private investigators could not?! That is about the time Travis’ buddy Reb shows up fresh out of his stint in prison. Reb tells Travis he can round up a posse and together they can take justice into their own hands and get Bobbi back. Reb was played by Eddie Hopper, which is ironic because after watching him act for the first (and last) time, it felt like this movie (which was already circling the drain at this point) had officially been flushed down the hopper. But shit got even worse when we meet the Professor. The Professor was played by Martin L. Keegan. I would like to point out that Keegan was a special kind of bad so it was no surprise to me that, like Eddie Hopper, this was Keegan’s first and last movie role. Bad acting aside, the character is named the Professor because he is supposed to be a computer nerd… the problem with the execution of this character is he never actually has a computer (nor was he actually executed). The Professor has a monitor and a keyboard but it is connected to NOTHING! When we are first introduced to the Professor he is sitting out in his yard at a table with the monitor and keyboard on it. The Professor is hitting random keys on the keyboard and explosions are going off all over his yard. Ctrl, Alt, Go Fuck Yourself Professor! I am all for suspending my disbelief when I go into a movie but this was just asinine. But I digress… The posse is rounded out by the gun nut named Loch (played by Tom Branton who obviously watched a lot of Conrad Dunn in Stripes while preparing for the role) and Suicide, the Hollywood stuntman (played by Steve Rally of Playgirl and Overkill infamy).
- Worst Montage Ever: How do you screw up a montage?!? I have seen some awful, awful movies yet many of them still had a watchable montage, because it is almost impossible to screw up a montage… almost but not quite said Maximum Breakout. The montage in Maximum Breakout focuses on Travis trying to fall asleep under the stars one night as he and the posse get closer to finding the ranch where Bobbi is being held captive. At the same time we see Bobbi lying in bed, crying her eyes out. Both Bobbi and Travis are listening to the same radio station, listening to the same stupid song and the same annoying overnight disc jockey. The music causes them to remember “happier times” as we go into flashbacks featuring Bobbi and Travis arguing (for those of us who longed for the opening scene of them bickering over the radio). Why is the first memory to pop into their respective heads of them arguing?!?! Both arguments lead to sex, where we never see full on nudity from Bobbi but Travis’ ass is out there for the world to see. His willingness to take part in love making scenes and do rear male nudity could be why Bobby Johnston made the jump from action movies to soft core Skinemax flicks like I Like to Play Games Too, Sinful Intrigue and Body Strokes. I am not sure if I was more disturbed by Bobbi and Travis’ obvious addiction to make up sex or the shots of Bobbi’s crying face that were interspersed through out the entire montage.
Maximum Breakout hit the maximum level when it came to bad acting, bad storytelling and bad action.
Maximum Breakout hit the minimum level when it came to quality villains, heroic characters the viewer could get behind and enjoyment.
Now to maximize this review, allow me to present some Bonus Bullet Points…
- Pride Before the Fall: Bobbi’s parents were rather well off, so Travis visits Bobbi’s father and asks him can offer any reward money for the guys helping get Bobbi back. He agrees but the whole time that Travis and Bobbi’s father are talking, you can hear Bobbi’s mom (who had suffered a nervous breakdown due to the stress of Bobbi’s disappearance) shouting nonsensical things off camera. They were the type of lines that I’m sure the writer of the movie thought were absolutely hilarious. The only thing that writer, Tracy Lynch Britton (who also directed the film) may have been more proud of was the embellished bullshit of a bio she wrote for herself on IMDb.
- Stupid Villains: Some of the hired help at the ranch prove they aren’t the sharpest tools in the shed when they mispronounce filet mignon and don’t know the meaning of the word decimate.
- Skid Marks: At one point Travis and the gang do a little play acting in order to get some low level hood to spill the beans on what he knows about the impregnation ranch. This scene ends with the guys making the sad sack strip down to his tighty whities while they hoot and holler and comment on the stains on the man’s underwear. After they send the poor sap on his way, Suicide quips that they should all get Academy Awards for their performances. He is the one and only person who ever felt that way I’m sure.
- Spoiler Alert: For those wondering if Bobbi and Travis reunite at the end of the film, they do. And we get two big reveals… #1, It was Bobbi’s best friend Debbie who was running the ranch and who set Bobbi up so she could have Travis for herself. #2, Bobbi was already pregnant with Travis’ baby when she was abducted but she was too scared to tell him.
