Review of Rush

Rush (1983)
4/10
I think I managed to endure it with minimal brain damage...
20 May 2000
...or not. This is one of Italy's worst post-nuke flicks, even worse than EXTERMINATORS OF THE YEAR 3000. Charisma-free hero Conrad Nichols prances around the desert killing and killing and killing gas mask wearing soldiers without end. In the end, his climactic battle with Gordon Mitchell (TEN COMMANDMENTS) atop an oil refinery is made laughable because Mitchell stunt double doesn't even attempt to hide his true identity! All this to the tune of Francesco De Masi's great music, which was shamelessly plundered from ESCAPE FROM THE BRONX and THE NEW YORK RIPPER. Plotless, pointless, boring... lots of action but it's all done quite badly, I doubt if Tonino Ricci ever actually showed up to any of the filming days, or if he did, he just gave his crew free reign. Giovanni Bergamini's camerawork is pretty good and Vincenzo Tomassi's editing is top-notch (as usual), but there's nothing to hold it all together aside from Tito Carpi's quickie script. A truly lame movie that won't do much for you unless you're a hard-core fan of Italian post-nuke action, though here it's even more cheesy and pointless than usual. See ESCAPE FROM THE BRONX or AFTER THE FALL OF NEW YORK instead.

Conrad Nichols became the leading man in almost every subsequent film directed by Ricci, probably just because he had more than a stunning resemblance to more famous musclehead Italian action star Mark Gregory (who last I heard works in a pizza restaraunt in Rome). Lord only knows where Nichols is now... (probably a night-stocker at K-mart)
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